How My Life Changed when I Changed My Cultivation Environment

Greetings Master
Greetings fellow practitioners

My name is Dorin; I am a practitioner from Spain who obtained the Fa in 2007.

The International Fa Conference in New York in 2013 was a turning point in my life. Such was the case that absolutely everything changed, firstly inside myself and then around me. To have the great fortune of attending the Fa Conference and seeing Master so close, as well as to have the possibility of sharing with so many practitioners about that experience, was just magical and wonderful. Also during those days I was given the opportunity to collaborate with practitioners in the coordination group that would bring Shen Yun for the first time to Spain.

Upon returning home, I packed up my stuff and embarked on moving 3,000 km, to make the most profound change in my life, along with my 5-year-old daughter. Certainly, the first big attachment I had to face and eliminate during the year was leaving my childhood environment. But nowadays I see more and more clearly the path that Master has established for me so I could let go of that burden. In fact, I have learned to be focused and to see clearly how everything that happens has its own reason. Time has taught me that although initially something seems complicated and very difficult to face, afterwards that thing was absolutely necessary to surpass some attachment and keep going on.

Looking within
My work environment also changed completely. My mother and I have a company. To this day there are five practitioners working there. That is to say, for a year I’ve been living surrounded by practitioners almost the entire day. This environment has really contributed to having more opportunities to share and raise our xinxing together. In confronting the tribulations that the outside world brings us almost every day, we can see how each of us faces them in his or her own way and how, on many occasions, to be together and speak about it has improved our individual understandings.

And of course there have also been frictions among us – difficult moments and different opinions. But first of all we are Dafa disciples! So we have that magic tool that Master has taught us: look within. Thanks to this, we keep learning and resolving the problems by observing where have we fallen behind and where our hidden attachments are. I have discovered myself that most of my attachments have the base of fear, in some way or another. Fear seems to be hidden in many human notions that I still have and which I discover daily.

It’s not easy to work with my family. In this case the boss is my mother and on many occasions we have different opinions on the moment to carry out sales strategies or make decisions. There are also differences in our private lives and concerning the education of my daughter.

I thought that my moving would involve our relationship getting complicated because, to make matters worse, we would live together for a period of time. But on the contrary it has been the opposite due to this tool of looking within. I knew that this would be an important test for me, so firstly I took the problem and faced it; I identified it and stopped ignoring it. After all, if I didn’t resolve that problem, I would not be able to advance in my cultivation, and our living together wouldn’t be very pleasant either. Moreover, my mother has also been a practitioner for a long time. So everything was a very intense process that is still going on to this day.

Master says in Essentials for Further Advancement, in “A Dialogue with Time”: “Divine Being: These problems have already become very serious. It would be good if they could manage to search within themselves for the things that they have been able to find in others”.

This was the key. My continuous criticism of my mother has become a habit since I was a teenager. So every time something comes from her that bothers me, I stop for a second and ask myself: “Wait a moment! Why am I bothered by this? Maybe I have this attachment as well? Maybe I do the same to other people or in other situations?”

This change inside of me has manifested also on the outside. Now our relationship is much better and though I still find some obstacles on my path that want to make me fall, and I even do fall sometimes, I try to work on it daily and don’t forget Shan and Ren on this issue; I need to be always alert. I also thank my mother very much for her dedication towards my daughter so I can better attend to my work for Shen Yun.

Forming one body
When I had just arrived in Barcelona it was also the beginning of the promotion of Shen Yun 2014. It was the first year for Shen Yun in Spain, so it was an entirely new world for me and I had to do my best and learn quickly; this was the case as well for every practitioner.

We intensified Fa study in Barcelona and in the rest of the regions quickly. We established specific days in several places where we would study and meet each other face-to-face. All practitioners who could attend would come. There was also a national Fa study, where almost every practitioner in Spain gathered to study together during two days. The online Fa study also intensified. Every time there were more and more people, so the intensity of the energy and the union were bigger both at the national and regional levels.

We had the opportunity of meeting each other, and sharing and improving together as a group. The feeling of a common goal was growing more and more. After the study and sharing, we also learned more about Shen Yun day by day, and about how to present the show. We were all training to promote the show the best we could, and we were also supporting each other unconditionally. To assist Master to save the largest number of sentient beings possible was and is our essential goal.

I was very lucky to share with many practitioners for the first time at this scale, sharing experiences and understandings. My situation changed so much that from practising alone by myself in a very remote place I came to live in a big city where I was always surrounded by practitioners. Each and every one of them has taught me something that I treasure inside of me. We really managed to form a united and solid body in a process of evolution as a whole that led all of us individually to feel like molecules in a single organism. To tell the truth, today when we gather to study, I feel at home.

I feel overwhelmed every time I think about that unconditional cooperation of each and every practitioner. Many would travel to Barcelona whenever they could, even for one single weekend or they organised their holidays to be able to come and help. Many slept in the same house giving up comfort, habits, schedules, privacy, etc. They have such big hearts!

Our coordinator for Fa study did a great job. It could be said that she was like the adhesive which join us together. She made sure that nobody would cause distractions, and that people went to the face-to-face Fa studies; she called by phone and sent emails until very late at night to remind us of the fundamental importance of Fa study, and that without it we would be unable to fill the theatre.

“Disciples, be diligent! Everything that’s the most magnificent and the most wonderful is developed in the process of your validating Dafa. Your vows will become testaments of your future.” (Essentials for Further Advancement II, Fa-Rectification Period Dafa Disciples)

Shen Yun 2014 promotion
Somehow my ordinary job at my company walked a parallel road with the project. Such was the case that my colleague and I (at the beginning we were only two and the boss) faced very similar situations: to try to move the company forward and to help to coordinate well with the main project. I am very grateful for having been able to share so much with my colleague. I think that Master put us together in an office for very specific reasons that I am still getting to know over the course of time.

It was amazing that so many people came to our office: salespersons who wanted to sell us advertising spaces, printing houses offering their services, marketing companies offering to carry out an advertising campaign for our company, etc … and in the end they turned out to be very good contacts to help us with Shen Yun promotion. Our office seemed to be the entrance for many predestined people, either to help us or to see the show. They seemed to be guided to come.

Finally we had the flyers! The promotional campaign for Shen Yun started and along with it the distribution of tasks among us.

We had some promotional stands and we handed out flyers on the streets and posted them through letterboxes, we promoted the show at the entrance and exit of the most important theatres, and we went to shops and placed posters in the shop windows. We were all very working hard to cover the largest possible area, always having in mind that we had to reach the mainstream society.

Meanwhile, we ran advertising campaigns in newspapers and on radios, there were banners hanging on the lampposts of the most busy streets of Barcelona, we posted the show on the internet, we sent out newsletter campaigns, and we presented the show to groups through conferences in clubs and associations.

Some practitioners put stickers on their cars and drove around, reaching other provinces. There were buses with Shen Yun advertising on throughout the city. Each practitioner carried flyers with him or her every time he or she stepped out of the door and used every opportunity to talk to people, from which they established very good contacts, either on the street, in the train or even on the plane.

It seemed that the only thing we needed was to be in motion and predestined people would come to us. We were only the vehicles for predestined people to come to see Shen Yun. What a great honour to assist Master to save the largest number of sentient beings possible.

Once we had a promotion in a shopping centre; I had to be responsible for the proper set up of the stand. In fact, I couldn’t do that task because of my ordinary job, so other practitioners did it for me. The following step was to organise the practitioners according to their availability so there was always someone promoting and informing passersby about the show during the opening hours of the shopping centre. At that moment I thought that although I didn’t know all the practitioners, nor their availability, nor their abilities, I would try my best to do a good job.

When I was about to start, a coordinator called me and said to me that she had already asked another practitioner to do my task; she didn’t mention the reason. It was just that she considered that the other practitioner should do it. Immediately I had a feeling of disappointment, defeat and sadness because I supposed that she didn’t consider me capable of doing that job. Immediately after that I thought that she might be right, and that maybe I couldn’t do it well. So I accepted the news dejectedly. It clearly moved my heart. I felt frustrated and my ego was hurt. What kind of coordination job was I doing if I couldn’t coordinate even this? Maybe I shouldn’t be a coordinator…maybe I wasn’t at the level for it.

Days went on and this practitioner, who I hadn’t met before, and I made the grid with the schedules so the stand would never be left unattended. She organised people and informed me. I began to realise that this practitioner was enthusiastic about this job, that she was indeed very grateful and once she told me that before she had difficulties communicating with other people and this job has given her the opportunity to open up and interact with others, and this helped her a lot. At that moment my eyes were filled with tears and I understood everything. On one hand I felt bad for my initial thoughts and on the other hand I was overwhelmed by the magical feeling that everything is perfectly arranged by Master, that what I have to do is just what is assigned for me, that I shouldn’t question anything, that I should never lose the goal, and mostly and first of all, that I must have faith.

“Cultivation was in the past merely a matter of one’s own Consummation, and how well or poorly one did had bearing on only that one individual. Now you are to save sentient beings, and that means that coordinating with each other and cooperating come into play. Human attachments will surface as you work together.” (Fa Teaching at the 2009 Washington DC International Fa Conference)

Shen Yun arrives in Barcelona!
The promotion, the advertising in the media and on the streets, the word of mouth, the promotional video on televisions in shopping centres, the presentations to groups, the visits to companies and sport clubs…everything was done! And in the meantime and at all times we were sending forth righteous thoughts, studying the Fa, and doing the exercises.

When the Shen Yun buses arrived in the city we all held our breath and made up our minds to face the final sprint.

The security group was instructed on their positions, the press group of The Epoch Times and NTDTV was ready and alert, the corresponding coordinators had prepared the audience reception, the selling of the last tickets in the theatre box was ready, and there were practitioners sitting in the gardens of the theatre sending forth righteous thoughts and studying the Fa. And suddenly and without fuss, in silence, and in a grand train of harmony, the artists arrived at the theatre. One by one they passed by us smiling and waving; they seemed to feel our long waiting, our dream, our devotion and respect for their mission.

During the days of the show I belonged to the security team and I was in a small office just at the entrance and exit for the theatre personnel. It turned out to be a gathering point for all kinds of situations during those four days. I learned so much!

It was strange because somehow that small office was the point for information, for resolving problems, to organise the personnel, and the point where artists and members of the orchestra would come if they had some questions or needed any help. The four days I was there I was attentive to the walkie talkie and organised the practitioners who would occupy their positions designed by the security coordinator.

There were problems and situations that came to me and that I had to resolve along the way even though I did not really know how to do it at first, but I looked for the way to resolve them. There wasn’t a moment of tranquillity there almost for the four days.

I had the great fortune of seeing from that position so many things which made me think about the grandeur of what was going on. Some practitioners were like all-rounders who were responsible for all kind of tasks like buying some little things on the streets that were needed, taking flyers somewhere, moving the boxes with the programmes, looking for pens, buying plastic glasses, taking or picking up somebody, etc…Others would be divided up to do various things at the same time. Women downstairs in the washing and ironing room worked so hard during long hours in that basement, enduring the heat and yet being so grateful to be, along with others, a cog in that great divine machine.

Immersed in all that whirlwind of work, in that coming and going, in that common feeling that everything should turn out perfectly, just in the middle, like an impassable, solid and divine core, was Shen Yun Performing Arts.

I came to the state of not wanting to even think. I had the feeling that I couldn’t let any other thought pass through my mind so as not to disturb the so-sacred duty that Shen Yun was doing, so I sent forth righteous thoughts constantly and I tried to do my best as a tool.

All the artists and members of Shen Yun are so disciplined and righteous, so diligent and compassionate! When they left Barcelona they left behind a trail of harmony and peace. I think that every one of us felt that we wanted it to never come to an end.

Thank you Master!, Thank you Shen Yun!
I see myself as so little compared to this very important mission. But I have learnt so much: it doesn’t matter what you do, always do it the best you can because at the end it only what has come from your heart that counts. Although on the outside you seem to be in control of a situation, on the inside there is the truth of your intentions and that is what Master sees. And so like a practitioner reminded me not long ago: it’s not about us, we are only the tools.

I feel that Shen Yun is an enhancer of our path of cultivation, through which we forge ourselves, we correct ourselves, we refine ourselves, we clean ourselves to be better tools for a common aim: to assist Master to save the largest number of sentient beings possible!

Thank you Master from the deepest part of my soul for helping me cultivate better and making me go through countless situations. I am willing to face anything that is necessary to reach where you let me reach. I am strong and I will never say that I can’t. I regret much that sometimes I’ve been late in realising some attachments. Thank you for letting me walk beside so many practitioners who are teaching me and helping me so much.

Thank you Master! Thank you fellow practitioners!