By a Falun Dafa practitioner in Toronto

(Clearwisdom.net) In 1992 I emigrated from China to Canada. My husband started to practice Falun Gong in 1997 and at that time I took it as some qigong for improving one's health. I really didn't understand what Falun Gong was or about its practitioners. Last year I started practicing Falun Gong. Now I really realize my good fortune and regret missing the earlier opportunity to practice.

My husband had been in poor health and was searching for a qigong to cure his illness. In 1997 he started to practice Falun Gong, so at that time I got a chance to read the main book of Falun Gong, Zhuan Falun. I spent three months carefully reading this book. I agreed with many topics mentioned and related very much to the idea of being a good person. Also I felt that this book went beyond just being a good person, but I did not understand the inner meaning of cultivation practice. At that time I only knew that Falun Gong was a good qigong that taught people to behave well and helped people to stay healthy. With my husband, I did attend an experience sharing conference to listen to Teacher Li's speech. As I was already very healthy and thought I was a good person, I did not practice Falun Gong although I knew it was good.

In 1997, my husband and I set up a coffee shop and business was good. In 1999 I decided to run the shop myself and let my husband go to college. He began to study computers. One day while driving to school, he hit someone riding a bicycle. He dragged bicycle and rider several meters. My husband was scared to death. Amazingly, the rider was not hurt and the bicycle only had a little damage. The cyclist was satisfied to receive less than 100 dollars.

All my patient persuasion was in vain--my husband was unwilling to go back to school. This, plus the slanderous propaganda of the Chinese media against Falun Gong, made me blame his cultivation practice, and I drifted away from Falun Gong.

In 2004, before the appearance of the "Nine Commentaries on the Communist Party," I had a vivid dream. In the dream a great catastrophe was coming and people were busy trying to escape. I squeezed onto a crowded truck with one of my legs dangling out. I saw many red and white ghosts chasing people in the streets. As the ghosts caught and fell on each person they would disappear. Suddenly a red ghost came close to the truck and grabbed my leg. I was so frightened my own outcry woke me from the nightmare.

At the end of 2004, the Nine Commentaries was published by The Epoch Times as a series of editorials and I read them from beginning to end. The mentioning of the evil spirit made me think about my frightening dream. Still badly shaken, I remembered what my husband had told me about the suffering and desperation in human society, how valuable a chance to cultivate this is, and how cultivation practice may change our fates.

From the commentary articles I sensed, for the first time in 50 years, that I had a clear understanding of the CCP. I also realized how easily a person might be deceived and how helpless and fragile our lives are. I started to consider how to free myself from this helplessness and how to change my fate via cultivation practice. Thus, again I picked up the book Zhuan Falun. Judging practitioners from what this book says, I finally realized what cultivation practice is and why the chance to cultivate is so invaluable. Then I decided to practice Falun Gong.

I used to look at Falun Gong as a practice for individual improvement. Now, reading the book Zhuan Falun again, I sensed that Falun Gong practitioners are all well respected. Although they may still have shortcomings or make mistakes, they squarely face up to them and try hard to improve when their mistakes are pointed out to them. They are constantly rectifying themselves. Although I think I may be better than some practitioners, I could not constantly rectify myself as they do. Take my husband for example. He has greatly improved. His health is much better and his bad habits are gone. He really follows the requirement of the practice during any conflict; he puts others before himself and searches inwardly for his own improvement.

After beginning to practice in 2005, I volunteered to work for The Epoch Times newspaper. Many of the tasks on the newspaper require the use of computers. In the beginning I was basically computer-illiterate. After some practice on the keyboard, my first page of Chinese text took four hours to finish. At 50, I started learning how to use the computer, including picture processing and type setting. The difficulties and setbacks would have made me give up had I not been practicing Falun Dafa.

Currently I measure myself by the standard of a Falun Gong practitioner. With my own improvements, the previous difficulties that had appeared so great now seem to be smaller. I have made it through hardships and after they are over, the difficulty is nothing and as transient as a fleeting cloud.

I am now a type-set editor at the newspaper. Cultivation practice makes my heart and spirit purer and purer as well as making me healthier physically and mentally. I used to frequently suffer from insomnia, lose of appetite, and lost sleep over minor things or I worried needlessly over little insignificant things. Now I am free and happier, as I do not taking personal gain so seriously.

It is really so fortunate to be a Falun Dafa practitioner. Sometimes I think if I had started to practice Falun Gong earlier, back in 1997, it would have been even better.

Posting date: 6/9/2006
Original article date: 6/9/2006
Category: Personal Cultivation
Translated on 5/29/2006
Chinese version available at http://www.minghui.org/mh/articles/2006/5/24/128614.html

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