Sharing on Using Media to Promote Shen Yun and Clarify the Truth

Greeting respectful Master! Greeting fellow Dafa practitioners!

It is my great pleasure to be given the opportunity of sharing my cultivation and practice with you here. Although I have thousands of words to say, I would like to share with you about promoting Shen Yun as a journalist during the UK Shen Yun promotion period this year.

In 2011, we did not do well on Shen Yun in the UK, the rate of ticket sales was low, moreover, we encountered many setback and obstructions in searching for a theatre for the 2012 Shen Yun Show. In “Dafa Disciples Must Study the Fa”, Master says: “Four years have passed. Some regions have made inroads, while some regions have not only failed to make inroads, but are doing progressively worse, with many problems coming about that should not have. This has to do with differences in terms of cultivation; it’s a reflection of the different mindsets each has had when going to save people. I had originally planned for it to take three years’ time to make some inroads for our performances, after which we would no longer need to utilize so many Dafa disciples. For that approach to work, one first has to make inroads into society’s cultural mainstream before reaching the entire society. This is just a strategy, actually.”

I deeply reflected on myself compared to this part of the Fa. I found that I did not use all my strength during Shen Yun promotion period in 2011. As the result of my cultivation status, I did not take the initiative to contact different team coordinators of Shen Yun. None of them asked me to do any promotion work either, so I did not fully take part in Shen Yun promotion in 2011. I felt very ashamed after reading this part of Master’s Dafa, I said to Master in my heart: if we, the UK would be given chance to promote Shen Yun in 2012, I must try my best……

1. Making good preparation for taking part in Shen Yun promotion

While searching for the Shen Yun theatre, British Dafa practitioners truly improved as a whole through group Fa study. There was good news at the end of last year: the 2012 Shen Yun venue had been secured. However, almost at the same time, I got a full time job offer.

In “Dafa Disciples Must Study the Fa”, Master says: “If, at this current stage, you can all work together and break new ground, and quickly reshape the situation like how eastern Canada and Taiwan did, I will have you know: when Shen Yun returns to town, you won’t have to put in such large amounts of time, manpower, or material resources. There are a lot of things you need to do with the many projects you have undertaken, and over the long haul, Master really doesn’t want to see you dropping everything to come work on Shen Yun. But at the current stage, what I want to see you do is precisely to focus your effort on making new inroads.”

What I see from this part of the Fa, is that Master wants us to “focus our effort on making new inroads”. I fell into contradiction, if I accepted this job offer, due to just starting work, I would be in probation period and would not be allowed annual leave at all in the first three months. Additionally, I have to look after my family and two young daughters, and routinely, I should have time to study the Fa and practise the exercises. If I took the job I would have very little time left every day. I then asked the company if I could temporarily work part time until May, the company said no. I thought that I just promised Master that I would use my full strength to promote Shen Yun. I couldn’t break my promise but I could look for a new job again. After consideration, I tried one last time to ask the company if I could start work in May. The answer again was no. I decided to give up this job offer, but I felt no regret, because I firmly believe what I should right now is promote Shen Yun. I could think of other things after the Shen Yun Show finished. I also believe there is Master’s arrangement for me, whatever it is I would accept.

I was concerned about one thing though: my mother was visiting me and she might be disappointed about my decision. She had been wishing that I could get a stable and decent job ever since I left China for the UK. Actually, my parents keep their wish that I can have normal life and proper job as I did when I was in China.

I told my mother about my thoughts. I said to her that, Master arranged her to visit us during the Shen Yun promotion period, which is not a coincidence. I really got to understand that she was here to look after my daughter, which was not for me to work full time, but to help us to promote Shen Yun. Therefore, she also took part in the Shen Yun promotion, which was a very rare opportunity for her! After listening to my words, my mother was happy.

2. Promoting Shen Yun to VIPs

I joined two Shen Yun promotion efforts: the Society team and the Shopping Centre team. A practitioner from outside London told me that the VIP team was lacking in manpower, and asked if I would approach VIPs as a journalist to promote Shen Yun by inviting them to send welcome messages.

I thought that it was probably my specific task arranged by Master in promoting Shen Yun. She explained further that although she was outside of London, she would cooperate with me in contacting VIPs. She said that she would start with members of the London Assembly and Lord Mayors of councils in Greater London area. I then made suggestions to my husband, who is also a fellow practitioner, that we could interview these VIPs under the name of Sound of Hope and NTDTV. He agreed and joined me. Through a few practitioners working closely and cooperating well, VIP contacting rapidly and smoothly unfolded. I would like to talk about a few cases here.

As members of London Assembly normally have very tight schedules, in order to successfully get interview opportunity, I often told their assistants that the interview would last about 10 minutes, and then, most of them were happy to book a slot for us. As the Chinese New Year was approaching, we secured interview opportunities by inviting them to send their Chinese New year’s greeting message toward Chinese in the UK. In the first week, we had already got appointments with several members of London Assembly.

The cameraman of NTDTV and I cooperated with each other. Due to the tight schedule, we started our tasks immediately after greeting the VIP. While he was setting up his camera, I showed the 30-second Shen Yun promotion DVD to the London Assembly Member right away, and then opened the Shen Yun Performing Arts tour album and explained page by page. When the cameraman was about ready, I grasped the moment to ask the Assembly Member if he/she would like to send welcome message to Shen Yun Performing Arts as well? By now, the Assembly Member had completely been attracted by Shen Yun and naturally was happy to do so. We even had to arrange a few interviews with different Assembly Members, and their offices were all in the City Hall. When we went there the next day, there were Assembly Members asking us about how many Assembly Members we had met so far, and said that almost everyone in City Hall had known what we were doing here. Even an assistant of an Assembly Member actively contacted us and suggested us to interview his boss for a New Year greeting message and Shen Yun welcome message.

Of course, we understand clearly, that it is very important to keep our righteous thoughts strong. We constantly sent forth righteous thoughts during every appointment. While I was talking about Shen Yun, the cameraman practitioner was sending forth righteous thoughts. Moreover, I required myself to carefully read the Shen Yun presentation document made by New York practitioners again and again, and meanwhile, I also read the English version of The Nine Commentaries on the Communist Party -- Commentary 6: On How the Chinese Communist Party Destroyed Traditional Culture, I found that when I talked about Shen Yun, I could use those contents freely. Under different circumstances, those contents would enter my head automatically, and I then spoken them out accordingly. I truly felt that everything was arranged by our Master with his great benevolence, the path had been paved, and the only thing we need to do was to step out.

During those days, we also experienced how difficult it can be to save people. Once, we got an opportunity to meet a Lord Mayor of an area in Southwest London. It takes one hour to drive there from our base in Northeast London if there is no traffic. As South London is always jammed, we set out two hours in advance of the appointment time. However, we obviously felt bigger interference on that day. The roads were severely busy meaning that we did not arrive on time. I had to call the Mayor’s office, and they said they had to arrange another time for interview, as the Mayor had another engagement. I then suggested the next appointment could be arranged in the afternoon two days later, because we would meet another mayor who was close by. In this case, we could save a lot of time. But after the mayor’s secretary looked at the mayor’s schedule, and told me that the mayor had an engagement at the nominated time, and asked if another time was OK for us? Namely, we would have to travel all the way to Southwest London twice. I had a bit of hesitation, but immediately I thought that we should not be afraid of trouble in order to save people, so we agreed to the secretary’s suggestion. But on the next day, I received a text message from the secretary, saying that the Lord Mayor was able to meet us at the time suggested by me. I told this news to the cameraman practitioner. Both of us felt this was arranged by Master.

In the morning of that day, after we successfully interviewed another mayor, we drove to the city where we should have been last time. There was only 30 minutes driving distance between those two cities. When we were about to enter the city centre, our satnav, which had never broken down, suddenly went black with nothing at all on the display. We sent righteous thoughts and were trying to resume the satnav’s system but to no avail. As the appointment time was approaching, I had to call the secretary again, and ask directions. After getting some rough directions, we drove round a few times and finally found City Hall. The secretary was waiting for us in front of the building, and again, we were late. We apologised profusely but the secretary comforted us by saying that this was life. He also told us that the mayor was meeting a group of people at this moment and would see us after that. During the waiting time with him, he asked me about traditional Chinese culture. I then showed him the beautiful Shen Yun Performing Arts tour album, and explained page by page. He was very interested in Shen Yun. When we finished looking at the whole album, we were informed that the mayor was able to meet us now. In the same way, we introduced Shen Yun and traditional Chinese culture to the mayor, and the mayor was very pleased to make a wonderful New Year’s greeting message and Shen Yun welcome message.

3. Some experiences in clarifying the facts to VIPs

There are altogether 33 councils in the Greater London area. We had opportunities to meet about 13 Mayors and councillors before the Chinese New Year. I found that one of the reasons why they were interested in our media was that they believed we represented the Chinese community. One question that I always got asked was: “You have a lot of contacts with the Chinese community, don’t you?” This was as if Master was reminding us through their mouths: “Your media must have a good footing in the ordinary human society.” Master said in Fa Teaching Given at the NTDTV Meeting: "If you want to run a media outlet well, you need to have a good footing in society. Ordinary things aren’t going to be magical, and old force factors are going to interfere with people’s salvation. Of course, work at the TV station is not itself Dafa cultivation, and it has no direct connection to Dafa. The station is run by Dafa disciples, and it is for the purpose of validating the Fa and saving sentient beings. That’s the connection. The station is not part of Dafa itself, but rather, it is a tool that is used by Dafa disciples to save sentient beings.”

As a member of the media, measured against Master’s Fa, I felt very ashamed and sad. I also know that we all have a path to follow. For projects that need the cooperation of Dafa disciples, such as media, the path is to cooperate and coordinate well. If all practitioners taking part in media projects can cooperate as smoothly as during Shen Yun promotion, we can definitely break through the current status quo and walk the path that Master arranged for us. Our media would achieve a good footing in ordinary society, become popular and get into a positive cycle.

While promoting Shen Yun to VIPs, I noticed sentient beings’ longing for traditional Chinese culture, which seemed to be the perfect talking point to introduce them to Shen Yun. In general the appointment slots with Mayors were more flexible than with councillors. They were all willing to sit down and ask us to talk about traditional Chinese culture. We found that London councils regularly exchanged official visits with mainland Chinese cities. We immediately realized that Master arranged the opportunity for us to clean their minds of the CCP Party culture through talking about traditional Chinese culture. We introduced Shen Yun from a cultural standpoint, telling them why Shen Yun could not be performed in mainland China, and the nature of the CCP in destroying traditional culture, etc.

After listening to us talk about Shen Yun and traditional culture, the Mayors and their assistants were very positive. I could feel very strong energy fields and that Master was right there by my side. We usually told them we would send them the finished greetings and congratulatory messages, and asked them to upload them onto their websites. We also asked them to distribute information about Shen Yun to everyone in the council via group e-mail. Many of them agreed. Some promised they would also put the information onto their personal web pages. Some even took us to see the the council’s collections of cultural artefacts, which served as testimonials of the councils’ history. Some gave us souvenir albums of their councils, as if we were cultural ambassadors.

There were also times when my righteous thoughts were not strong enough. Once we went to see a Mayor. As I walked into the office, I found that I lacked the usual righteousness, thinking it would be fine to just do the New Year greeting. I should leave out Shen Yun because the Mayor may not be interested. As I hesitated, a thought also came to mind: why not talk about Shen Yun? I must do it no matter what! So I opened the laptop and showed the 30-second teaser. The Mayor enthusiastically called over four other staff members to come have a look. I took the opportunity to give them each a Shen Yun flyer and a Shen Yun photo album to pass around, encouraging them to come see the show. The Mayor was immediately very interested and said he would arrange to see the show one night if his schedule allowed. And he gave a very sincere welcome message to the Shen Yun Performing Arts, which I did not expect. When we came out of the Town Hall, I told the cameraman about my initial lack of righteous thoughts. So he said he sensed that something was wrong when he saw me hesitating in taking the laptop out to show Shen Yun adverts. He had been sending forth righteous thoughts. It just goes to show the importance of righteous cooperation between practitioners.

In the UK, the Mayor is the council's first citizen, the representative of all its citizens. Mayors that come to see Shen Yun regard it as a formal event, appearing in the theatre dressed in the Mayor’s Chain. The audience can immediately recognize he / she as the Mayor. The council will also record his / her attendance at Shen Yun. Through our introduction of Shen Yun, some MPs also purchased tickets on their own to see the show. In a democratic society, MPs represent their constituents. In the near future, these constituents will know what an honourable blessing that was.

Master said in Fa Teaching Given at the 2010 New York Fa Conference: "Promoting the Epoch Times and NTDTV itself serves as clarifying the truth, and those you encounter while promoting the media are precisely people to clarify the truth to. That is, you can clarify the truth to people in your interactions with them. As for how to handle these things in particular circumstances, you will gain experience in the course of your work. Just talk with the person and adjust your approach according to whatever you think suits that person. "

I find that our interactions with VIPs are exactly like what Master told us. First, they are curious as to what kind of media NTDTV and Sound of Hope are. So usually we first introduce the background of these two media, handing them business cards with websites of the media printed. One MP told me, “I remember you. You (Sound of Hope) were once refused the application of promotional activities in Chinatown. I wrote a letter to the council responsible to voice my protest.”

I felt that through Shen Yun promotion, Master arranged for us to visit a dozen Greater London councils to clarify the truth, as if opening up the Cosmic Orbit. It’s a pity that we did not have the chance to visit all of London's councils to bring the news of Shen Yun and the truth of Dafa to every representative of the citizens of London. I hope that in 2013 Shen Yun promotion we can continue to deliver the hope of salvation to sentient beings.

Fellow practitioners, on our future cultivation paths let us follow Master’s wish, cultivate ourselves well, cooperate and coordinate well. Let us always remember to saving sentient beings and to honour our vows and the mission of us Dafa disciples.

Thank you, Master! Thank you, fellow practitioners!