Life and Death is Human; Righteous Thoughts Pave the Way to Heaven

[PureInsight.org]

1.    Will You Become Cold?
On a certain day in 2015, I suddenly felt dizzy. Upon coughing, large amounts of blood started flowing from my teeth and nose. At the time, my first thought was that I was fine. I told my teeth that it was part of my body, and asked it to stop emitting blood immediately. After a minute, the bleeding stopped. Half a year later, while I was working at a construction site I suddenly became dizzy and collapsed. A worker then took me to a local hospital. I was sent to the emergency room, where I underwent blood testing. A week later I was informed that I had leukemia. In order to not worry my family and therefore affect their cultivation states, I kept this a secret from them as well as from fellow practitioners.

I constantly experience bouts of sharp pain, bleeding, coughing, and dizziness, which interfered with my validating of the Fa. Through long-term group and self Fa-study, I’ve become aware these arrangements were forced upon me by the old forces; they come repeatedly because of my human attachments and personal karma. However we do not accept the old force’s interference and arrangements. I must look inwards based on the Fa so as to eliminate my attachments and improve.

During periods when my righteous thoughts were strong, my condition was fine; at other times, it hit me severely. If while enduring the pain I developed the attachment of fear, my will would start to waver. The attachment of fear can cover up all the positive factors in one’s cultivation and can lead to many more, such as the attachment to saving face, the attachment of anxiety, not wanting to be told by others, competitiveness, showing off, etc. The attachment to being wary of attachments will then further enhance this fear. Cultivation waits for no one. “Fear is a death trap on a human being’s journey toward divinity.” (The Essentials of Diligent Progress VOL. III, Pass the Deadly Test)

One morning, when the intense bodily pain spurred me on to send forth righteous thoughts, I suddenly remembered when I was in New York, venerable Master had said to me three times “Will you become cold?” For a very long time, I had been using human thinking to understand Master’s words. I had thought it was an ordinary phrase referring to that the weather had become cold; words a Master caring for his disciples would say. I did not use a cultivator’s standard in my each and every thought to evaluate the things that I heard. I suddenly enlightened to that the inner meaning behind “Will you become cold” is similar to that of “Cultivate as you did at the beginning, and you are sure to succeed!” (Fa Teaching Given at the 2014 San Francisco Fa Conference). Master was asking me to find that unmovable True thought that I had at the beginning of my cultivation. To not become cold – this is already a righteous thought rooted in the Fa, as well as a thought that truly comes from the heart.

We are too lost in the human world. The human shell in the three realms is just like the Daoist’s Dan-tempering furnace in Journey to the West. The human shell is cultivation’s “golden furnace.” Life and Death is a Fa principle given to humans. But to a cultivator walking on the path to divinity, the question of life and death does not exist, because we are returning to our original true selves. So while we are in this human-shell furnace, we must temper ourselves into a God. Then the fire used to burn this furnace is precisely the Fa in Zhuan Falun. All the hardships that we encounter during the tempering process shape this human shell so that it can be saved along with us —this is the manifestation of compassion. On the other hand, the ego that protects the self must be shed before one can ascend.

After enlightening to the above Fa principle, I felt much lighter. In a brief out-of-body experience, I very clearly saw a pair of huge hands remove the red substance from out of my chest, and then my body become lighter. After I awoke in the early morning, I knew I had made it through. It was Master that removed that accumulated karma from me. I also came to understand Master words in Zhuan Falun, “Cultivation depends on one’s own efforts, while the transformation of gong is done by one’s master.” In the months to follow, the coughing, aching, bleeding, and dizziness all disappeared. Only after walking through this process did I realize that life and death is human; righteous thoughts pave the way to heaven.

2.    There is Never a “Set Time” in Clarifying the Truth

In 2017, my mother, a practitioner, suddenly developed cerebral thrombosis. In order to care for my mother, I took two months off work. At the time, my uncle forced my mother to go to the hospital, but my mother refused. My uncle did not understand Dafa. When I arrived at the hospital, my uncle raised several questions denigrating Dafa. His first question: If your Dafa is this powerful, then ask your Master to allow your mother to be able to walk and talk in three days. Two: Is it true that your Master teaches you to not go to the hospital when sick? Three: If your practice is so powerful, why do some people become paralyzed after practicing?

As I maintained my xinxing and thought about how to reply, my uncle pointed his finger at my nose and said, “If it wasn’t for you introducing Dafa to your mother from the start, she wouldn’t be refusing to come to the hospital and get treatment as she is now. She also wouldn’t have delayed for a week the golden treatment period. Your practice is a cult!” The expressions on my sister and aunts’ faces told me to maintain my xinxing, but I just couldn’t listen to Master and Dafa being defamed without doing anything. There is no such thing as a “set time” in clarifying the truth. In my heart I decided that I would use some understanding closest to humans and based on Fa principles to clarify the truth.  

I told my uncle, “Falun Dafa is an advanced cultivation practice of mind and body. Our Master did not spread the Fa to cure illnesses, but as a cultivator improves in his/her cultivation, it can indeed have the effect of healing illnesses here at this level. If today someone does a bad deed, would it be allowed to absolve him/her of his/her sins at will? Would it work if he/she doesn’t pay for his/her own wrongdoings? You were a former military officer and believe in Buddha. Then you should understand these principles!”

“‘Of course a person needs to take medicine when he gets sick.’ ‘Of course a person needs to go to the hospital for treatment when he gets sick.’ This is how people deal with this, and it isn’t wrong” (Lectures in the United States, Teaching the Fa in New York City). But as a cultivator, one must understand the standard of cultivators. If someone learns the practice like he/she is studying philosophy and doesn’t improve his/her xinxing when dealing with conflicts, then of course he/she is not a cultivator. Then as a human, whatever should happen to him/her will happen to him/her. A human should go to the hospital if he/she is not well.”

“It is like a doctor in a hospital: Because one is a doctor, one should never be ill in this life—how can it be understood like that?” (Zhuan Falun). “If a teacher uses one textbook to teach a class of students, will every student’s grade be the same? Some will score 100 points, while others will not pass. Each student absorbs the teacher’s teachings at a different level. The student’s own circumstances and qualities are also different. You cannot make a blanket statement that this teacher is no good, or that the teacher’s teaching material is no good.”

After I made this reply, the whole room became quiet. I also realized that this was a test given to me. In clarifying the truth, one must do so based on Fa principles, and ordinary people should be able to understand. Clarifying the truth should be done without exceeding the understanding of everyday people and be without attachment. It should be done for the sole purpose of helping the other side understand the truth.

As I was looking after my mother in Taizhong, I said to Master, "Your disciple will not neglect a single fellow practitioner. Master: please strengthen my mother's main consciousness so that she can leave the hospital." I told my uncle that I was going to take my mother out of the hospital. My uncle refused, telling me that if the hospital said that it was okay, then he wouldn't reject. I sent forth righteous thoughts and found the head doctor to talk about leaving the hospital. The doctor said that due to my mother's high blood pressure, it wasn't recommended for her to leave the hospital. If she was to leave, then I would have to help her write and sign a written pledge taking full responsibility. I thought about how once at a group sharing, a fellow practitioner shared how when he was undergoing a sickness karma test with his wife, he was also asked to sign a pledge certifying full responsibility. He mentioned how practitioners in detention centers are made by the evil to sign a pledge. This scene flashed again in my head. How could a Dafa practitioner sign this? I was clear in my heart that this was a trick by the evil. But if I didn't sign it, the hospital would not allow a release. My mother's blood pressure was over 240; the doctor wouldn't allow her to be released either.

Hospitals are akin to cages that confine people. Both my mother's hands were filled with so many needles that she couldn't move them. I know that on the surface, this pledge certified that I would be taking responsibility for any consequences. But in actuality, I knew that in another dimension this was a test to see whether I and my mother truly believed in Master and the Fa. Seeing my mother lying on the bed at dawn that day my fear came out. For the first time, I felt miserable and helpless. Later, I thought of a passage of Fa that I thought of when going through my test in 2015: "You are Dafa disciples, and you can't have fear inside. If a cultivator can truly let go of [the fear of] death, then that death will forever be far removed from you. But this isn't something you can will to happen---it's a point that you cultivate to in the Fa, one at which you become that kind of being" (Teaching the Fa at the 2004 International Fa Conference in New York).

I later softly asked my mother if she was willing to believe in Master and the Fa and leave the hospital. My mother could not articulate clearly, but she nodded her head. I knew that my mother's knowing side was clear. Starting from the morning, the hospital checked my mother's blood pressure four times during the day, and her blood pressure was detected to be in the 170-180 range. The next day I again asked the doctor if my mother's condition had improved enough that she would be able to leave the hospital. The doctor was very surprised and said my mother's blood pressure had decreased so much in just one night. The doctor didn't know the cause, but said that my mother's blood pressure was still higher than normal. Later the doctor said that after looking at my mother's records from her week-long stay in the hospital, it should be fine for her to leave the hospital. It was thus agreed that I wouldn't have to sign a pledge and that it would be fine to conduct the normal procedure for leaving the hospital.

After finishing the procedural work, the doctor told me that there was one thing that puzzled him. When conducting x-rays on my mother's head, he noticed two blood clots in the left region of my mother's head where she had suffered a stroke. It was due to this that my mother's speech was affected and the right side of her body was paralyzed. Yet half of the right region of my mother's head was damaged and deficient of oxygen. Under normal circumstances, the left side of my mother's body should also be paralyzed. Yet my mom didn't have this symptom. Based on the timeline, this symptom should have occurred two years ago. Later I told the doctor that I and mother had cultivated Falun Dafa for five years. It should be that my mother had passed this test, so I took advantage of this opportunity to clarify the truth to the entire team of doctors working in the stroke department of the Wuqitonzhonghe hospital. Thank you Master for this arrangement.

During those days that I was looking after my mother, there was something else that occurred. It was that my older sister had also started on the path of Dafa cultivation. I had given her the book Zhuan Falun five years ago, and this year she had started studying and practicing. For the past two years, my sister had been in poor health; later, I found out that she had been going through radiotherapy. My sister said that she was diagnosed with lymphoma at the end of 2016. When I was preparing to write my experience sharing this year, she sent me a text message saying that she had started to read Zhuan Falun and that the radiotherapy she been doing to control the lymphoma cells was ineffective, and even made it worse. But after she read Zhuan Falun and constantly thought of the book's principles to guide her in her everyday life, in three months, the doctor manning the radiotherapy department told her that the lymphoma cells had suddenly disappeared. The doctor was very surprised. She later sent a text message thanking me and mother for not neglecting her and always urging her to study the Fa and do the exercises. She said it was our cultivation state that allowed her to see the beauty of Dafa and want to take up cultivation. I told sister that we in fact should thank Master. Everything is done by Master. Master was looking after her, while she also didn't give up on herself.

After leaving the hospital, I accompanied my mother in studying the Fa, doing the exercises, and sending forth righteous thoughts daily. My mother's condition improved day by day. A month later, she was able to walk on her own, and was able to be understood when she talked. One day when I and my uncle took her to our home in the South, a neighbor came over to see her. The neighbor asked, "What is this young person's relation to you?" Worn and fatigued, my mother replied, "This is my brother's child." At the time I froze and felt emotional; I felt difficult to breathe and knew this was the human Qing. Later some of Master's words entered my thoughts: "Since one’s real life is one’s Original Soul, the one who gives birth to your Original Soul is your real mother" (Zhuan Falun). Another passage of Fa appeared in my mind: “I want you to cultivate to reach the kind of Consummation that is of a righteous Fa, with righteous enlightenment, and is one in which others come before yourself. That is removing selfishness, being able to remove “self”" (Teaching the Fa at the Fa Conference in Australia). I suddenly then enlightened to another passage of Fa: "Without 'nothing,' it is a human feeling. If it is a human feeling, then it's not bei (compassion)" (Teaching the Fa at the 2004 Western U.S. Fa Conference). Compassion (ci bei) describes the manifestation of a state of Gods that surpasses that of human emotion.

My depressed state lasted for five minutes before my heart suddenly felt light. It is precisely this "self" that protects my selfishness. On the road of cultivation, Master constantly points out to me to enlighten to things based on the Fa, as well as to elevate and eliminate this "self". I should also look at things from others' vantage point, and treat everyone with a cultivator's compassion and righteous thoughts. At this point, I have no words to express the painstaking efforts Master made in saving his disciple.

3. Nine Day Ascent to the Heavens; The Grace of the Golden Buddha Body

Since obtaining the Fa in 2012, I once had a dream where I was surrounded by 12 light-emitting people wearing white monk garments. Some people had long curly gold hair; others had short curly blue hair. I was teaching them the exercises. All I knew at the time was that in the universe was a huge asteroid, on it engraved a blue dragon mark which flashed a flickering golden light. Under the dragon claws of the dragon were some cloud patterns; on the clouds I could vaguely see 10 or so rows of ancient text. It looked a little like oracle script or seal script. Later, after I had obtained the Fa for 4 months or so, I was lucky to become a volunteer at a 9-day lecture series.

The classes were a cultivation experience not only for new students, but also for veteran students and volunteers. Conflicts would occur when some ordinary people were averse to volunteers using their hands to correct their exercise movements. Some people were very attached to studying the exercise movements, and would use human thinking to judge and argue right and wrong. In actuality, this was a process for them to remove their attachments.

In 2013 Master let me see that during the lecture series, while watching the lectures, rotating within every person in the class—whether a volunteer, practitioner, or ordinary person, was a transparent glass-like Falun the size of a thumb. When the Falun struck the body, a loud sound—similar to that of a tower clock or a drum, would emit, eliminating all the karma and notions on the person's body. It is just like, "At the mallet’s drumming one knows to be diligent; The Fa drum rouses those lost in confusion" (Hong Yin II).

When the nine-day class finished, I saw the changes on the bodies of practitioners. Master planted varying degrees of golden shining lotus seeds in the bodies of new practitioners. The idea was that during future true cultivation, the lotus flower would grow alongside the immortal infant until the golden lotus fully blossomed, after which the immortal infant would rotate on top the golden lotus. When veteran practitioners come to the class, if their xinxing is up to par, one can clearly see different colored Falun emblems on the bottom of the lotus flower. It constantly turns to help the student adjust mechanisms that have gone awry, as well as purify the body. The immortal infant can also be seen growing at a fast rate. Every time I see these manifestations, I know that it is Master using His boundless compassion and Fa power to help students purify their body. At the same time, it is helping students bear a portion of karma that previously belonged to themselves.

During true cultivation, to understand cultivation and elevate requires one to know the high level Fa.

"We’ve said that your main consciousness has to be aware, for this practice cultivates your own self. You should progress with an alert mind" (The Great Way of Spiritual Perfection). At the same time, one must use the highest principles of Zhen, Shan, and Ren to evaluate oneself rather than others, as well as meet the xinxing requirements set for us by the principles of the practice. This book also states, "Those who focus solely on the exercises but neglect character cultivation will not be acknowledged as Falun Dafa disciples. Dafa students thus need to make studying the Law and reading the books the essential part of their daily cultivation"(The Great Way of Spiritual Perfection).

Towards the end of Master's Fa Rectification, I hope all veteran students can return to the lecture classes to hear Master lecture on the Fa, as well as set straight any mechanisms that have gone awry. This is being responsible to oneself, sentient beings, and to Master. We must not only do the three things well, but study the Fa and do the exercises, send forth righteous thoughts, clarify the truth, and finally, be worthy of the title of Fa-Rectification Period Dafa Disciple and a disciple painstakingly saved by Master.

Finally, I would like to give this poem as a tribute to great, benevolent Master.

True Thoughts

Body at the low levels, a disheveled world

True Thoughts accompany me as I enter the universe

The mind at higher realms, the Fa light shines

Falun Dafa, cultivate xinxing

Look inward, find the reason, and the mist dissolves

Zhen Shan Ren is good, save sentient beings

Fa Disciples, an unwavering mind and will

The Fa sound disseminates the human realm

Thank you great, benevolent Master, thank you fellow disciples.

Translated from: http://www.zhengjian.org/node/240946