My Cultivation Experiences in the Ukraine

Greetings honourable Teacher!

Greetings fellow practitioners from Poland, Europe and the rest of the world!

I’ve been cultivating in Falun Dafa since 2001. Since then my personal cultivation merged with the period of Fa rectification.

Before, I didn’t share my experiences, until a certain moment in my cultivation that I thought my understanding did not differ from other practitioners’ understanding. Later, being in constant contact with fellow practitioners and joining Falun Dafa related activities, I understood that everyone has something to share about his way of cultivation. The way to consummation for one practitioner differs from the way of any other practitioner as we are all different and we can learn from listening to others’ experiences. That’s why today I will talk about something that seems to be very important, something that I can share with fellow practitioners.

Once, I thought a lot, trying to realise why I didn’t want to let go of my attachments. I understood that my attachment infiltrated so deeply into my mind. With my mind polluted by this attachment, together with my wrong understanding of the issue acted like a huge barrier; it was like a second “me”. Then a period came when I realised the attachment and it seemed that I wanted to get rid of it, but I still couldn’t.

What was stopping me? Hardships or maybe suffering? I tried to figure it out. Teacher guides us Zhuan Falun saying:

“You will stumble, and from that grasp the truth.”

I understood it theoretically, but what about practical implementation? For several days I repeated this phrase over and over again. So often that at the beginning it even frightened me. Why did I repeat this phrase over and over? I felt this phrase was a live righteous substance; it grew inside me and became so big that it filled every cell of my being. Once I accepted it, a real understanding of this principle came. I realised that my reluctance to feel the suffering and bitterness of cultivation blocked me from getting rid of this attachment. At that moment I received a hint from Teacher: I saw myself walking with extremely heavy baggage on my back yet the baggage was at the same time very sacred. The feeling of sacredness and solemnity surpassed all difficulty and bitterness. I went along an endless round of truth clarification. It was an endless road which made me tread it with my head down. I thought, “Why is my head down?” and then I enlightened: “It was so that nothing would divert me from the Path and so nothing would rise temptations or intensify my attachments. Only when I raised my eyes, was I immediately occupied by emotions, feelings and notions. But this way a Path will be shorter.”

At Teaching the Fa at the Western U.S. International Fa Conference Teacher said:

“I say that because during the journey you will have hardships, tests of every sort, unforeseen ordeals, and you will have unexpected interference from all kinds of attachments and emotion. The interference will come from family, society, good friends, and even fellow cultivators. And along with this there is interference from changes in the state of human society and from human notions that were formed in society. All of those things can drag you back to being like an ordinary person. But if you can break through all of it, you can advance towards godhood.”

There is a big and very beautiful park in Kiev. It called Mariinsky. The building of The Supreme Counsel of Ukraine is located in the centre of the park.

For a long period, each morning we practised the Falun Gong exercises and clarified the truth to the Ukrainian people in Mariinsky Park, close to the government and The Supreme Counsel. At the very beginning of our activities, for about two weeks, almost no high ranking officials wanted to take flyers, newspapers or listen to our explanations. They passed by theatrically with their heads roused high. But we persisted on coming each day and practised at lunch break when the park was crowded with people. Sometimes, we practised the exercises more than once in order to let officials see us. We also distributed newspapers, flyers and clarified the truth about the persecution in China. We called this place “Ukrainian Manhattan”.

After three weeks of morning activities in Mariinsky Park, one high ranking official stopped and told me, that what he read in the 6th issue of “Falun Gong Around the World” newspaper, he sees as a program for cultivation and reflection of the principles according to which we cultivate. He thanked us for clarifying the truth with our posters and our own explanations about the horrors of the persecution. He told us that after such explanations he called the Chinese ambassador in the Ukraine, on his own initiative, and asked for an appointment at an important political meeting. He expressed his attitude about the persecution of practitioners in China to the ambassador. The heart of this high ranking official helped him to realise that he can’t keep silent about this horrific persecution. He told me “I directly asked the ambassador, “When will you stop persecuting those kind and enduring people? I am acquainted with them and see them practising daily in the park. They are kind, they think of others and help others to learn the truth to become clear about the situation” Of course the ambassador tried to say something to excuse himself, but the official didn’t believe him. The official started to share with me that China isn’t as economically strong as it tries to portray itself and it’s all a populist approach. The official added that he looked through different sources about us and that he believed us and supported our actions. He also knew about the lawsuits. He wished us and our Chinese friend success and for the timely end of the persecution and then left.

What a wonderful lunch break meeting and such a great attitude towards the practitioners’ published newspaper!

I understood that the environment we are living in can only be changed by ourselves, not by anybody else. If practitioners are not succeeding at touching people’s hearts – it is only our shame. Tolerance and once more tolerance, along with our compassionate wish, is what’s needed, for persistence, in this non-convenient and indifferent environment, to collect our strength and aspiration to do this. It is not necessary to travel long distances to clarify the truth. This work is always near us. It depends if we want to notice it and act on it or whether we are thinking about doing it later. Sometimes we focus on countries that are quite faraway, using all our savings for the tour, but then we are unable to participate in a local large-scale activities due to our lack of financial resources. I don’t want to hurt anybody and I am not against travelling to other countries to take part in activities but I am against going to extremes.

Teacher always says to us that we should clarify the truth more to officials. However, quite often we are unable to get in contact with them personally, as the old forces create barriers, making it too hard to get into the officials’ offices to clarify the truth. Although, as Teacher says, (not exact words) that maybe they had cultivated in their past lives and now are worthy of getting such high ranking positions and also their salvation. If we don’t succeed by going into their offices, can we find other ways? Here are some ways that practitioners from Kiev used to clarify the truth to high ranking officials. Since they didn’t let us go in, we went to the parks near their offices and in a patient, but persistent way, clarify the truth to them. We practised morning and evening, to create a clear, compassionate and generous field near their buildings until they themselves would come and enquire about our activities. I think every practitioner has in his mind the personal understanding of a personal Manhattan. You should not be pained if you unable to travel and take part in activities to expose the persecution. Many things that we promised to fulfil in history are not less sacred or unimportant and they are often waiting for us just round the corner.

For over two months now we have had a daily peaceful protest in front of the Chinese Embassy, regardless of the weather conditions, from morning until night.

When we started the peaceful protest we tried to discuss all the related things, but it turned out that protest announcement, concerning the beginning of the peaceful protest, was interesting only for some practitioners but not all. After sharing understandings, regarding the importance of eliminating the evil near the embassy, regarding the importance of truth clarification especially near the Chinese Embassy and about constantly exposing the illegal organ harvesting of Falun Gong practitioners in China, a number of practitioners, who have continuously participated in the protest, were able to hold the protest for 3 weeks. By this time, other practitioners gradually started to join, while upgrading their understandings and their characters on these issues. Our One Body was made stronger together with the upgrading of our levels. I see a peaceful protest as one of the powerful forms of eliminating evil, as and an effective form of cultivating, and as a very effective method for truth clarification. When participating in a peaceful protest you feel a spontaneous and rapid growth of our mind-nature.

You may have heard that in the four last months, in the Ukraine, things were very complicated, such as political changes and the concern with the formation of a new government. Ukraine’s territory is pretty big and Falun Dafa practitioners aren’t always able to get to all the regions to clarify the truth. Teacher explains to us that all conditions of society are depending on the thoughts and deeds of practitioners. In my opinion, in these past months we have been weak in truth clarification and in spreading the Nine Commentaries on the Communist Party in the Ukraine, leaving out many people who were or are still are members of the Ukrainian communist party, which is mainly in Eastern Ukraine. But our compassionate Teacher helped us even here – because our understanding of spreading the Nine Commentaries is not high enough or we don’t have enough money to go to the eastern regions, where there is a very strong influence of the communist ideology, half of the Ukraine residents have instead come to Kiev with their own money. It seems on the surface that they came to encourage the political leaders in their fight, but we know that Teacher has guided them to obtain the Fa, to get to know about Falun Dafa and the persecution and to choose their futures. Every morning they passed near the peaceful protest while going to the Supreme Soviet. When coming back, they asked us for numerous newspapers and flyers for their neighbours, friends and relatives. Teacher is always nearby and he gives us and the people his Compassion.

Thank you, Teacher.

Teacher places us exactly where we have to fulfil our mission in saving people

On the last day we had to get to the Vienna conference on time, we, the practitioners of Kiev, assembled urgently to discuss the issues that obviously interfered with our trip to Vienna. We shared our understandings and experiences. Every practitioner saw his drawbacks, his omissions and attachments that haven't been removed yet. These were the things that caused interferences, not giving us the possibility to arrange the official paperwork at the Austrian Embassy. We realised that it wasn't enough to just see the attachments; they had to be removed to enable us to move on. In those days it seemed that it was simply a must to participate in the conference in Vienna, after finally managing to assemble twelve people, which was a lot under the circumstances!

The outcome was not quite what we planned. In the given situation I had a chance to understand much better the principle of "mutual generation and mutual inhibition" prompted to me by Teacher. It wasn't for the first time that I had to realise: a practitioner's life isn't subordinate to his plans. That is, there is a plan, but we aren't always allowed to see it. That is where discomfort begins. When you plan something, you can prepare for it, thus, any preparation is a way of creating comfort, comfortable conditions for cultivation. When I felt again that I wasn't prepared for the situation of an unplanned trip, I understood that only by overcoming this quiet discontent with events not planned ahead, will I be able to progress and be able to cut off the attachment to comfortable cultivation. Having understood this in myself, I started packing my bag for the journey.

On our way to Vienna it was planned to spread the Fa in one of the towns in Western Ukraine, so this is what I decided to do. I thought: “If nobody joins me, I'll go by myself.” But several more practitioners decided to join.

In the evening we were all at the station, without any precise plans. Now I wasn't even making plans. We bought tickets for Mukachevo – the furthest western town away from Kiev. The following morning we found ourselves in a wonderful little town in the mountains. Walking through the town, distributing flyers to the residents, I could feel and see the long awaited expectation fulfilled. I could see their boundless gratitude to Teacher when the people took the flyers and they sent their gratitude to Teacher via me. I understood that their gratitude to Teacher knew no limits; that's why they repeated again and again what they knew and were able to express. Their enlightened parts rejoiced, and the physical body couldn't understand why they felt so good, so light at heart, their souls feeling joyful and solemn. All this was reflected on their faces. Then I realised that the Teacher has placed us where we were most needed, where sentient beings would perish without the Fa, they will get their chance for salvation through our hands and our hearts. Should they perish without the Fa, it would be partially my fault, as well. So I thanked Merciful Teacher again and again for the chance He gave me and for the salvation of my soul. Various new aspects of my salvation are discovered, which is also the salvation given through us to the world's people.

“As the mud and sand are completely sifted, gold shines forth.”

I have often read these words in Teacher's lectures, thinking they refer to practitioners only. But in the Western Ukraine I realised that the flyers, the papers, disks and photographs, also the stories about the persecution in China, help not only to open the people's hearts, but if you look deeper, you can see that the process of washing away the sand happens to ordinary people as well. This process is longer, more complicated and less noticeable to us. We know nothing of the fate of those who received the Falun Dafa related materials from us. Maybe they started cultivating or maybe they will become cultivators of the future. This way or another they weren't abandoned by me. Through removing my own attachment to comfortable cultivation, I could raise myself and give the people of this region the chance to learn about Falun Dafa.

The girl's enlightened side rejoices on finding Falun Gong

The Striy Park in the city of Lvov is a wonderful place; one could say it bears all the marks of a paradise. For the residents it's a favourite place for leisure and recreation. That Sunday was one of the few pleasant days of the season, so there were many people willing to take advantage of it and commune with nature. Two girls strolled by, talking quietly, next to the place where we have been performing the Falun Dafa exercises for the fifth or the sixth time. One of the practitioners was handing out Falun Dafa materials, holding the paper "Falun Dafa in the World". As soon as one of the girls approached the practitioner, she saw the name of the paper and I heard an exclamation of joy, as if she met her best friend or a long awaited opportunity. The girl excitedly asked for all the materials we had relating to Falun Dafa. Only after having them in her hands did she leave, with peace and joy in her heart. The question is not whether she realised why she felt so happy. The main thing is, in my understanding that her true self has been waiting a long and yearning period of time for this opportunity to learn about Falun Dafa. She didn't receive the good news from me but this doesn't matter; we are all One Body. The main thing is a person received the long awaited salvation.

I have shared my understanding and experience in cultivation. The Fa contains much deeper meaning, please, compassionately point out my mistakes and shortcomings in understanding.

Thank you for your attention to my experienc and thank you for attending today’s conference.