PureInsight | May 17, 2004
[PureInsight.org] In the final stage of the Fa-rectification period, we shall form one invincible body if every Dafa practitioner places Dafa before everything and thinks about the best interests of the sentient beings at all times.
When two Dafa practitioners have a conflict, both of them must have some attachment(s). Here is a fairly common scenario: A practitioner finds that another practitioner has a deeply hidden attachment and does not want to tell him about it face to face. But when the latter practitioner encounters an obstacle or tribulation, the former one immediately jumps up and comments to others, "Will you look at him? He has had that attachment forever, but he never really wanted to remove that attachment. He is such an everyday person. We have already progressed to the final stage of the Fa-rectification, and he is still neglecting his cultivation practice. He practically begged for trouble. It is all because of the attachment that he has brought the trouble to himself."
We are really in no position to criticize other people for their cultivation. What we really should do is to be more compassionate and to encourage our fellow practitioners, instead of pointing fingers.
When we discover that fellow practitioners around us have run into problems and fail to help them clean up their fields, we are acknowledging or tacitly approving these unrighteous elements. It is our mission to rectify everything that's not righteous [in other dimensions]. Silently watching these degenerate elements consume fellow practitioners and we are silently harboring these degenerate elements ourselves. Our passive respecting of those elements persecutes our fellow practitioners, and provides those degenerate elements an excuse and an opportunity to continue persecuting more fellow practitioners. I think we must ask ourselves a question: Why am I the person who sees or knows a fellow practitioner's problem? It must be that we have some type of attachment to be removed. With that in mind, indifference to fellow practitioners' attachments is practically the same as indifference to our own attachments.
Allow me to illustrate my point with an example:
When I saw a fellow practitioner running into problems, the first thought in my head was: "Let me examine myself to see if I have the same attachment. If I don't have the same attachment, I should remind myself not to repeat his mistake." You can see from the above example that I was attached to my cultivation because I thought only of my cultivation and myself. "Selfishness" pretty much summarizes my mentality. I think I should, instead, seek inward and help fellow practitioners to improve at the same time.
My problem is that I clearly differentiate my business from other practitioners' business. When I help fellow practitioners, I do it to enhance my cultivation. I rarely regard fellow practitioners' businesses as my own business. Teacher said:
The next person's things are your things, and your things are his things.
(From "Teaching the Fa at the Washington, D.C. Fa Conference," July, 2002)
Since I spotted my selfishness, I have been working on removing it little by little in my cultivation practice.
When I heard that an elderly western practitioner living in a neighboring city kept up the Fa study and Falun Gong exercises, but never helped with any type of truth-clarification work, I felt really concerned for his cultivation and persuaded several other fellow practitioners to go visit him. We drove to his area and went through a lot of trouble to finally locate him. At first, I wanted to subject him to a lecture on the present situation of the Fa-rectification and the importance on stepping out to clarify the truth about Falun Dafa. But a fellow practitioner reminded me that I should not feel superior to him [just because I have been clarifying the truth about Dafa]. She also suggested that I put myself in his shoes. She explained patiently to me, "He has been limited to his personal cultivation for the past few years. [It's probably not that he does not read Teacher's latest articles or that he doesn't know what the Fa requires of him during the Fa-rectification period.] It's probably that, although he knows what he should do, he does not have sufficient understanding of the Fa and he may also have some personal attachments obstructing him from stepping out. It is uncharitable for us to judge him [who is on a different level of understanding of the Fa] based on our own understandings of the Fa."
We knew that he practiced the Falun Gong exercises outdoors once a week in his neighborhood. [That's why we drove to his area that day and were able to locate him.] A practitioner suggested that we start joining his practice every week starting that day, so that we could create opportunities to study the Fa with him and gradually influence him. I thought her suggestion was very good. That day we practiced the Falun Gong exercises together with him. He was so glad that we came to see him that he was smiling all the time. We noticed that he did all five Falun Gong exercises incorrectly, so we patiently corrected his movements. Since then, a fellow practitioner and I would go to his area by bus to practice the exercises and study the Fa together with him almost every week. He was moved by our concern for him and became increasingly diligent in his cultivation practice.
Two months later, we went to the city of his residence to promote Falun Dafa and invited him to participate in our activity in the downtown area. He gladly accepted the invitation. That was the first time he distributed flyers to passersby and it took him a tremendous amount of courage to start and sustain this work. Each time a person said, "No, thanks," his facial expression stiffened immediately. He seemed to have a difficult time overcoming each rejection. From time to time, he needed to sit on a bench on the sidewalk to recover from the feeling of being rejected. Each time a pedestrian rejected his offering a flyer, he felt very upset and discouraged. At the end of the day, although he was exhausted, we were glad that he had finally taken the first step that meant a lot to him.
As we became more acquainted, we found him to be very selfish. Although I felt disturbed by his selfishness, none of us criticized him. Instead, we reminded ourselves to conduct ourselves like cultivators. Whether it rained or shined, we went to his area every week to practice the exercises and study the Fa together with him. At the same time, we also invited him to participate in our large group Fa study and Fa-promotion activities. Little by little, he gradually enhanced his understanding of the Fa from an emotional level to a rational level. I'm not sure when it all started, but he began to come to our city to participate in our group practices and Fa-promotion activities. One day, he offered money to buy [truth-clarification and Fa-promotion] flyers because he wanted to distribute them in his area. On another occasion, he repeatedly recited a few Chinese sentences that a fellow practitioner has taught him during a big group Fa study event. On his way home, at the bus station, we saw that he walked up to a Chinese waiting for the bus and offered him a small Chinese truth-clarification pamphlet in his hand. Then he said in Chinese with a thick American accent, "How are you? Falun Dafa is good. Please try to understand Falun Gong." Fellow practitioners and I smiled from the bottom of our heart when we saw the heartfelt sincerity in his action. Nowadays, he pays with his own money to holding two weekly sessions for the free teaching the Falun Gong exercises and the Fa studies. Little by little, he gradually melted into the group environment.
When a practitioner fails to handle a situation properly and correctly, fellow practitioner's assistance from the Fa is what's needed the most. We should be compassionate and kind to such a fellow practitioner to relieve his defensive reactions. We should also rationally exchange our cultivation experiences and use positive encouragement to reinforce his faith in cultivation. Our benevolence will create a righteous energy field that will envelop people around us with benevolence. When we Dafa practitioners unite, we shall be invincible.
Today, Dafa practitioners inside and outside of China have become one body. Even though practitioners in China are unable to directly participate in our rally activities around the world, they can use righteous thoughts and echo with corresponding activities in their areas instead of feeling unconnected. We can, at the same time, use all sorts of methods to clarify the truth and support them, including adjusting our attitudes toward the facts of the persecution on Dafa websites. We should not merely browse through the titles of the facts of the persecution. Instead, we should use righteous thoughts to instantly eliminate the evils when their actions and locations are exposed at Dafa websites.
My understanding of a truly magnificent enlightened being is that an enlightened being would always put himself/herself in others' shoes. These enlightened beings will possess harmonious wisdom and a big heart to tolerate all living beings. All Dafa practitioners are lives created by the most magnificent Fa. All Dafa practitioners are disciples of our Master. All Dafa practitioners are particles of the Fa. Therefore, we should correct problems when they arise, no matter who creates the problems. When we truly form one invincible body, the residual evil forces will be eliminated in a split second.
Let's form an invincible body and foster the arrival of Fa-rectification in the human world.
Translated from: http://www.zhengjian.org/zj/articles/2003/11/3/24327.html
