My Beliefs - The Reason I Dance

I have been with Shen Yun Performing Arts for well over a decade, first through practicum via Fei Tian and then professionally when I was hired full time. And I’ve been a Falun Dafa practitioner ever since childhood. It’s a shame to see the New York Times’ articles slandering Shen Yun and Falun Dafa. It’s both frightening and sad. It reminds me of the statewide propaganda campaign the CCP has launched on Falun Dafa since 1999. Having escaped that, I now come face to face with another attack on my beliefs. I was too young to speak up then, I will speak up now.

I was born in Beijing, China and grew up in Toronto, Canada. My family on my mom’s side all started to practice Falun Dafa after seeing the miraculous health benefits my grandma received from the Falun Dafa meditation exercises. At the time Falun Dafa was a trending health phenomenon in China. Many people will gather in parks to do the exercises in the early mornings together. However in 1999, the CCP banned Falun Dafa and started a massive crackdown on us. Both mentally through government propaganda, and physically through hard labor and persecution. Seeing this dire situation my parents flew me out of China a few months after the persecution began.

I haven’t been back to China in 24 years.

Living in a mainly Chinese community in downtown Toronto. I was afraid to tell people that I actually practiced Falun Dafa, as I didn’t know whether they have seen the propaganda first. We had no voice in society, news agencies from all over the world got their information about Falun Dafa straight from the Chinese government. Despite living comfortably in Canada, I never felt truly at ease. Part of my identity has always been shunned, so I decided to help spread awareness of the persecution.

I would go with my family among other Falun Dafa practitioners, we attended parades to spread awareness, we asked for signature for petitions against the persecution on the streets, we handed out fliers about the truth of Falun Dafa, we sat in peaceful protest in front of the Chinese embassy, we attended candlelight vigils to remember to Falun Dafa practitioners who lost their lives to the persecution. When other kids were enjoying their weekends, my Saturdays were spent trying to tell society the truth.

I heard practitioners got together to try to use dance to spread awareness of Falun Dafa. Eventually Shen Yun was created, it was made up of mainly Falun Dafa practitioners. The mission was to show the China before communism. Buddhism, Taoism, Confucianism were the pillars of Chinese culture. They existed for thousands of years before the CCP of the last century. Shen Yun also showed modern stories depicting the true events of the CCP persecution of Falun Dafa.

I didn’t expect much when attending the Shen Yun show, but it made me as proud as ever. Shen Yun gave me a breath of fresh air and hope to see that many in the audience resonated with the stories of my culture and faith! It made me realize, in just a few hours, everyone in the audience saw the truth about the persecution all at once. It got me thinking, if one show could let thousands of people understand us. Then why not dedicate my time to strive to become a part of Shen Yun, I have been spending my free time trying to achieve the same effect anyways.

That’s how I started my dance journey.

People think Shen Yun is mysterious, how did such a dance company strive when other dance companies are failing in the current economy? For me, the answer is simple; the power of faith. Faith is what has kept Falun Dafa practitioners unwavering in the face of persecution. We have walked on the edge of danger and are still doing so for over two decades. For those that have been wronged, there’s that energy in us to try to make things right. If Shen Yun can really show the audience what kind of people Falun Dafa practitioners are like and how the CCP has wronged us, I believe for many like me, that energy to support Shen Yun is unstoppable. It is not money driven. My mom worked at events to speak out about the persecution in Canada and the US since 2000. Now she is a volunteer for Shen Yun in America. If you would like to find out more about Shen Yun, I can share more about my time with the company here.