Memorizing the Fa

(Minghui.org) I was in the prime of life and making the most of society’s offerings. However, it led me into a moral decline, and it was difficult to extricate myself from it. Luckily, Buddha nature was rooted deeply in my bones. Besides, I was continually asking questions about life and the universe. It was on that contradictory and intricate journey that I came across Falun Dafa, learned about the true meaning of life, and embarked on the path of cultivation. I experienced that in 2012, after I had graduated from college.

I am extremely grateful for Master’s meticulous arrangements. Master pulled me out from hell and provided me with a diligent cultivation environment immediately – right from the start of my cultivation. I was surrounded by veteran practitioners who had been cultivating for years. They woke up early and stayed up late, engaging in the three things every day. I could feel a very strong energy field, and each day I was bathing in a state of holiness and purity.

I’d like to share the importance of memorizing the Fa and how it has helped me over the past 10 years. I hope to encourage more practitioners to do the same.

Memorizing the Fa With a Group in Winter

Winter mornings are extremely cold, but that did not deter the practitioners around me. We would gather together at 4 or 5 a.m. to memorize Zhuan Falun, the main book of Falun Dafa. Once seated, we agreed on one paragraph to memorize. We allocated about 5 to 10 minutes to study it on our own, and then recited the paragraph as a group. We then continued with the next paragraph.

Elderly practitioners who no longer had to work could dedicate about three hours each morning from 4 to 8 a.m. and memorize the Fa. They could memorize a lot each day. However, at first it was difficult to wake up that early. Thus I adjusted my memorizing schedule from 5 to 7 a.m. It took me approximately a year to completely memorize the book Zhuan Falun.

Memorizing the Fa the first time had a profound impact on me. I had to overcome the mentality of seeking comfort, maintain my concentration, and eliminate disturbances from various forms of thought karma. At the same time, I realized a significant difference between memorizing and reading the Fa. Memorization demands strong focus, and the Fa principles are revealed more clearly. While reading the Fa, it’s possible to overlook some words if not attentive enough, which is the issue of studying the Fa, but not understanding the Fa.

Righteous Thoughts Defeat Evil Interference

I moved to a new city due to a job transfer. I held an incorrect notion that memorizing Zhuan Falun once would be enough, and there was no need to memorize it again. So, during that period of time, I only read Zhuan Falun. Even though I continued reading Zhuan Falun and Master’s other teachings, many human attachments surfaced.

I was determined to memorize Zhuan Falun after reading some sharing articles on the Minghui website. The goal was not merely to memorize the Fa, but to persistently memorize the Fa. During the following round of memorizing Zhuan Falun, I approached it with great seriousness. I no longer pursued speed. I memorized and recited every paragraph and every word solidly. I set a requirement for myself: to achieve proficient and accurate recitation 10 times before moving on to the next paragraph.

Memorizing the Fa for the second time can be considered the second stage of my cultivation. In that stage, I had moved away from the diligent veteran practitioners and found myself surrounded by younger practitioners with different cultivation levels. Many attachments I hadn’t previously noticed started to surface: fame and gain, vanity, dependency, seeking comfort, lust, and so on.

I memorized the Fa daily, and made every effort to improve myself according to the Fa’s requirements when bad thoughts surfaced from time to time. Facing various tribulations, sometimes I did well, and other times not so well.

Due to my lack of experience with rescuing imprisoned practitioners, I inadvertently gave the police my details. They found my home and took me to the police station, investigating everything about me. That was the first time I had faced such a tough situation, and I had no idea what would happen next. I repeatedly recalled Master’s Fa and held strong righteous thoughts. I didn’t cooperate with their coercive tactics, thinking, “I’ll leave everything to Master. Only Master decides my fate, as no evildoers are qualified to test me.” In the end, I was released.

In the days that followed, fear and anxiety gripped my heart, and I couldn’t shake them. I didn’t know if they would come for me again, and what might happen next.

I kept reciting poems from Hong Yin, continuously looked within, and rectified anything that wasn’t up to the Fa’s standards. I realized that I still harbored a combative mentality toward the police. I worked hard to generate compassion and lamented how pitiful these lives were, who were being manipulated by evil beings. I should hold benevolent thoughts toward them. As this thought arose, I could clearly feel the cloud of negativity that was pressing down suddenly dissipate, and my entire field became incredibly clear and bright.

That test might have appeared insignificant to many veteran practitioners, but for me, a newcomer to cultivation, it was as challenging as climbing a mountain. The crucial factor that helped me smoothly overcome that demonic interference was constantly bearing in mind Master’s Fa and acting accordingly.

Life-and-Death Test of Lust

Many practitioners face the test of lust, but for me it was a life-and-death test, which might have a lot to do with the karma I accumulated when I was young. The old forces seemed to have been following me since I was little and arranged many things around me to lure me into lust. Under the old forces’ arrangement, I had lustful thoughts when I was very young, and it became stronger during adolescence.

I was once studying alone in the high school laboratory, when an inexplicable invisible thing penetrated my body through the perineum. Since then, I was often interfered with and disturbed by messy, dark negative things, which was painful. It impacted me so much that my academic performance was poor and eventually I couldn’t get accepted by my dream college.

When I was in another college, I began to date a senior student. I made some casual friends, and developed some bad habits. As a result, I began to suffer from illnesses. This was all before I found Dafa.

In the early stage of my cultivation, because the practitioners around me were very diligent, I could quickly eliminate the interference of lust after sharing with veteran practitioners. But in my new environment, I met many men, and whenever I had a bad thought, the demon of lust would take advantage of me. I would be tormented and restless due to the interference of sexual desires. Letting go of these bad thoughts was incredibly difficult.

Facing other tests, I could quickly rectify myself by recalling Master’s Fa, but when confronting the test of lust, a powerful demon from other dimensions seemed to be controlling me relentlessly, to the point that I couldn’t summon the righteous thoughts to resist the demon. When things got particularly intense, I couldn’t even pick up Zhuan Falun, and my mind was filled with negativity and dirty things. During a particularly severe period, I was hit by an electric bike and suffered a leg injury, which took me about a month to recover from. At times, I even considered giving up cultivation, feeling that it was too hard. However, every time, I remembered Master was by my side, and I would be able to pass it.

As long as I had a spare moment, I would resolutely study and memorize the Fa. I told myself: even if the lust demon tries its hardest to drag me down, I still have Master’s Fa by my side every day.

As time went on, my righteous thoughts gradually strengthened, and I was no longer tormented by sexual desires. I dreamed that I was with a lust demon, and it was already disabled, but we reached a point where dogs were blocking our way. I worried that the lust demon might get hurt by the dogs and tried to protect it.

I woke up and realized that I hadn’t completely let it go and still wanted to protect the lust demon. I had another dream, where what seemed to be a demonic being told me that because I tried to eliminate it and not allow it to live, it wouldn’t let me live either. At two points in July and August, it would try to kill me.

One night in July, I suddenly suffered from the illusion of food poisoning. I told some veteran practitioners, and with their help I soon recovered.

Afterward, I moved to a new apartment on a high floor with no protective barriers on the windows. When I leaned out of the window to look down, I felt an inexplicable sense of fear, as if a force was trying to pull me down. I was very scared, and didn’t dare get close to the windows again. As time went on, that feeling of fear grew stronger. I even avoided looking at the windows. Whenever I accidentally got close, a strong sensation seemed to pull me toward the windows and wanted to make me jump. I realized that this was thought karma trying to lead me to my death, which reminded me of the strange dream I had.

Whether I was reading practitioners’ sharing articles or Master’s teachings, I would come across content related to thought karma. I knew Master was helping me. I intensified my efforts in memorizing the Fa. In the past, I would memorize one paragraph of the Fa a day, however, during that particular time, I memorized three or four paragraphs each day.

I later started working and my environment changed, and that feeling of fear gradually faded away. I came to understand that the particular thing in my dream that wanted me dead was the lust demon.

With Master’s help and protection, I finally broke through the life-and-death test of lust after several years of struggling. After passing this major test, my cultivation state became noticeably stable and solid.

Inspiring Others Around Me to Memorize the Fa Together

The benefits of memorizing the Fa has helped me tremendously over these years, so I often encouraged practitioners around me to memorize the Fa with me.

There was a practitioner who was very diligent in studying the Fa, doing the exercises, sending righteous thoughts, and clarifying the truth. However, I noticed that he often made mistakes while reading the Fa. He would misread four to five times in a paragraph and had to point at each word to read more accurately. I suggested that we memorize the Fa together. After memorizing about half of a lecture together, at some point I noticed that he stopped making errors while reading.

Another example was a veteran practitioner. Due to experiences of persecution and other reasons, he seemed to have a barrier that he couldn’t break through. He often become preoccupied with his job and was entangled in worldly pursuits, and was not in a diligent state.

He was facing continuous harassment from the Chinese Communist Party’s “Zero-Out Campaign.” Consequently, he found himself cooperating with the authorities and struggling to overcome the challenges. He felt deeply distressed about the whole situation.

Some practitioners and I arranged to visit him on weekends to memorize the Fa together. He was very earnest and focused when memorizing, which generated strong righteous thoughts within him. The old forces arranged for some officials to knock on his door repeatedly. He was no longer afraid and confronted the officials’ intimidation and threats with righteous thoughts. He talked with reason and sternly, seemingly scaring them away. The officials never bothered him again and stopped asking him to sign the “Zero-Out” statement.

Seeing the transformation in the practitioners, I became even more motivated to encourage others to memorize the Fa. I understand that some practitioners might think that studying one lecture of the Fa every day could be faster than memorizing a paragraph in a similar amount of time. However, on my cultivation journey, the changes brought about by persistently memorizing the Fa can be quite significant.

Many practitioners often expressed this sentiment: After studying the Fa for so many years, I finally understand this Fa principle.

Studying the Fa in tranquility can remove one’s thought karma, continually elevate oneself, strengthen righteous thoughts, and reveal different layers of Fa principles that were previously unseen. I hope that practitioners who haven’t started memorizing the Fa may consider letting go of any preconceived notions that have hindered them from reciting the Fa and start to memorize Zhuan Falun.