By a Falun Dafa practitioner from Ireland

Greetings to Respected Master!

Greetings to fellow practitioners!

I obtained the Fa and started practicing cultivation in May 2004. At the beginning I walked into cultivation practice with an attachment to pursue a good life and to make my body healthier. However, I learned that Dafa was a good practice that can only be found once in ten thousand years. Everyday I insisted on studying the Fa and doing exercises after work even when it was very late. I watched the video lectures of Master and tried to make every thought of mine correct. I cherished every chance that I could improve my xinxing. I went to the Chinese Embassy to send forth righteous thoughts and utilized different methods to clarify the truth

Showered with compassionate Master's grace, I was often given hints to guide my cultivation. When I can hold a pure heart and do well in Fa study, exercises, sending forth righteous thoughts, and truth clarification, I can feel the supernatural manifestations. Through studying the Fa, I have gradually understood that Fa Rectification Dafa disciples shoulder the mission of saving sentient beings and help Master to rectify the Fa. I let go of the attachments I had when I obtained the Fa. I feel that I am the most fortunate and blessed being on the earth. Gods from all the cosmos are envious of us for becoming Fa-rectification period Dafa disciples.

During the process of letting go, I often blamed myself and became depressed. Then Master arranged fellow practitioners to talk with me and give me support and encouragement. They studied the Fa with me and encouraged me to send forth righteous thoughts outside the Chinese Embassy. In the end, I obtained firm righteous thoughts. No matter how difficult it is, I will firmly walk well the path of Fa Rectification that Master has arranged for me. If I fall down, I just need to stand up immediately. I will deny the old forces themselves, instead of cultivating and improving in the tribulations arranged by the old forces.

Through this experience, I realized that the old forces just cannot position well the relationship between personal cultivation and Fa Rectification cultivation. They take personal cultivation as being most important. If we are attached to ourselves, actually we are cultivating in the arrangements of the old forces. If we can really understand the responsibility of Fa Rectification Period Dafa disciples, eliminate our attachments and cultivate ourselves well, put Dafa and sentient beings as our first priority at every moment, then the old forces will have no excuse to test us any more.

Master mentioned in "Fa Teaching at the U.S. Capital 2007:"

"Aside from what you as individuals need to go through and establish on your final road to Consummation, what is most important for you and most significant right now is to save people."

I have found a big gap between me and those diligent practitioners. Those practitioners always keep in their mind the sentient beings we have to save and the projects of validating the Fa. In comparison, I often spent time blaming myself for not cultivating well and thought about myself all the time. What is most important is to study the Fa well everyday, send forth righteous thoughts, and make good use of all our time to save sentient beings.

In June this year, I participated in the third truth clarification car tour in Ireland. Together six of us visited seven cities in Ireland. During the last week of our car tour, the weather changed very often. It was often raining and windy. There were a lot of difficulties. However, all of us were very determined in our hearts. Bad weather did not affect our determination to tell people the facts about the persecution.

In each city, we went to meet the local councilors and media to tell them about the brutal persecution that Falun Gong is being subjected to in China and the violent nature of the Chinese Communist Party. Many kind people had never heard of Falun Dafa before. Through this car tour, many people got to know about Falun Dafa. They were shocked by the CCP's brutality in persecuting Falun Gong and harvesting organs from living practitioners. They signed our petitions to condemn the CCP brutality.

Many Chinese students have also learned more about the persecution. They were very angry about the violence the CCP uses. Several Chinese people said that they wanted to quit all the CCP organizations. During the car tour, after we finished the event on the streets and returned to the hostel, we studied the Fa together and then shared our experiences of that day and exchanged understandings about some problems. Every morning, we studied Master's new lectures together.

One day, because the weather was bad and we were not familiar with the locations, we went the wrong way as we looked for a hostel. The driver--and also a practitioner--was very impatient. I told him not to panic. He lost his temper with me. I immediately guarded my xinxing and looked inside. It was my problem that I did not consider how tired that practitioner was after driving for a long time with a full load of newspapers and boards on truth clarification. In this conflict, my attachment to complaining and seeking outwardly added more difficulties to my fellow practitioners' cultivation. I talked with him kindly and he also realized that he should not look at things from the outside, but should look inside and do more sending forth righteous thoughts to eliminate the interference.

This incident has also made me enlighten to the fact that when we have conflicts with fellow practitioners or when we see other practitioners having tribulations, we should look inward and exchange understandings from the perspective of the Fa principles. We should not regard the behavior of interference as if it were done by his true self. When we can put down our ego, our righteous thoughts are the greatest help to the practitioner, which will be a denial of the old forces' interference and persecution on him or her. We should definitely not blame or scold fellow practitioners, otherwise the evil's aim of interfering with our saving sentient beings would be accomplished and our blame would make our fellow practitioners' tribulations more severe.

After returning from the car tour, I studied the Fa a lot. I also increased the number of times I send forth righteous thoughts each day. I attended the events in Parnell St. or outside the Embassy to spread the Nine Commentaries and to try to persuade people to quit the three Communist organizations. For a time, I felt that I lacked compassion. I talked about the truth of Dafa, I talked about the tide of quitting the CCP, and I talked about prophecies, but my listeners still hesitated.

When I could purify my heart and genuinely consider things from the perspective of the listener, I could clarify the truth using my wisdom as well as my heart. Then the listener would be able feel that I was not talking just to persuade him, but really for his own benefit, that I wanted him to quit the Party and make himself safe and have a good future. At this time, Master's Fashen would be able to eliminate the bad elements in his head and let him quit the Party with righteous thoughts.

Once when I studied Master's "Fa Lecture in Vancouver Canada," I felt that Master was giving me a hint to go to the US to attend the Washington DC Fa Conference on July 20. So I started to prepare my visa application. I was holding a calm heart without any pursuit. The whole visa application process was very smooth. I realized that it was because of merciful Master's reinforcement so that I would be able to see Master during this precious period of Fa Rectification Cultivation. During the days in Washington DC, I participated in a public rally to end the eight years of the persecution by the CCP towards Falun Gong and to support the 24 million Chinese people who have quit the CCP. There was also a candlelight vigil to mourn the practitioners who had been persecuted to death and other activities.

My deepest impression was that the parade to support quitting the CCP was moving forward with great strength and vigor all along the streets of Washington, DC. I could see neither the start nor the end. The sound of practitioners' horns and drums penetrated the time spaces level upon level, which frightened the evil as we shook the whole colossal firmament. The sentient beings were awakened one after anther and chose justice and a bright future.

Recently, I have often read fellow practitioners' sharing articles about stopping the persecution immediately. I obtained the Fa after July 20, 1999, and have not experienced that evil persecution. After obtaining the Fa I have directly walked into anti-persecution efforts, saving sentient beings of Fa Rectification cultivation. When the projects to validate the Fa became more intense, I sometimes have taken the projects of truth clarification as routine work and have not reached a clear understanding that this persecution itself should not exist at all and it should not last for one extra minute or one extra second. The whole persecution must be stopped immediately. So from now on, at every moment, let us deny the old forces' arrangements in every one of our thoughts and let us together stop this persecution that should not have existed at all.

To conclude, please allow me to quote Master's Fa in the "Fa Lecture in the Canadian Fa Conference in 2005",

"Everything here in human society was established for Fa-rectification, and all that exists today exists for the sake of my Dafa disciples validating the Fa. Remember: you are the stars of today's world, you are the lives that sentient beings are watching the most intently and you are beings who are determining the future of every person in the human world!"

Posting date: 11/3/2007
Original article date: 11/3/2007
Category: Practitioners' Insights
Chinese version available at http://minghui.org/mh/articles/2007/10/10/164242.html