(Minghui.org) I began to practice Falun Dafa in 1996 when I was 58. By diligently doing the three things, my cultivation has gone well and I have made considerable progress, though not without formidable challenges.
Blood on the Sheets
One morning during the summer of 2017, I found blood on my bedsheets. Blood appeared on the days that followed, and I became weaker with each passing day.
Soon, I started to look pale and walking became difficult. My daughter noticed and commented, “Mom, why are you losing so much weight? Let's go to the hospital.” I replied, “Don't worry, I'll be fine in a couple of days.” She wasn't satisfied and urged me to go, but I held my ground.
Watery Dreams
That night I had a dream that really got me looking inward. I was walking by a small creek and saw a man sitting on a rock up ahead of me. As I approached him, I could see that he had a mean look about him.
When I attempted to walk past him, he lunged at me and tried to push me into the water. He tried three times but did not succeed.
I awoke with a start and knew that the dream was a hint from Master, but I couldn't figure out what it meant.
A Visit to the Hospital
Blood continued to appear each day, and I began to pass out for short periods of time. When a couple of practitioners came to send forth righteous thoughts with me, I passed out several times. My children saw me lose consciousness. They overrode my resistance and took me to the hospital.
As soon as we arrived I proclaimed, “I don't belong here. Please take me home.” Then I passed out again. When I came to, I heard the doctor tell my children, “Your mother has late stage cancer. I am sorry, but there is nothing we can do for her.
My kids wanted a second opinion and took me to the provincial hospital. The doctor there said the same thing: “Her cancer has spread all over her body and her tumor has festered. There is nothing we can do for her. Please take her home and prepare for the worst.”
Faith in Dafa
Everyone in my village knew that I practiced Dafa. I was concerned that if I died of cancer, some people might get the wrong impression of Dafa.
The situation was beyond my control. I had no choice but to let go of my concern for whether I lived or died and put all my trust in Master.
Master said:
“But all the same, Master doesn't acknowledge them. And you shouldn't acknowledge them either. Do things well in an upright and dignified way, negate them, and strengthen your righteous thoughts some. "I'm Li Hongzhi's disciple, I don't want other arrangements or acknowledge them"--then they won't dare to do that.” (“Fa-Lecture During the 2003 Lantern Festival at the U.S. West Fa Conference”)
I thought to myself, “I have practiced Dafa for so many years. My body has been completely transformed by high energy matter and my level has already surpassed the three realms. How could I still have cancer? It is all an illusion. I must negate all the old force arrangements.”
Inundated with Water
Once, when I was trying to send forth righteous thoughts, I lost consciousness and dreamed that I was standing on a bridge that spanned a flooded river. Only the handrails remained above the water.
I tried to cross the bridge when the water level suddenly surged and the handrails disappeared below the surface.
Out of nowhere a rope suddenly appeared hanging in front of me. I grabbed it, hoping to swing to the other side. But instead, I ended up dangling at the end of the rope over the middle of the river,
Hanging on with the last of my strength, I looked down and saw several practitioners sending forth righteous thoughts for me.
I shouted, “Master, please help me.” Suddenly, a force pushed me across the river and I landed safely on the shore.
My symptoms improved for a few days, but then they worsened. The bleeding increased and I lost even more weight. I fainted frequently and I could hardly talk.
I couldn't study the Fa in that condition, so I listened to the recordings of Master's Fa-lectures instead. I listened to them nonstop and negated the old forces’ arrangements.
I constantly looked inward, trying to find my loophole. What was it that I was holding onto?
One afternoon I entered into an altered state and had a vision that I was standing in a pool of beautiful blue water. I was taken by the beauty of the heavenly scene when all of a sudden, the water began to rise. Soon it was up to my chest. As the water rose over my jaw, I felt that I was going to drown so I shouted, “Master, please save me.” The scene instantly disappeared and I fell into a deep sleep.
When I woke up, my daughter asked me if I was okay, and I said I was. I knew in my heart that Master had saved me again. I wondered why my dreams always had water in them. I looked inside and thought about it deeply.
Master said,
“People act for the sake of emotional bonds, and emotion follows you everywhere you go. Everything human about this world stems from emotion, from likes to dislikes, from joys to sorrows, love to hate. And so you will have problems in spiritual practice if you don’t manage to free yourself of it.” (The Fourth Talk, Zhuan Falun)
Remembering Master's words led me to realize that my symptoms must be related to my feelings for my children.
Submerged in Emotion
One day I ran into my daughter on her way to my house in tears. She was coming to tell me that her son and his wife had bullied her.
That really got me going: “What? Nobody can bully my daughter!” I told her to come with me to talk to them. She said, “Please just let it be. If I stay at your place for a few days, it will blow over.” I refused to listen and made her come with me.
When we got to her home, I confronted my grandson and his wife: “You two bullied her and hurt her feelings. That makes me angry!” Even though there were many bystanders, I proceeded to scold them for three hours straight before I finally let up. When I looked back, I could see that my behavior then was terrible. Where was my compassion? Where was my tolerance?
There I was with the symptoms of incurable cancer when I suddenly realized that my entire relationship with my kids was driven by my attachment to emotion. I suddenly understood why I had been dreaming about water: I was drowning in my own emotion.
With the realization of how attached I was, I broke down and knelt in front of Master's portrait. I resolved to eliminate my attachment to sentimentality as well as my show-off mentality.
A Ladder to Heaven
As soon as my attachments were identified and I committed to getting rid of them, the bleeding stopped and I could eat again. Three days later, I was riding my tricycle around the village and talking with the people I knew.
When my neighbors saw that I was not only alive but out riding my tricycle, they were stunned.
One dumbfounded man said, “I thought you had passed away. But here you are, out riding around as usual.” Another said, “You’re still alive? The doctor said you would not survive. This is incredible!” The lady next door said, “She practices Falun Dafa. That must be why she got better. Falun Dafa is really great.”
By identifying that my behavior was driven by emotion and vowing to improve myself and get rid of my attachments, Master blessed me with a new life. The illusion of illness disappeared. My weight returned to normal and my complexion assumed a rosy glow.
Since then I have been full of energy. I can hand out fliers and do what a Dafa disciple should.
I will do my utmost to help people learn the truth and hold myself to the standards of a Dafa disciple.
Category: Improving Oneself