Grandma Lu, was born in June 1953. She is from the Han ethnic group, has a primary school education, and has two daughters. She began to practice Falun Gong in July 1996 due to stomach bloating and flatulence, which could not be cured for a long time. By practicing Falun Gong, the symptoms really alleviated, so she was convinced of the magical power of Falun Gong and the might of Li Hongzhi, whom she felt so grateful to and regarded as “master”. Even after the Falun Gong cult was banned by the Chinese government in 1999, grandma Lu did not change her attitude and kept practicing. She thought Falun Gong was true and could help people to be kind and build up health. She kept practicing at home and would not abandon her obsession no matter how much her family tried to persuade her, as she refused to realize the errors of the cult. We took following measures to make grandma Lu understand the true reason why Falun Gong could “cure illness and build up health”.
Help grandma Lu understand non-organic illness could be alleviated by practicing
Non-organic illness means non-pathological illness and is just a functional change and obstacle. For example, cancer patients belong to pathological change and must be cured or alleviated by treatment, while neurasthenia, feet pains, stomach bloating and gas are closely related to psychological factors. Lifestyle, diet habits and fatigue are factors which cause and can gradually alleviate symptoms through certain adjustments.
Grandma Lu used to be a night shift worker in a foodstuff factory and mainly kept seated for long periods every day. Due to being less active, she fell into the stomach flatulence illness after long time accumulation of factors. She became obsessed with Falun Gong, which she thought could cure her illness. I analyzed her bloating and flatulence symptoms and found that they belong to an illness that could be alleviated through exercise, diet adjustment and changes in habits. After hearing my words, she said that she did exercise as well before she began to learn Falun Gong and I asked her to tell me her general exercise routines and times. According to what she said, she only occasionally went to the river side to take a walk, which is not sustained or effective exercise.. Later on, grandma Lu began to practice the 5 sets of Falun Gong exercises every day. Falun Gong exercises are simply composed of a form qigong actions, which were plagiarized by Li Hongzhi and combined from scientific chanmigong and other qigong movements. It is an increase in exercise that alleviated the illness instead of Falun Gong, which has no magic power at all. On the contrary, if grandma Lu kept seated for long periods, her bloating and flatulence would become worse and this is also the reason why she did not get rid of the illness for so many years. After my repeated explanation, grandma Lu gradually reduced her sitting time and turned to regular exercise in the open air.
------ make Grandma Lu understand that it is necessary to stop relying mentally on Falun Gong and its related activities.
From a normal person to an addict, Falun Gong believers always volunteer to accept mental control by Falun Gong for their own reasons and their physiological health is greatly damaged. In order to make them change ideas completely, they have to gain self-conscious awakening. Actually she had serious emotional dependence on the cult which could not be unlocked easily. I gradually took many measures to make her change her thinking towards Falun Gong. One way was to list the facts. At first, grandma Lu would say to anyone how good Falun Gong was and what a good virtue the true kindness was and attempted to brainwash people to quit the League or Party. I asked her: “Is there anyone who accepted your persuasion in recent years?” she answered: “No”. “This proves that your perception is wrong.” I also told her “you should know that nobody would accept Falun Gong and believe what you said.” Then, for many times, I talked with Grandma Lu about the sense in quitting the League and Party. Why should people quit the Party? Could you say something about how you are not satisfied with our Party? On what terms could you feel the warmth from government and Party according to your own experience in recent years? Falun Gong always spread rumors that our country would end but, instead, our Party is becoming stronger and stronger. Didn’t you see the military parade on the 3rd of September? Wasn’t it a shocking scene? Hearing this, grandma became wordless and got lost in thought. As a person born soon after new country was established, she should have more deep affection towards our country and Party.
The other way was to talk about Falun Gong. Could Falun Gong really bring people peace and security? As Grandma Lu didn’t have a good education and in order to avoid tangling on the so called Falun Gong theories with her, I just listed the facts around her one by one. One Falun Gong believer in our town called Zhang Guilin and his wife, who once was the person in charge in a certain position in our town, eventually died of illness at home. He was very miserable in the final years and kept reading and practicing Falun Gong, even though his illness was already very serious, until his family was completely destroyed. At the same time, I listed the fact that our country’s crack down on the Falun Gong organization would never weaken. At present, eight Falun Gong believers are sentenced and this is the way to save other peoples’ happy lives and to avoid getting other influenced people involved. After my careful explanation, grandma finally realized that: “each Falun Gong believer is selfish and hides a selfish motive in their heart. That is, for his own perfectness, even if it harms others or their closest family members. The result of being obsessed with Falun Gong is running in the opposite direction to family, society, virtues, ethics and friends! They gamble their lives but eventually obtain nothing. Families and friends are implicated due to everything that she has been doing. But she is not abandoned by our society. All of the society believed in her, pulling her back from the cliff edge and helped her come back to the warmth of family, which made her feel very relaxed and valuable.
—Help Grandma Lu understand how “Falun Gong” harms our society and family, especially its potential endangerment to families.
Grandma Lu prayed for peace and health by practicing Falun Gong and actually thought highly of her family, especially her two grandsons. We, together with her family, tried to dissuade her from practicing. Her husband disliked Falun Gong very much, saying: “I have reached agreements with family members: if she continues to practice Falun Gong, I have to break off all the relations with her.” Grandma Lu lived together with her daughter and we asked her daughter to arrange some housework for her, to accompany her to walk in the street, to chat with her, as well as to participate in some public activities. We tried to divert her attention and interest from Falun Gong to some ways of health-building like physical exercise, walking, taichi etc. She reduced her Falun Gong practice from twice a day and two hours each time previously, to once day and one hour each time. Gradually, one time every two or three days until eventually she stopped practicing altogether. Several arguments happened in her family, as all members disagreed on Falun Gong and each argument was just like a political lecture and denouncing class, but was always better than the last time. Grandma Lu understood a lot and said: “My family offered me the best love and sacrificed a lot for me, but I am still hurting their hearts. How inhumane am I? But without your help, I may still be unaware of how numb I have been to my family. I am so sorry to my family and my two grandsons. I should think of future generations and not influence their prospects and family happiness.” I also occasionally called her and had chats with her. I sent her greetings on her birthday and festivals as well as consolation money at Spring Festival. We sent her anti-Falun Gong materials such as books and CDs to make her understand that we were all caring for her and helping her to enhance her levels of self-consciousness, self-respect, and self-confidence. We helped enlighten her suspicion of Falun Gong speeches, dialectical thinking and critical awareness to gradually get rid of her mental dependence on Falun Gong and its related activities. We have helped her to recover her psychological health and then helped integrate her into normal social life.
Through our patient and meticulous help, Grandma Lu eventually let go of the Falun Gong fallacies of “eliminating illness and building up health”. Later on, we communicated with Grandma Lu from the perspectives of laws, maintaining good health etc. The case of Grandma Lu makes us realize that helping and saving Falun Gong addicts from their obsessions is the obligation of the whole society. Only with the full attention and participations of the whole society can we effectively help and save those Falun Gong fanatics, eliminate the fertile ground for cult recruitment and build a harmonious society full of humane care.
