Triumph over the Demon of Sleepiness

Written by a Falun Gong practitioner in Beijing

(Clearwisdom.net) I am a Falun Gong practitioner in Beijing. I attained Dafa in 1997. In 2001 I was locked up in a brainwashing class, and I lost my way due to my shallow understanding of the Fa. I was transformed and went down a wrong path. In 2004, when I was in the deepest confusion and pain, Master gave me many hints. I suddenly awakened and realized that I was on the wrong path.

It was very hard to describe my feelings after I came back to the Fa. I followed Master's direction and spent most of my time studying the Fa. Instead of being passive about the mistakes I had made, I tried to eliminate the interference and catch up. I realized that time is very precious, and that I needed to catch up with more effort and follow Master's Fa-rectification process since I had lost a lot of time. I quickly went into a relatively good state. Everyday I tried my best to do the three things well. I thought I should be more diligent, but I did not know from which aspect I should improve myself.

At this time one fellow practitioner brought me a truth-clarifying flier with directions on how to break through the Internet blockade and access the Minghui website. I was able to access the website smoothly. I knew clearly that Master was helping me and that I needed to improve in my understanding of the Fa. I read many articles of fellow practitioners sharing experiences and enlightened to a lot of things. Some fellow practitioners only sleep 2-3 or 3-4 hours a day. They reduce the time for sleep to handle tight schedules. I also tried to break through in this aspect. I used to sleep 8-9 hours a day. I reduced it to 6 hours and now I sleep only 5 hours a day.

At the beginning, I was very sleepy when I studied the Fa. I thought: fellow practitioners work so hard, and this is nothing to me since I sleep much more than they do. I kept on encouraging myself not to put down the book. Once I read an article by a fellow practitioner: she talked to her eyes when she was sleepy when studying the Fa. I then talked to my eyes: "You are the tools for me to study the Fa. You should follow my requirements. You should not be sleepy or tired. You should be energetic." With a strong will I continued to study the Fa. When I was extremely sleepy and could not keep my eyes open, I would sleep for a while with the book in my hands. At the beginning I would sleep for an hour. It gradually went down to half an hour, to 20 minutes, and to 10 minutes. Each time when I woke up from a sound sleep, I would rub my eyes, shake my head, and continue to study the Fa.

Due to lack of sleep, my complexion was pale. The look of fatigue was obvious on my face, but I continued like this day after day. Every time when I took a nap, I would think about when to wake up, and I would wake up at the time I planned. I knew that seeing my will to be diligent, Master was by my side looking after me all the time. I was very touched, and this encouraged me to be more diligent.

In the area of sending forth righteous thoughts I also made progress. At the beginning I could not guarantee sending forth righteous thoughts everyday at the four set times. Later on I was able to do it on time. Then I tried to send forth righteous thoughts at the three set times every Sunday morning. At the beginning I would do it at 5:00 a.m. and 6:00 a.m. and then I would continue to sleep. I realized that I was still wasting time and I rearranged my schedule: After sending forth righteous thoughts at 5:00 a.m. I would practice exercises 1, 3 and 4. After sending forth righteous thoughts at 6:00 a.m., I would practice exercise 2. After sending forth righteous thoughts at 7:00 a.m., I would take a short break, do some chores around the house, (all my family members are practitioners, so I have a very good environment at home) and start to study the Fa. This meant that I had another hour to study the Fa.

In nearly three months, with Master's compassionate care, I finally broke through the demon of sleepiness. At present I only sleep for about five hours every day, but I am not sleepy at all during the day. At the end of the day, my face still looks energetic and refreshed.

During this period of time, Dafa kept showing me new principles. I would like to share what I enlightened to with my fellow practitioners.

Once I read in Chapter Six of Zhuan Falun:

"Let me give you an example. There was this person who was tied to a bed. They lifted his arm and told him that they would make him bleed to death. Then they blindfolded him, scratched his wrist (they didn't make him bleed even a bit), and turned on a water faucet to have him hear the dripping sound. He thought that his blood was dripping, and in no time he was dead. But actually, they didn't make him bleed one bit -- it was the tap water that was dripping. His mind caused his death. When you always think that you've got health problems, you might just give yourself health problems. That's because your character has dropped to the level of an ordinary person, and of course ordinary people do get health problems."

From reading this passage, I understood that one's main consciousness has to be strong and not just believe whatever others say. When I read the above passage again, I had another understanding about the attachment to life. Without fear of death and letting go the attachment to life, one will not die. Not being able to give up this attachment, one will die. Life and death depend on one thought. Non-practitioners are afraid of death. We Dafa practitioners are beyond ordinary people's things, so we can let go of everything in the human world.

We practitioners need to have a cultivation environment. We should not give up cultivation due to fear when there are people who are against Dafa, slandering Dafa and even persecuting Dafa. Teacher said, "Regardless of who or what social forces tell you not to practice cultivation anymore, you then give up your cultivation. Do you practice cultivation for them?" ("For Whom Do You Practice Cultivation?" in Essentials for Future Advancement) We should cultivate righteously.

"When there are flies and mosquitoes in our homes we can drive them out and install screens to keep them from getting in. But if you can't drive them out sometimes, it's okay to kill them. If they bite people and harm people in people's residences, of course we should drive them out. And when they can't be driven out, we can't just watch them bite people there. You're a practitioner so it's not a problem for you, you're immune to them. But your family members don't practice, they're ordinary people, so there's a concern about getting a contagious disease. So you can't just watch them bite your kid's face and not do anything about it." (Zhuan Falun)

As practitioners, we are not interested in the changes in the ordinary human world. However, the persecution has started. Just like when there are flies and mosquitoes at home we need to get them out or keep them outside, we need to clarify the truth to people, expose the evil and eliminate the evil. In particular we need to help people understand the evil nature of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) so that they can resign from the CCP and remove the mark of the beast from themselves. This is the most urgent thing to do to save sentient beings. The vicious suppression and persecution are like flies and mosquitoes that are poisoning people. We practitioners are not afraid of these things, but people are misled and poisoned by the lies. We cannot merely stand by and watch while this happens. This is the main purpose for us to be in this world and obtain Dafa. It is our grand wish and promise that we made in a prehistoric time

When I read the paragraph about Shakyamuni asking his disciple to clean the tub, I enlightened to the same principle.

During Fa study, the inner meaning of Dafa is continuously revealed to me. The more I study the Fa, the more I want to read it. I know that Master is giving me hints all the time. When I enlighten to one layer of the Fa principles, I can feel the change to my mind and body, which is beyond description. Only by being diligent, following Master closely during Fa-rectification, and doing the three things well can I be worthy of Master's compassionate salvation and fulfill the grand wish from a prehistoric time.

Please point out anything that is incorrect in my understanding.

March 24, 2005

Chinese version available at http://www.minghui.org/mh/articles/2005/3/28/98261.html

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