2021年澳洲法會發言稿 5: Online Falun Dafa webinars during lockdown (中文翻譯: 网上教功班的修炼体会)

Cultivation experiences within the project of online Falun Dafa webinars during lockdown

By a Falun Dafa Western practitioner in Australia 

Greetings Master!

Greeting’s practitioners!

My name is E and I live in Ballarat, Australia. I obtained the Fa in May 1998 in Melbourne, when my mother and I saw some practitioners exercising in a park. We were out together celebrating my birthday and Mother’s Day. The practitioners were there celebrating Falun Dafa Day. It was a very beautiful, happy day, because we learnt the exercises and obtained the Fa. We also bought the Dafa books from them straight away. It was the spiritual way I had been waiting for. I’ve been practising Falun Dafa for 23 years now, and still, every day brings new enlightenments and understandings on my cultivation journey, realisations on how to improve and opportunities to forbear and be more diligent.

1. Starting out with an online project during COVID lockdown

In 2020 last year, we had been in lockdown for several months, and I realised that the truth clarification projects I had been working on had all kind of finished up. I had also been feeling down about being in lockdown. I felt a wish to help people in lockdown to feel some hope and to clarify the truth, but I wasn’t sure how to do this during lockdown? I had a brainstorming session by myself and wondered if teaching the exercises online could be okay at this time. I realised clarifying the truth was very important and I should try and do this every day.

Master said,

Assisting the Fa

You resolved to save sentient beings,

And assist Master as he journeys this human world;

Come now, and help me turn the Falun,

When the Fa is fulfilled,

Heaven and Earth will be yours to travel.” 

(Hong Yin, The Grand Verses, (Translation A) )

Just a week later, the predestined chance came up – a practitioner suggested in a sharing group to start online Falun Dafa webinars to introduce the practice. I jumped at the opportunity and volunteered to help.

As soon as I joined though we had many challenges, and the project went around in circles for weeks.  We needed someone to co-ordinate who knew a lot about the logistics and technical aspects of how to coordinate an online project.  I had the tech knowledge and skills, but due to my personal and work circumstances I knew there was no way I could coordinate the project effectively. Recently a family member had been diagnosed with cancer, and also our business was struggling due to the prolonged lockdowns, so we had to focus on marketing. To coordinate a project at this time would be going against all the current circumstances I was in.

I know I also have the tendency to usually be the coordinator of projects, as my business is event management and marketing. I also have an attachment to become overzealous in projects I work on, particularly hongfa projects, and not balancing well the other things I should do in my life. I realised this was a good opportunity to put aside my ego and not put myself forward if this project could succeed and do well and was a good chance for me to make sure I could balance working on the project with my other tasks and life.  A very capable and young practitioner in our group was keen to take on tasks and happily she said she could coordinate the project. I was happy to support and be her assistant. Soon the project got off the ground, and our team came together to do the various jobs required. Actually, as it turned out, it turned out to be a bigger job than we had guessed.

2. Running Social media ads as part of truth clarification

In our team, I had the most experience with marketing and running a certain social media ad, so I volunteered to do this part. It was very interesting timing, as I had just decided I would no longer run this social media ad campaigns anymore. I run my own business and do marketing for other organisations and found this social media ad to be annoying and repetitive. Suddenly, after joining this project, I had to put those feelings aside, and reverse my decision.  It made me smile and thought that’s a good hint to let go of those attachments and do what will help save sentient beings.

I studied with another country’s team who were already running ads to promote the Falun Dafa introduction webinar and saw how they had promoted theirs successfully and used that as a guide to setup our campaigns, as well as my background knowledge. Our ads did very well, and then we expanded our campaigns to the Asia Pacific region, targeting English speakers.  We got a lot of people from India, Pakistan, Burma, Bangladesh, Nepal, Australia, and the Philippines to attend our Falun Dafa introduction webinars.

As it turned out, we got a lot of messages on our ad for people interested to learn Falun Dafa, who were feeling anxious or stressed because of COVID-19 or the lockdowns. After joining the webinar and learning one or two of the exercises, the feedback was positive and people felt relaxed, some also felt energy moving around.

We have had around 10,000 people sign up so far, although 15% usually actually attend the webinar, so around 1,500 people have attended so far.  This 15% is a usual amount for our webinars worldwide, but we realised this is a great opportunity as well to send a few emails with further information about the practice, or to invite them to attend the webinar again. Also, over 3.5 million people have seen our ad, so even if they just have a little bit more of a deeper understanding of the practice from the ad, is very good.

3. Cultivating and improving within the project and during lockdown

Working on this project, of course, has provided good opportunities to improve myself and cultivate.  Sometimes my attachments came from wanting to run or organise things a certain way. This has been a great opportunity to let go of my way of doing things, and seeing that everything still works fine, if not better.  I improved my way of thinking to be more aligned with “wuwei.”

Running this Social media ads has been a great opportunity to work on my attachment to not liking to do the same thing over and over again. My tendency is to like to do new and varied tasks, and I lack consistency. However, once the ad campaigns have been tested and are up and running, it requires a lot of consistency. I sometimes have to force myself to check the campaigns over and over again, to make sure they are going well.  In this way, it’s been a good way to temper myself, and slowly work on that attachment of not being consistent and wanting to do new things.

Often, I found I would go to check the social media campaigns but would end up being distracted by this social media content.  Sometimes I even forgot why I had gone there in the first place.  I realised this was a great opportunity to strengthen my main consciousness and resist those things, to stay focused on my tasks.  Sometimes I still failed, but I started to see some progress which was encouraging.  This social media is designed to be addictive and distracting, so it’s a pretty good place to steal your will if you do need to use it.

During the lockdowns, I would often feel compelled to read the news about protests, the big mental health crisis, lockdown restrictions and sometimes I would feel upset and worried for the state of the world. In particular, after having a meeting for my job with a NGO who helps children who are in state care, and how they are almost in solitary confinement due to covid restrictions, I felt very moved in my heart.

After sharing with my mum who is also a practitioner, I shared how I felt upset about these issues. She reminded me that the world is very chaotic right now, but is it our job to fix all the wrongs in the world?  The phrase from Zhuan Falun, Lecture 9 came to my mind.

Master said,

“Some people say, “I just want to discipline bad people.” I would say that you are best off becoming a policeman.” (Lecture 9, Zhuan Falun)

I realised, we are not here to be the policeman of the world, we are here to clarify the truth, and cultivate. I also remembered with some shock that Master has been saying all along we are in the Dharma ending period. I considered more deeply, what does this really mean?  I think it means that all sorts of things are happening right now that could be very scary and not good, but whatever happens or whatever we encounter, we should not be moved.

Master said in the latest jingwen,

“While in this world, a Dafa disciple is to do well in spiritually developing himself and fulfilling his historic mission of helping me to save people. The very reason that human society still exists today is so that Dafa may save people.” (“A Strong And Urgent Warning”)

In my understanding, we have to steal our will and not be distracted from our historic mission by anything going on in society.

4. Running the 9-Day Video Lecture Series Online

Our team ran the English 9-Day Falun Dafa exercise seminar online, and I ran ads to promote it as well.  We promoted it to family friends, practitioners, and most people joined from the social media ads, or had attended previous online introduction seminars. Interestingly, I could feel the energy leading up to the 9-day lectures was sacred and solemn, almost similar to an in-person 9-day seminar.

We had 150 people who joined the social media group and around 40-20 people joined every night live, and other people watched via the links in their own time. Mostly new people attended, but we did have a few veteran practitioners attending too.

I also attended, and it’s been many years since I did the 9-days in a row lecture series in a group, perhaps 20 years ago, around when I first started practicing! I wondered how the time passed so quickly, that I hadn’t done this in so long. I thought that was a big gap in my cultivation.

The energy field was very strong, even with an online group Seminar, and I felt very strong energy to put part of my brain asleep during Lecture 2, 3 and 4.  From lecture 6 I had powerful karma elimination, and for several days after.

After finishing the 9-day lectures, I found a renewed urge to be diligent in my personal cultivation and have been able to look within much more consistently when I encounter something or have found myself in a particular situation. I’ve been able to take it as an opportunity to improve my Xinxing. I still had slip ups and made mistakes, but when I managed to truly look within and find the problem, it was magical and helped things change for the better. I could feel my level improving.

Conclusion

We’ve realised that so many people have come to learn Falun Dafa – many are in regions where there are no practitioners. Also, many practice sites are too far away or very early in the morning to be convenient for absolute beginners to try it out. This is a precious opportunity for them, and we are grateful to be able to assist people to either learn more about the practice, or to start their cultivation journey in Falun Dafa. We have recently planned to host a weekly online exercise class for newcomers to join. We would also like to do another English 9-day video seminar soon.

Thank you everyone for the opportunity to share my experiences.

Thank you Master!

Thank you, fellow practitioners!

(Presented at the 2021 Australia Online Falun Dafa Experience Sharing Conference)

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中文翻譯

 

疫情期间推广网上教功班的修炼体会

文:澳大利亚西人大法弟子

尊敬的师父好!

同修们好。

我住在巴拉瑞特。我是一九九八年五月在墨尔本开始修炼大法的,当时我和妈妈看到一些大法弟子在公园炼功。那天我们出门庆祝我的生日和母亲节,正好大法弟子在那里庆祝法轮大法日。那一天非常美好、快乐,因为我们学了功,得了法。也直接从大法弟子那里请了大法书籍。我感到这就是我一直在等待的返本归真之路。至今,我修炼大法已经二十三年了,但在修炼道路上,对于如何提高忍耐力和更加精進,每天都有新的领悟和认识。

一、禁足期间,开始网上讲真相项目

二零二零年,墨尔本经历了长达几个月的禁足。我一直参与的讲真相项目几乎停滞了,自己也一直因为处于禁足状态而感到沮丧。我想讲真相,帮助被禁足的人们看到希望,但又不清楚在禁足期间该怎么去做。经过苦思冥想,我想看看在网上教功是否可行。我意识到讲真相非常重要,因此应该每天都努力的去做。

师父说:发心度众生,助师世间行;协吾转法轮,法成天地行”[1]

就在一周后,机缘来了。一位学员在分享群中建议开办网上法轮大法教功班来介绍功法。我抓住了这个机会,主动提出提供帮助。

刚一加入,我们就遇到了很多困难,项目在几周内毫无進展。我们需要一位懂得协调网络项目并懂技术的同修来做。我虽懂技术,但由于个人和工作情况,我感到自己无法有效的协调这个项目。我的一位家庭成员刚被诊断出患有癌症,而且由于长时间的禁足,我们经营的业务陷入困境,因此不得不专注于做营销。在这个时候协调一个项目,不符合我当时所处的状况。

我乐于做一名项目协调人,因为自己从事的业务就是活动管理和市场营销。但我也有一种执着,就是对自己参与的项目,特别是大法项目过于热心,不能很好的平衡生活中该做的其它事情。我意识到,如果能成功做好这个项目,就是一个放下自我,并证明自己可以平衡好大法项目和常人工作及生活的好机会。

我们小组中一位非常有能力的年轻学员高兴的表示,她可以协调该项目。我很高兴的支持并成为她的助手。很快项目就启动了,我们的团队齐心协力完成了各种所需的工作。事实上结果证明,这是一项比我们想象的更艰巨的工作。

二、作为讲真相的一部分  投放社交媒体广告

在我们的团队中,营销和投放某一个社交媒体广告方面我的经验最丰富,因此我主动提出负责这个部分。这是一个很有趣的时机,因为我才刚刚决定以后不再投放该社交媒体广告。我经营自己的业务,也为其它组织做营销,发觉该社交媒体广告令人讨厌且重复。突然的,在加入这个项目后,我不得不把之前那些感觉放在一边,并改变我的决定。这让我会心一笑,觉得这是一个很好的暗示,去放下那些执着,做有利于救度众生的事情。.

我向另一个国家的团队学习经验,他们已经开始投放该社交媒体广告,宣传大法网络教功班。我学习他们如何成功的推广,利用他们的经验和自己的专业知识作为指导,進行广告推广工作。我们的广告取得了非常好的效果,接下来,我们将广告覆盖范围扩展到亚太地区,目标群体是说英语的人。有很多来自印度、巴基斯坦、缅甸、孟加拉、尼泊尔、澳洲和菲律宾的人参加了我们的法轮大法网络教功班。

我们通过广告得到了很多留言,一些因疫情或禁足而感到焦虑或压力的人们想要学习法轮大法。在参加完网络教功班并学习一两套功法后,大家的反馈很积极,他们感觉到轻松,有些人还感受到能量的流动。

到目前为止,有约一万人注册了我们的活动。这其中通常会有15%的人真正来参加,因此到目前为止大约有1500人参加了我们的网络教功班。15%的比例是推广全球网络教功班的一个正常数字,但我们意识到这也是一个很好的机会,后续可以通过收集到的邮箱地址,发送一些介绍大法的电子邮件,或邀请他们再次参加网络教功班。此外,有超过350万民众看过我们投放的广告,即使他们仅仅是通过广告对大法有了些许了解,也是非常好的。

三、禁足期间在项目中修炼并提高

这个项目也给我提供了很好的修炼和提高的机会。有时我会执着于想以某种特定的方式進行或协调一些事情。而这个项目是一个很好的机会,让我放弃我的做事方式,并看到一切仍然能运行良好,甚至更好。我改進了自己的思维方式,更加符合无为之道。

同时,投放该社交媒体广告还是一个帮我修炼的好机会,修去我不喜欢一遍又一遍做同样事情的执着。我偏好去做新鲜的多样化的任务,缺乏持之以恒做好一件事的习惯。然而,一旦广告投放活动经过测试并开始运行,就需要很好的耐心去维护。有时我不得不强迫自己一遍又一遍的检查广告投放,以确保進展顺利。整个过程很好的魔炼了自己,修去了那颗不能持之以恒、总想尝试新鲜事物的心。

在查看广告投放情况时,我时常会被该社交媒体上的其它内容分散注意力。有时甚至忘记了一开始为什么会浏览那里。我意识到这也是一个很好的机会,加强我的主意识,抵制这些东西,专注于我要做的。有时仍然会失败,但我已经获得了一些令人鼓舞的進步。 

在禁足期间,我常常感到被迫去看一些有关抗议、严重心理健康问题和禁足措施的新闻,有时会为这个世界的状况感到不安和担忧。特别是,由于工作原因,与一个非政府组织机构开会,我了解到那些受到国家照顾的儿童,因为禁足措施而几乎被单独隔离后,我的内心受到很大触动。

和母亲同修交流时,我提出了对这些问题的不满。母亲提醒我,现在世界非常混乱,但我们大法弟子的任务是归正世界上的所有错误吗?师父的一句法映入我的脑海:有人说:我就想管坏人。我说那你就当警察去算了。”[2]

我明白了,我们不是来做世界警察的,我们是来讲真相、修炼的。这时我心中一震,意识到师父一直在说我们身在末法时期。我更深入的思索,这到底是什么意思?我想这意味着现在发生的各种各样的事情可能非常可怕,但是无论发生什么或遇到什么,我们都应该做到不动心。

师父说:大法弟子活在世上就是修炼好自己、做好助师救人的历史使命;当今的人类社会还存在,就是留给大法救人的,” [3]

对此我的理解是,我们必须坚定我们的意志,完成我们的历史使命,不被社会上发生的任何事情干扰。

四、举办网上九讲班

我们的团队在网上举办了英文九讲班,我投放了广告進行宣传。同时我们也推荐给身边的亲人、朋友和同修。大多数人是通过看到社交媒体广告前来参加的,也有人参加过之前的大法网络教功班。值得一提的是,我能感觉到网上九讲班的能量神圣而庄严,与面对面开办的九讲班几乎一样。

150人加入了我们的脸书群组,每天晚上约有20-40人同时观看在线播放的讲法录像,还有一些人在合适的时间自己通过链接观看。其中大多数是新加入的常人,也有个别老学员参加。

我也参加了。上一次参加连续9天的讲法班已经是很多年前了,大概是二十年前,那还是我刚开始修炼的时候!不禁感叹时间过得如此之快。我想这是我修炼中的一大疏漏。

网上九讲班的能量场非常强,到第二、三、四讲的时候,我感到有一股很强的能量让我的部分大脑睡着了。从第六讲开始,我经历了为期几天的大消业。

九讲班结束后,我重新下决心要精進修炼。任何事情任何情况下,都能做到始终向内找。并能够以此为契机,提高自己的心性。虽然仍有跌倒或犯错的时候,但是当我真正的向内找并找到自己的问题时,事情就会神奇的得到好转。我能感觉到,自己的层次提高了。

 

结语

我们发现,有那么多人来学大法,很多都住在没有大法弟子生活的地区。也有很多炼功点距离他们太远,或者由于早上时间很早,新学员无法去参加。因此网上炼功和讲法班对他们来说是一个很宝贵的机会。我们很高兴能够帮助人们更多的了解大法,或者开始他们的法轮大法修炼之旅。最近,我们计划为新学员举办每周一次的在线炼功班。同时,我们还想尽快举办另一次为期九天的英语九讲班。

谢谢大家给我这个机会,分享我的修炼经验。

谢谢师父!

谢谢同修。

注:

[1] 李洪志师父著作:《洪吟》<助法>

[2] 李洪志师父著作:《转法轮》

[3]  李洪志师父著作:《猛喝》

(二零二一年澳大利亚网上法会)