(Minghui.org) Nearly half of the practitioners in our area have fallen asleep during the meditation exercise during morning group practice over the past two years. They might wake up for a short period of time, but then fall asleep again.

We've talked about this with some of them, and they knew this was happening but couldn't overcome the sleepiness. After a while, they simply accepted it.

I occasionally fell asleep during meditation, too. But I would always meditate again later in the day, making sure I was clear-headed and didn't fall asleep. It appears that this is related to my human notions of getting up early and not having enough sleep, because I only started feeling sleepy when we started doing the exercises together early in the morning.

If one sleeps during the meditation exercise, it means that the person's master soul isn't practicing and the meditation is in vain.

An elderly practitioner passed away recently due to illness karma. She only slept for a couple of hours each day, because she had been making phone calls to tell people about Falun Gong and the persecution during the night for the past few years.

Fellow practitioners admired her persistence and heart to save more lives, but they also noticed that she fell asleep during meditation and while sending forth righteous thoughts. Practitioners had shared this with her, but we didn't see any improvement regarding her sleepiness.

I was wondering what excuses the old forces used to take her life and thought that one loophole might be that she hadn't truly been practicing the meditation exercise for many years.

Master has taught us about this:

“When a person does the exercises in that state his body is being evolved to its fullest extent. It’s the best state. So that’s why we have you enter into stillness in that kind of state. But don’t go to sleep or get all foggy-headed. Somebody else might practice and get the good things then.” (Zhuan Falun)

Fellow practitioners, please pay attention to the human notion of sleepiness and overcome it based on your own situation. If you are not getting enough sleep, please consider sleeping more--or send forth righteous thoughts to clear out the interference of sleepiness.

The above is my personal understanding. Please kindly correct me whatever is inappropriate.