The Process of Cultivation Is a Process of Letting Go of the Attachment to Self

By Meizhen, a practitioner in Jilin Province, China

(Clearwisdom.net) I began my cultivation in 1998. Immersed in Teacher's boundless benevolence, I have traveled along with other Dafa disciples through the path of Fa-rectification cultivation amidst the roughest storms. Recalling my cultivation experiences in the past few years, I find it difficult to describe my feelings and cannot help but sigh, and I cannot stop my tears from falling. It is a combined emotion involving my steadfast belief in Teacher and Dafa, and my fellow practitioners' helping me along the way with their unselfishness and righteous thoughts. I want to share my experiences by describing an incident below. I hope that by discussing them with my fellow practitioners, it will help us do better in the future on our Fa-rectification path.

It was June 2006. With the care of Teacher and Dafa disciples' righteous thoughts, I was released from a local detention center. The rough treatment of forced-feeding by prison guards during my hunger strikes in the detention center led to my tuberculosis and having much liquid accumulated in my lungs. It got worse after I came home. I coughed day and night and was unable to breathe. I threw up phlegm one mouthful after another, followed by blood and black phlegm. My lung was failing. My family wanted to take me to the hospital, but I knew that it was not an illness and refused. I struggled in pain for over a month, but things did not improve any. Often times I could not breathe and nearly died as a result. I began to worry. I thought that if I died, it would impede the salvation of some sentient beings. I lost my righteous thoughts and let my family take me to the hospital. I did not know at the time that by doing that I was acknowledging the persecution by the old forces. My husband borrowed some money and took me to the TB hospital. I was too weak to hold a book, and thus could not study the Fa. I did not know what to do since there were no practitioners around me. I hope that practitioners will avoid having conflicts with each other in the future. We need to communicate and visit each other more often and help each other, and not leave the practitioners that are under tribulations alone.

We went to the hospital in the afternoon. While capable of being on my feet at home, I could not do it as soon as I was in the hospital and my condition worsened dramatically thereafter. I began to lose it at 11 PM, not able to breathe on my own and having to rely on oxygen. I was not getting any better after four bags of oxygen in one shot. I told my husband to switch hospitals immediately and in the meantime I kept asking Teacher in my mind, "Teacher, please save me. I cannot die no matter what. While whether I die or not is unimportant, and I have no problem letting go the attachment to my own life, I am concerned that my dying will affect Dafa. I can never let myself taint Dafa's reputation." I thought that if I died, the impact would be huge. The whole city would know. My own little town all knew that I had been persecuted and put in jail many times because of my doing exercises and not giving up my beliefs. Despite my family being broken up by the persecution, I did not give up my beliefs. Now, if suddenly I died, they would think that Dafa was no good and it was all fake. It would have affected all of my friends and relatives, and more sentient beings would have missed the opportunity to be saved. So I had a steadfast thought in my mind: "I cannot die no matter what, and please, Teacher, save me." I asked my husband help me to switch hospitals and I asked for help from Teacher whenever my head was clear.

My husband found a taxi, put me in it and had the taxi drive toward the city hospital. I passed out after that, knowing nothing about what happened on the road, how we got up the floors in the hospital, how the doctor took my blood samples, how he could not find my vein, and how he told my husband to prepare for my funeral, etc. When I woke up, I felt that something was in my nostril that made me uncomfortable (the oxygen tube). I lied there motionlessly, not knowing where I was. Then my husband came in. He was excited seeing that I was awake and came to hold my hand, and he told me what had happened while I was unconscious. Then, I knew that I was lying in a room in the internal medicine department on the sixth floor of the city hospital.

My husband told me, "The day is breaking soon. Your parents will be here. You are okay now. Just rest quietly." He then pointed to the two IV bottles overhanging my head and said, "They are saline solutions. Only one has some medicine in it. We had almost used up all the money at the TB hospital and had only one hundred Yuan left. The hospital refused to give you medicine without our paying first, so only a saline solution was used."

I cried. I knew that Teacher had saved me again upon seeing my precious few righteous thoughts. Right after daybreak, my brother and sister-in-law, nephew, and niece all came. I cried again. I knew that they had come to bid me farewell. If it weren't for the benevolence of Dafa and Teacher, I would not be still alive in this world. My family members would not be seeing a living me.

Through negating the old forces' attempt to take away my life, taint Dafa's reputation, and interfere with saving sentient beings, I came to understand that no matter what the environment is like, or however dangerous the situation is, we need to put away our attachments to ourselves while validating Dafa. We need to forget about our own gain or loss, eliminate the selfish nature of the old universe, and unconditionally think of others. We need to think for the sentient beings and the needs of Fa-rectification. Only then will we no longer be selfish and become a "for-others" life that is assimilated with Dafa. We will then be able to escape from the control of the factors of the old universe. Teacher will be able to help us, turning dangerous situations into safe ones, and let us reach the good state beyond the turmoil. While our own fame or interests are being harmed, or we ourselves are being tortured and in pain, or we are on the verge of losing our lives, as Dafa disciples we need still be thinking about whether others are being affected and whether sentient beings can be saved. Not being concerned about oneself and entirely being for the good of others is indeed the manifestation of a Dafa disciple's greatness and benevolence. It is the manifestation of Dafa in the human world and it is the everlasting virtue and power of Dafa in the universe.

It has been four years since Teacher and Dafa gave me a second life. But every time I think of it I cannot help but cry. I cannot describe my deep gratitude for Teacher's benevolence and the immense compassion of Dafa. All I can do is to trust Teacher and Dafa even more steadfastly. I will work with fellow practitioners to use our actions to validate Dafa and to accomplish what Teacher wants us to do for the Fa-rectification. This way we will be able to meet Teacher's expectations when he saved us, and will meet sentient beings' hopes for us.

I am writing this article to let everyone know my personal experience of being saved by Teacher and Dafa, which is a realization of Teacher and Dafa's saving disciples, rectifying the Fa, and saving sentient beings. I hope this will help all of us in our cultivation. We will be more steadfast in our belief in Teacher and Dafa, and will walk the future path better. Thank you everyone.

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