Only When I Absolutely Have Faith in Teacher and the Fa and Study the Fa Constantly Can I Avoid Taking A Detour in My Cultivation Practice

I had the enormous fortune to attend Teacher's Falun Dafa (or Falun Gong) lectures in 1993 and 1994. I can still remember Teacher's countenance and smile when Teacher took a group photo with us!

Before I started my cultivation practice, I suffered from multiple illnesses. I had tried practicing many schools of qigong (a form of traditional Chinese exercise which cultivates qi or "vital energy") with an attempt to restore my health, but no qigong really worked. Shortly after I started my cultivation practice in Falun Gong, all my illnesses completely disappeared without a trace. As a result, I had a very good first impression of Falun Gong. Unfortunately, there were myriads of different phony qigong schools prevalent over China during that period of time where I learnt a lot of bad notions. Moreover, I mainly focused on practicing the Falun Gong's exercises, and ignored the importance of cultivating my xinxing (mind nature, moral character.) In fact, I did not have a good understanding of Teacher's Fa (universal principles, the teachings in Falun Gong) or a strong faith in Teacher and the Fa. Due to these reasons, I had regarded it as illness when I experienced severe physical discomfort twice during my first few years of cultivation practice. I took a lot of medication but, as you might have guessed, the medicine did not work. I even lost over 600 yuan while I was picking up my prescription. I had very poor enlightenment quality at the time, so I simply attributed the incident to my lack of good fortune. Later, fellow practitioners offered me their kind advice. "Isn't it Teacher's hint that it's time for you to eliminate your karma?" Then I suddenly realised the meaning of my physical discomfort and my loss of money. Thus I enhanced my understanding from the Fa on this matter, and started to regard my physical discomfort as a sign that Teacher was eliminating my karma for me. Soon my physical discomfort disappeared.

At the beginning of 2000, I repeatedly suffered from the Chinese government's persecution. Without giving you too many details of the persecution, I can tell you that the Chinese police repeatedly tried to force me to renounce Falun Gong in writing. Back then I had already elevated my faith in Teacher, so I was able to reject the police's demand determinedly each time.

I once went to Beijing at the beginning of November 2000 to peacefully appeal for Falun Gong. Prior to my journey, several fellow practitioners in my area talked about going to Beijing with me, but in the end they changed their mind because they thought, "the situation was dangerous." I ended up going to Beijing on my own. I was very determined to appeal for Falun Gong, so I started the journey by myself. The trip went very smoothly. After I arrived in Beijing, I saw that the police were crawling all over the Tiananmen Square. But the police patrol failed to intimidate me. Because of my strong righteous thoughts, I appealed for Falun Gong at the Tiananmen Square and returned home safely.

the former President of China Jiang Zemin started to openly persecute Falun Gong practitioners on the 20th of July, 1999. I had been helping with creating Falun Gong related materials in China up to March of 2003. Back then there was a lot of work to be done, but I had a difficult time finding reliable fellow practitioners to help with the work. I had no choice but to print and distribute materials on my own. As a result, I had to contact a lot of fellow practitioners directly. I knew it was very risky for the materials production site and for me as a provider of materials to directly contact so many fellow practitioners, but I had no short-term alternatives while there was a shortage of help. During that period of time, the Chinese police abducted a fellow practitioner while he was distributing Falun Gong fact clarifying materials on the streets. Due to the lack of strong righteous thoughts and his attachment to fear, he succumbed to the police's torture, threats and reward incentives, and told the police about me. As a result, the police abducted me and ransacked my home in March 2003. It was midnight when the police knocked on my door. Although I didn't open the door, they knew I was at home because the light was on. They kept on knocking on the door and shouting out loud. In about an hour, the police pried my steel door open. Then a dozen policemen burst into the room and created a mess and chaos in my home. They left nothing unturned. About two hours later, they had stolen about 15,000 yuan of my personal belongs.

During the interrogation, the police lied by telling me that more than one fellow practitioner had told them about me. They also told me their names. At the time I was overcome with my human thoughts, so I started to resent and hold grudges against those fellow practitioners. During the interrogation, it started to register in my head that the police would most certainly turn me over to the forced labour camp, now that fellow practitioners had told them about the Falun Gong activities I had taken part in, even if I refused to acknowledge it. Although I did not do such horrific things as giving the police information about my fellow practitioners or renouncing Falun Gong, I kind of lost hope of freedom and somewhat cooperated with them in some other aspects. As a result, I suffered from the police's persecution that I should not have suffered from. Later I enhanced my understanding of the issue on the Fa and reinforced my righteous thoughts, and truly let go of the thought of life and death. I refused to acknowledge any of arrangements that the old forces had forced upon me. In the end, I was sentenced to one year of forced labour on probation. So I walked out a free man.

After I was released, I carefully contemplated and tried hard to search inward for any possible loophole in my cultivation practice. I gradually came to the following conclusion: I should not blame my abduction on the fellow practitioner that had "sold me out." The root cause had been my own attachments that solicited the evil's exploitation. Although I was incarcerated for more than a month, I developed a better perspective on the nature of evil. I realised that I should not cooperate with the evil in any way in the future. After I enhanced my understanding of the issue on the Fa, I visited the fellow practitioner that had told the police about me. I said to him, "We should both follow Teacher's Fa from now on. Everything Teacher says is Fa, and we should follow everything that Teacher says to avoid making any mistakes. I will no longer hold any grudge for what happened between us." He was very moved by my words, and made a lot of improvement in his subsequent cultivation practice. When the police abducted him for the second time, he behaved very differently. He refused to give the police any information or cooperate with them in any way. He denied the old forces' arrangements with his righteous thoughts and ended up being released under Teacher's protection.

Next, I would like to talk about my health and my understanding of my health based on my humble understanding of the Fa. I am turning 77 years old this year. Since I started my cultivation practice in Falun Gong, all of my illnesses went away. For nearly ten years since 1995, I have not needed to take any medicine or injections.

Before I started to practice Falun Gong, I had hyperopic vision and had to wear glasses to read newspapers. Now I can even read the fine print in newspapers without glasses. This is just the improvement on my vision. My level of strength and stamina seems to have been restored almost to the level when I was young. My wife and I once bought a bag of potatoes that weighed 99 lbs. Because we live on the fifth floor, my wife suggested that I get another bag and divide into it into two loads first. I told her that I would like to try to see if I could carry the entire bag on my own, and I ended up carrying 99 lbs of potatoes all the way to the fifth floor without any break. Nowadays I often I carry 50 to 60 lbs of stuff by myself effortlessly. My wife is very frail, so I'm the one who does most of the house chores. I have never felt tired. I feel full of life and energy.

I now have very good focus, reflex and excellent memory. Each cellular phone number in China has 11 digits, but I can easily remember a cellular phone number. I have been riding a motorbike since the year 2000 because it is several times faster than riding a bicycle, and it increases the efficiency of my work. The flip side is that it is more dangerous for those who have slow reflexes. It is especially dangerous to ride a motorbike in northern China during the winter when the roads are slippery. Some younger people in northern China even avoid riding bicycles during the winter, but I continue to ride a motorbike in the winter. It speaks well for my excellent focus and reflexes.

At the age of 77, I still do not have any wrinkles on my face. Instead, I have a very healthy and rosy complexion. Overall, I have far better health than an average elderly man the same age in terms of vision, strength, memory and reflex. I could not be any healthier. I am not showing off my health; I am trying to present my perfect health as a testimony of the power of Falun Gong. I don't think I "earned" my health by practicing Falun Gong exercises very hard. I believe it is Teacher that has given me good health out of compassion so that I can help clarify the truth about Falun Gong and complete the honourable mission that Falun Dafa has bestowed upon me. Hence, I am immensely thankful to Teacher's compassion. In addition, my transformation of health is an excellent testimony of Falun Gong's body and mind cultivation practice when I go out and promote Falun Gong. When I share with others my experience of restoring my health through practicing Falun Gong, they are often filled with awe and respect for Falun Gong.

I also experienced what Teacher has described in the core text of Falun Gong teachings, Zhuan Falun.

Teacher said in Zhuan Falun, "human cells will be gradually replaced by the high-energy matter, and ageing will slow down. One's body will appear to gradually return to youth and experience gradual transformation until, in the end, it is completely replaced by the high-energy matter. By then, this person's body will have already been converted to a body of another type of matter. That body, as I said earlier, will transcend the Five Elements. Since it is no longer confined to the Five Elements, this person's body will no longer degenerate. "

I can testify with my own health that Teacher's words are absolutely true. This is truly miraculous.

Falun Gong also improved my disposition and temper. There is an ancient Chinese idiom, "Changing one's nature is harder than changing the location of a mountain or the course of a river." It means, "A fox may grow gray, but never good." I used to be an introvert. I was standoffish because I didn't know what to say to other people. A lot of people mistook me as arrogant, so I don't have many friends. It is usually my wife that entertained our guests. Since I started my cultivation practice in Falun Gong, I became a completely different person. I am now able to carry on a conversation with everyone. I can speak from my own experience that Falun Dafa can indeed broaden the wisdom of its cultivators.

Finally, there are a few things I would like to share about further enhancing our xinxing. First, I don't think we can possibly reinforce our faith in Teacher and the Fa on our own; we must guide ourselves with the Fa. Otherwise, we cannot arbitrarily elevate to higher levels of cultivation practice. We all know that we must guide our cultivation practice with the Fa. With that in mind, what can we guide ourselves with if we don't study the Fa well on the regular basis? Therefore, it is imperative that we study the Fa more and study the Fa better. Second, even if we have built a strong foundation of faith in Teacher and the Fa, and even if we have studied a lot of Fa, I don't think we will be able to enhance our cultivation level if we lack good enlightenment quality. It is because of good enlightenment quality that we know how to harmonise a conflict with the Fa and to enhance our cultivation practice during the conflict.