(Clearwisdom.net) After reading articles written by fellow practitioners recalling the tender care they received from Teacher, all kinds of thoughts welled up in my heart. To thank Teacher for his enormous and powerful graciousness, I am sharing some of my experiences and understandings from my seven years of cultivation.
I was born in China in 1945. I am a peasant with only several years of elementary schooling. I was greatly tormented by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). I witnessed Land Reform, the Three Anti-Campaigns, the Five Anti-Campaigns, the Great Leap Forward, the Anti-Rightist Movement, the Cultural Revolution, the Tiananmen Square massacre and the persecution of Falun Gong, which were all orchestrated by the CCP. The Party has created a culture of deceit, wickedness and violence to distort people's thoughts, destroy their righteous faith, and lower their ethical standards. As a result, after absorbing the Party culture, the younger generations are difficult to educate. Hence, I always was in despair. This resulted in my developing various health problems, such as insomnia. I could not find the way to resolve all these problems.
After "April 25", 1999, a local TV station began to broadcast negative propaganda about Falun Gong. I wanted to know the truth, so I borrowed a copy of Zhuan Falun from local practitioners. After I began to read it, I realized that it is a precious book and that Teacher came to save sentient beings. When I was very young, my father told me about how Laozi saved people, so I understood what Teacher meant when he wrote about how Buddhas and Daos save sentient beings. I realized that I had been waiting for Zhuan Falun, hoping for the day I would be saved. The day finally arrived--how exciting! Immediately, I purchased Zhuan Falun and other Dafa books, beginning my path of cultivation in Falun Dafa. I know that I started late, but I seized the time to study the Fa and to do the exercises. Within less than one month, all my illnesses were healed. I had never before felt so happy and relaxed.
However, cultivation is not always smooth sailing. During the 2000 Lantern Festival, officers from the local police station and agents from the District Management Committee ransacked my home, confiscating my Dafa books and a Fa lecture cassettes. Then, they took me to a rehabilitation center for drug addicts in order to persecute me. During the past few years, the persecutors have been monitoring me closely. Because of my omissions, lack of depth in understanding the Fa and my human attachments, I was arrested and taken to a detention center, a brainwashing center and the Sanshui Women's Forced Labor Camp. I was arrested five times in total. However, no matter how rampant the evil is, it cannot shake Falun Dafa practitioners' will, which is as solid as rock. The more vicious the old forces are, the more we practitioners are able to tell right from wrong. The more severe the persecution is, the more solid our will becomes. Because we are practitioners created by Dafa, in the midst of tribulations we remain calm and we firmly remember Teacher's words to us. Thus, we are able to pass one trial after another.
At the Sanshui Forced Labor Camp, practitioners are persecuted more severely than at local detention centers. Guards use drug addicts, those who are very brutal and lack human nature, to torture Falun Dafa practitioners. They fabricate facts to slander Dafa practitioners. Newer practitioners who have been recently taken to the forced labor camp are put into dark rooms. Four drug-addicts and guards take turn watching those practitioners and carry out round-the-clock persecution against them. They force them to read books and watch videotapes defaming Falun Dafa and Teacher. They also grab practitioners' hands to force them to write the so-called Three Statements. If practitioners do not write what the persecutors require, they are beaten, cursed at, and deprived of food and bathroom facilities, and deprived of sleep. The perpetrators closely watch practitioners' moods and facial expressions, and carry out brutal torture.
There are two very poisonous books used in the Sanshui Forced Labor Camp: one book is entitled, Criticizing XXX , and the other is Revive After Death. Both books distort Buddhist theories. I could see that the real authors for both books were rotten ghosts from hell. They are evil demons manipulated by the old forces. I calmly used righteous thoughts to eliminate the demons.
While I was detained, I made every effort to validate this glorious Dafa. I did so when writing required monthly reports, giving my understandings on good and evil in the human world, reflecting practitioners' righteous thoughts and healthy mindset. In 2005, I wrote: "Falun Dafa is a cultivation path of 'Truth, Compassion, Forbearance.' Dafa taught us to be good people, and Falun Gong can do no harm. It brings numerous benefits to all lives in the universe--let history be the witness!" As soon as the wardens read my statement, they quickly took it and showed it to the guards. Immediately, they called me into their office, and guards surrounded me and started to curse at me. They said that what I wrote was a strong insult to all the wardens and guards in the labor camp.
On New Year's Eve in 2006, while I was sleeping, I felt someone patting my head. I heard Teacher's voice saying, "It is time to leave." I thought that I was in a dream. Unexpectedly, on New Year's day, I was released before my sentence was up. The labor camp authorities asked my son to come pick me up.
Thinking back on all the tribulations and trials during the past seven years, I feel that they have fully shown that Teacher's Fa is so correct! The reason why I did not feel my own suffering was because Teacher had told me that Dafa practitioners are the most honorable beings in the universe. What pains my heart is that I lost some precious Falun Dafa books and lost precious time to study the Fa and to clarify the truth to save sentient beings. I will redouble my effort to make up for the losses and do the three things that Teacher entrusted us to do well. I will never fail Teacher's expectations and salvation.
Due to my limited level, fellow practitioners, please point out to me anything that is inappropriate.