The cultivation practice form that I have left for Dafa disciples ensures that disciples can truly improve themselves. For example, I ask you to do the exercises as a group in parks in order to form an environment. This environment is the best way to change the surface of a person. The lofty conduct that Dafa disciples have established in this environment--including every word and every deed--can make people recognize their own weaknesses and identify their shortcomings; it can move their hearts, refine their conduct, and enable them to make progress more rapidly. Therefore, new students or self-taught disciples have to go to the practice sites to do the exercises. There are currently about 40 million practitioners in China participating daily in group exercises at the practice sites, and there are tens of millions of veteran disciples who do not go to the practice sites very often (for veteran disciples, this is normal, as this results from their state in cultivation practice). Nevertheless, as new disciples, you should never miss out on this environment. This is because all those whom you come into contact with in society are everyday people. What is more, they are everyday people who have undergone a rapid decline in human morality. In this big dye vat, people can only drift along with the current.

There are also many new Dafa practitioners who are secretly practicing at home, fearing the embarrassment of others finding out. Think about it: What kind of thought is this? An ordinary fear is an attachment that needs to be eliminated through cultivation practice. Yet you are afraid of others finding out that you're learning Dafa? Cultivation practice is a very serious matter. How should you regard yourself and the Fa? There are also some people in leadership positions that find it embarrassing to go out and do the exercises. If you can't even overcome such a trivial feeling, what would you be able to cultivate? In fact, even if you go to the practice site, there might not be people who know you. In some workplaces, almost all the executives are learning Dafa, but no one knows that the others are also learning. The environment is created by you, yourselves, and it, too, is essential for your improvement. I often find that you are in a good state of mind when you study the Fa or do the exercises, but when you come into contact with your work or other people, you become the same as everyday people. You sometimes seem even worse than everyday people. How could this be the conduct of a Dafa disciple?

I want to treat you as my disciples, but what should I do if you, yourselves don't want to be my disciples? Every attachment for you to remove in your cultivation practice is a wall, standing there and blocking your path of cultivation practice. If you cannot be determined about the Fa itself, you cannot practice cultivation. Do not take your position among everyday people too seriously. Do not think that others will fail to understand you if you learn Dafa. Think about it: Even people's claim that they have evolved from apes is able to be highly regarded. Yet with this great Dafa of the universe, you are embarrassed to give it a correct position--this is human beings' true shame.

Li Hongzhi

October 17, 1997