(Clearwisdom.net) For three years after obtaining the Fa, I went through some severe ups and downs in my personal cultivation. I lived with young non-practitioners in a relatively isolated area. In this situation, the quality of my Fa-study would really determine the quality of my Fa-rectification period cultivation. Through this series of severely alternating and contrasting periods of being a diligent cultivator and an everyday person, I came to realize how central Fa-study is on a fundamental level.
So when I moved to a bigger city in October 2004, I looked forward to the group environment and working with more practitioners together on clarifying the truth, saving sentient beings and, perhaps most importantly for me, having consistent righteous thoughts through consistent group Fa-study. I felt that the group environment of doing the three things well would be helpful to all of us, and it could truly be like,
"Study the Fa and gain the Fa,
Focus on how you study and cultivate,
Let each and every thing be measured against the Fa.
Only then, with that,
is it actually cultivation."
("Solid Cultivation," from Hongyin)
However, I was surprised to find that our group was not giving Fa-study the important position that it deserved! It seemed to me that a lot of practitioners I was in touch with rarely studied the Fa, saying that "things were so busy" and they had "no time." The practitioners who knew the importance of Fa-study seemed to be relegating Fa-study to a secondary place, studying late at night or in the wee hours of the morning.
I was worried about how this lack of a Fa-study environment was adversely affecting the cultivation and Fa-rectification activities of the practitioners in that area.
"Some volunteers go long periods of time without reading or studying the Fa. How could they do Dafa work well? You have unwittingly incurred many losses that are hard to recover."
("Towards Consummation," Essentials for Further Advancement II)
Master has emphasized many times how important Fa-study is.
"I've often said that you need to study the Fa well. Whenever I've met with students at Fa conferences or in other settings, I've always said that you must make Fa-study a priority, and that no matter how busy you are you have to study the Fa."
(Touring North America to Teach the Fa)
"When you do well in the Fa-rectification, I can see that it's always because you are able to understand the Fa from the Fa; and when you do somewhat poorly, I can see that it's because you aren't making a priority of Fa-study and you aren't able to understand the Fa from the Fa."
(Teaching the Fa at the 2002 Fa Conference in Boston)
I understood how important Fa-study was, since I had experienced how far one can fall when Fa-study is lacking, or the quality of the Fa-study and group study environment is not there - or missing altogether.
Our project involved media work, and I felt that our group work and office was similar to the "materials sites" in China. In the beginning, (at least in my understanding) our work was chaotic. Practitioners' Fa-study was chaotic, and everyone was basically just squeezing in a little bit of Fa-study every day. At this time, conflicts were really intense, and several practitioners stopped coming or stopped working with other practitioners on this important project. Often, important work would meet with a lot of interference and sometimes fall apart.
In this situation, a few of us started a daily group Fa-study in the office. We started to study a chapter of Zhuan Falun daily in the evenings together as a group.
At first, there were only two or three of us, but gradually our group began to expand and more and more practitioners started to join the group Fa-study. As the group Fa-study grew bigger, I started to feel an immense surge of happiness and fulfillment while studying the Fa - something that I hadn't felt in a long time. I felt that our group was able to look at things more righteously and we were able to walk our paths in the Fa-rectification better. After a few months of being immersed in this group environment that was centered around our daily Fa-study, I felt that my degenerate and selfish notions gradually melted away and I was able to immerse myself wholeheartedly in Fa-rectification cultivation.
Also, we noticed that we really did not lose anything by studying the Fa more and that as a group we were actually able to accomplish more in our everyday work and truth-clarification work. As Teacher said,
"Studying the Fa well definitely won't affect anything of yours in your cultivation, and on the contrary, it will help you get twice the results at your job or with your schoolwork with half the effort."
(Explaining the Fa During the 2003 Lantern Festival at the U.S. West Fa Conference)
I feel worried that some groups, especially in big cities, might neglect Fa study. Overseas, we live in a more relaxed environment than in mainland China. We have read many experience sharing reports on Clearwisdom about how material sites fell apart and practitioners were arrested when they started to neglect Fa-study and just focused on work. For us, lack of Fa-study may manifest in other ways.
I hope that we can pay more attention to Fa-study and work together to do the three things well, keeping Fa-study central to all our efforts. Especially in big cities, we have many "materials sites" where it is easy to sink into a state where we can go long periods of time without studying the Fa. If we give primary importance to Fa-study, we would do better in personal cultivation and do better validating the Fa and saving sentient beings.
Master said in "Teaching the Fa at the 2005 Manhattan International Fa Conference,"
"If you don't cultivate yourselves well you won't have mighty virtue, what you say will not be in line with the Fa, and then you can't possibly save sentient beings. When what you say has no mighty virtue and no power, it will have no effect, and the evil will capitalize on that."
And,
"Study the Fa a lot, read the book a lot."
These are just my personal understandings. Please point out anything inappropriate.