Source: Howard County Times
http://www.explorehoward.com/community/63344/falun-gong-participants-gather-ellicott-city/
Concentrating on nothing but the music and finding their inner peace, 12 people gathered in Centennial Park on a recent Sunday morning, their arms stretched overhead, their eyes closed, their feet shoulder width apart.
One of the participants, Yuwei Zhang, let her arms fall to her side as she walked off the concrete stage. She put weekly Falun Gong exercises on hold to share her story of perseverance and survival -- a private version of an international story about a spiritual exercise with a long and sometimes troubled history.
Zhang, of Ellicott City, has been a dedicated practitioner of Falun Gong since 1996 -- so dedicated that she endured torture and imprisonment in her native China, in part so that she can freely practice this spiritual discipline.
Every Sunday at the F. Leonard Dunn Amphitheater in Centennial Park, Zhang and about a dozen other people gather for two hours to participate publicly in the meditation exercise they have come to value. They spend an hour in various standing poses, then another hour in seated meditation.
According to the Falun Dafa Association, Falun Gong is a non-religious, spiritual discipline derived from Buddhism and Daoism. It is based on three universal characteristics: truthfulness, compassion and forbearance.