By a practitioner in Northeast China

From The Second Mainland China Internet Experience Sharing Conference

(Clearwisdom.net) Master, greetings! Fellow practitioners, greetings!

The following is some of my experience during the Fa-rectification.

I was born with a timid nature, which caused me to have strong attachment of fear on cultivation. In 2001, because of distributing truth-clarifying materials, I was arrested and sentenced to forced labor. In the forced labor camp, I witnessed the brutal persecution of practitioners. Because of fear, I compromised against my own will and was afraid to express my attitude to firmly cultivate Dafa.

Because of timidity, I liked to look upon others and didn't take the Fa as Master. Seeing those practitioners who vowed to firmly cultivate Dafa suffer brutal torture (including electric shock, physical punishment, deprivation of sleep and so on) I was very scared. After seeing those who used to be very steadfast compromise, I would think, "Even he cannot hold on. How am I able to?" So, I was resigned to the situation. I even comforted myself, "Wait until I'm out of this place."

At that time, I didn't understand Master's Fa well. I thought that as long as I declared to be firm in my cultivation, the tribulation would be increased. It would be a victory if one could stand up against the brutal torture. Such a thought acknowledges the old force arrangements. In fact, with righteous thoughts and righteous actions, there is no need to suffer the persecution. Many practitioners who do very well in Fa-rectification are not arrested at all. The reason is, I didn't study the Fa well and I lacked righteous belief in Master and Dafa.

To get rid of the attachment of fear, I had to first study the Fa well. I strengthened my Fa study after I got out of the forced labor camp. The attachment of fear should be eliminated gradually while doing the three things. One cannot wait and do nothing until the mentality of fear disappears. It can never happen. After getting out of the forced labor camp, within a short time I wrote an article exposing the persecution and published the cases that I collected in the forced labor camp on Minghui website (Chinese version of Clearwisdom.net).

Then I started to distribute truth-clarifying materials. At first, thoughts came from my human mind. I felt it really unfair that just because of distributing truth-clarifying materials I was sentenced to forced labor. Therefore, I hated the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) very much and had strong competitiveness. I thought, "I just distributed a dozen materials, and you persecuted me. This time, I would distribute as many as I can to seriously expose you and to crush you." Sometimes, I even thought, "If I was arrested again, I would not behave as I did the previous time, and be transformed so easily."

Through study of the Fa and looking inward, I knew that all of these thoughts were not right. How can good people be arrested and detained? How can the evil deserve to test Fa-rectification practitioners? How can a practitioner have hate? In Master's article "Realms" (from Essentials for Further Advancement), Master pointed out,

"A wicked person is born of jealousy. Out of selfishness and anger he complains about unfairness towards himself. A benevolent person always has a heart of compassion. With no discontentment or hatred, he takes hardship as joy. An enlightened person has no attachments at all. He quietly observes the people of the world deluded by illusions."

I began to check my xinxing problem that was exposed in distributing the truth-clarifying materials, and tried to correct it.

On November 15, 2005, Master published the comments on the article of "Expose the Evil Happening Locally to the Local People." I realized how important it was, so I paid more attention to the news on Minghui and the local news. I talked to the practitioners who just recently got out of the forced labor camp and exposed the persecution they endured. In the process of doing so, the attachment of fear has been gradually removed.

Later I found on the Web that there was a local practitioner using photos to expose the persecution. I felt that this was a good idea. Photos were more direct and persuasive, to more effectively clarify the truth. At the same time, I thought that if we could do more, it could decrease the persecution of those practitioners in jail. I decided to take photos in the local forced labor camp and the prisons.

I went to the forced labor camp where I had been detained. At first, I was so scared that my hands were shaking, and I felt like I was doing something wrong by taking pictures. I immediately put away the camera after taking a shot. Seeing a car approaching from far away, I couldn't help but think, "It may come for me." I walked around to hide. Later I thought, I was doing the most sacred things in the world. What did I fear? Gradually I calmed down and became much more stable.

When the photos were published, the effect was very good. With the cooperation of fellow practitioners, I felt more confidence to expose the evil with photos. Later, with the help of fellow practitioners, I took many photos to expose the evil. My state of mind became more and more righteous. Later with the help of fellow practitioners, I went to the detention center and local police stations where practitioners were detained and collected information such as the persecutors' names and their positions.

Through doing these things, I realized it was not a dreadful thing to have fear and the key was to get rid of it through doing the three things. One should not stop because of fear. Even ordinary people have such a saying, "The planning lies with man, the outcome with Heaven." Master said, "The cultivation is up to you, gong is up to the master." (Zhuan Falun) When a practitioner does right, Master will help. As long as we truly cultivate, we can get rid of our attachments. As long as we do with our heart, we can do well.

In the process of doing things, the issue of validating myself was also exposed. For example, after sending the articles and photos to the Minghui website, I expected to see them published, and once they were published, the mentality of showing off and complacency would show up. I liked to talk to fellow practitioners, "What do you think? Excellent work." In the end, it became so bad that I would expose the persecution because I wanted to write articles. I felt like there was nothing to do when there was no persecution in the local area. Behind this thinking was the attachment to prove myself.

Regarding cooperation as a whole, I always liked to do things by myself and didn't like to cooperate with other practitioners even when distributing truth-clarifying materials, because I thought they were too slow and were a burden, and I felt it was more efficient to do this by myself. Through several times cooperating with the practitioners on Fa-rectification, I deeply realized the importance of working as a whole. One must however first eliminate the mentality of selfness in order to cooperate with others well.

This past spring, local national security police started a large-scale arrest sweep. One night three police officers arrested me. They handcuffed me behind my back in the painful "carrying the sword" position and threw me into the police car. I was taken to the police station. At first, my mind was a little unstable. Later I thought, since I already came to the evil's den, let me see it clearly. Normally it was hard to have such an opportunity to expose them. I calmed down and had much less fear.

They took me to a room on the fourth floor. I noticed the sign on the room was "National Security Section." Once I got into the room, a policeman who was around 30 years old put me into a chair and handcuffed my hands to the back of the chair. He started to interrogate me.

He asked me some questions and I answered with "not clear" for all the questions. He said, "It seems you force me to hurt you." He threatened, "Do you know why we arrested you even though you were not in our district? Those who were arrested ahead of you, at first, just like you, refused to answer questions, but in the end they told us everything after being shocked." He got up and got a high voltage electric baton from the adjacent room. I sternly warned the police, "It is not good for you if you do such a thing." He quibbled, "Isn't it you who forces me to do so."

I began to send forth righteous thoughts to eliminate all evil that manipulated the policeman and asked Master for help - making the electric baton fail to work or work in reverse. He asked me again whether I would cooperate. I refused. A policeman came to hit my head. The officer who was interrogating me started to kick me on my lower body and took the electric rod to shock the back of my hands. I kept sending forth righteous thoughts. Somehow the electric baton didn't work. The police checked and started to charge it, and said, "It isn't charged enough." After a while, he said, "We haven't eaten yet. We can't continue to waste time with you. I will go to eat first. You take a good consideration again." The two police officers left.

There was only one left in the room. I began to clarify the truth to him. Later the deputy of the national security division came and interrogated me for a while. I still refused to say anything. Half an hour later, the two policemen that beat me before came back. They asked me, "Have you thought through things?" I looked at him directly. He tried not to contact my eyes. He held the now fully-charged electric baton and tried to shock the back of my hands, but again it didn't work. He said, "What's going on? Is it you who send out Gong?" I said, "Let's not talk about whether I send out Gong or not. There are indeed many supernatural phenomena among Falun Gong practitioners." He said, "If you send out Gong to turn off the light, I will immediately release you." I didn't pay attention to him.

Two of the officers left. At nearly midnight, one of them came back and said to me, "It seems I have to send you away (to a forced labor camp). Do you agree?" I said, "I do not agree. I didn't commit any crimes. The persecution of Falun Gong has no basis in law. It is the heavenly principle that good will be rewarded and evil punished." He said, "I've arrested several hundred Falun Gong practitioners, but I haven't met with any retribution." I gave him some examples of people who received immediate retribution for persecuting Falun Gong. He kept silent and at last he said, "You go back home today. But it is not over yet. Whenever we call you, you must show up." The deputy of the National Security Division ordered his people, "Send him downstairs." With Master's help, I returned home.

This arrest, once again, exposed my attachment of fear. At that time, I just had just come back from other places. At the exit of the train station, I remembered that I heard police always checked people's ID at the train station but I didn't carry it with me. Therefore when I just entered the ticket hall, police came to ask for my ID. I started to panic and sent righteous thoughts, but with strong fear. They recognized my lack of identification and arrested me. Was it a tribulation caused by my own attachment of fear?

The fear has layers. After one layer is removed, there is another behind. Once we find it, just face it and eliminate it. As long as the righteous thoughts come out and one truly believes in Master, the tribulation will be dissolved. The evil and attachments seem strong and stubborn. In fact, they are the garbage of the universe and should be eliminated. They are nothing in front of the firm righteous thoughts of Dafa practitioners.

Not long ago, I lost my job, and then my younger sister was diagnosed with cancer. The doctor said she only had several months to live. My younger sister and I are very close. These two things affected me a lot and I became downhearted. I had tried to look inward but only found out some surface reasons. I didn't see the fundamental reason from the Fa and was also moved by sentimentality. Therefore I became very low-spirited.

Later I exchanged thoughts with fellow practitioners and realized it was the old forces that took advantage of my sentimentality, selfness and human notions to interfere. At last, my sister quickly started to learn the Fa and became very diligent. Now she is very healthy physically and mentally. She even encouraged me with Master's words,

"As you get rid of human mentality, evil naturally disappears" (provisional translation subject to further improvement, "Don't Be Sad," from Hong Yin II).

The most important thing I've realized is that during cultivation, during the process of doing the three things, we should keep looking inward and eliminate human notions. Only when one puts down human thoughts and human notions can one walk the cultivation path well and true, and all the way to the end.

November 7, 2005

Chinese version available at http://www.minghui.org/mh/articles/2005/11/11/114039.html