She actively helped her family members in their revolutionary activities, undergoing all sorts of hardships and mental sufferings.

When her eldest son Kim Hyong Jik, an indomitable revolutionary fighter, passed away, she told her eldest grandson Kim Il Sung: "Jungson (grandson), you will have to take over the burden your father was carrying now. You must pick up the cause where he left off and win back the country, come what may. You may have no chance to take care of me or your mother, as is your filial duty, but you must give yourself heart and soul to the cause of Korea's independence."

Recalling her remarks, the President in his reminiscences "With the Century" said: "I was deeply moved by her words. If she had told me instead to aim for wealth or a successful career, I would not have been as inspired."

Ri Po Ik never yielded to any coercive power or injustice forced by the enemies.

As part of the campaign for the surrender of the Korean People's Revolutionary Army, the Japanese imperialists dragged her away from Mangyongdae and took her to the area of Mt. Paektu where Kim Il Sung was carrying on an anti-Japanese armed struggle, subjecting her to all kinds of cruelties.

Whenever the enemy poked her in the back with a rifle butt to make her call out her grandson's name, she retorted, "I don't know how to blabber wild nonsense like that. Anyway, do you think you can kill me and get off scot-free? Go ahead, kill me if you want to end up with my grandson's bullet in your skulls!"

She was neither a communist nor a professional revolutionary but merely an old countrywoman who had never been to school, never received revolutionary education from an organization, and never even learned to read or write.

What made her stand up to the enemy so stately and conduct herself so wisely and honorably is ardent patriotism, strong sense of justice and indomitable mental power.