(Clearwisdom.net)
Revered Master taught in "What is Forbearance (Ren)?"
"Forbearance is the key to improving one's xinxing. To endure with anger, grievance, or tears is the forbearance of an everyday person who is attached to his concerns. To endure completely without anger or grievance is the forbearance of a cultivator." (Essentials for Further Advancement)
For a long time as I practiced this Ren I was in a state of forcible tolerance (or suppression) and always felt quite agonized, because I couldn't restrain my impatient temperament. I've practiced for over nine years. Since I couldn't tolerate certain circumstances, my shortcoming brought about many conflicts and caused alienation between practitioners or my family and me. I could clearly recognize my shortcomings from the standpoint of the Fa, so I made up my mind to restrain myself. I told myself that when encountering problems I should not get angry or speak insolently but should keep calm. Nevertheless, each incident only led to small improvements. Even though I could restrain myself then and there, it preyed on my mind. I could not put it out of my mind, even after a long time. To be completely at ease without grievance or anger seemed too hard for me to achieve. I was disappointed in myself.
When I eventually passed this test, I truly experienced the state of "To endure completely without anger." It helped me one more time to better tell what the innate true self represents and what all sorts of acquired post-natal human notions and attachments really are. I experienced and better understood Master's words:
"What we lose is actually something bad. What is it? It is karma, and it goes hand in hand with different human attachments." (Lecture Four in Zhuan Falun)
Not too long ago, a practitioner pointed out my problems. I thought it was not the truth. I initially endured the comments for a while. Then I started to explain. As I was explaining, I felt more and more upset. At last I burst into tears, because I felt too wronged. I really felt it was unfair and I couldn't calm down. It was a true suffering when the conflicts came up and hit me at the very core of my being. The next few days I put all my heart into studying the Fa. When I was studying the Fa, I experienced no suffering and my heart was at peace. Yet, when I put down the book, soon after, the emotions of grievance, unfairness, or having been wronged again preyed on me.
I cried for a while in the afternoon but suddenly realized that my attitudes were incorrect. I thought, "I will simply send forth righteous thoughts. I don't want to suffer; but the hurt always preys on me. Then I'll eliminate the things that cause me pain. Didn't Master say,
"Dafa Disciples' Righteous Thoughts are Powerful?"
I then sat down and started to send forth righteous thoughts, holding my palm upright to eliminate the bad thing that always wanted me to hurt. Thirty minutes later I felt relaxed. My family (fellow practitioners) asked me if I was still indignant. I said loudly, "I'm not angry any more. I've already eliminated that thing." I really didn't get angry anymore in the following days. My mental attitude also became good. My previous habit of speaking rudely with people and staring at them changed. I became gentle and soft. It was really an amazing feeling.
Another test followed closely. My husband's brother and sister called us and said my mother-in-law was sick. The only three people in our family who are practitioners are my husband, my mother-in-law, and I. My mother-in-law, obstructed by emotions, would seldom clarify the truth of Dafa to her children but would occasionally do so. If she felt she couldn't explain clearly, she would simply give up. Her children saw that she had good health and thus didn't say anything. This time they discovered that their mother showed serious illness symptoms and her blood pressure reached 180. Her non-practitioner children took her to the hospital against her will. The doctor said their mother needed to be hospitalized. My mother-in-law insisted on going home, but didn't tell the children why. Her children were quite anxious and angry but couldn't force her to stay in the hospital. They had to bring her home. Then they turned on us.
Of course I knew that they actually targeted me, because they thought I was the instigator. They thought I was indifferent to losing my jobs under the persecution in order to persist in practicing. They thought I felt all right, even though I was arrested and detained for clarifying the truth everywhere. They also saw that I was even firmer after I was released and thus thought that it was I who influenced my mother-in-law to become like this. When my sister-in-law tried to persuade her mother again and again to take the medicine but mother still refused, she shouted invectives at me. It was really offensive.
When she stopped verbally abusing me I was not angered at all. Instead, I was smiling and in good spirits. I wondered to myself, "Why am I not at all angry today? I was really not angry!" I suddenly realized I had really eliminated the thing that makes me upset. I came to understand why I had always felt annoyed before. It was because I regarded the bad thing tormenting me as me. I tried to control it while I unconsciously acknowledged that the bad thought came from me. That is the reason it was so hard to remove it. Now the bad thing was eliminated, and the attachment that went hand in hand with the bad thing was also gone. This time I truly experienced complete ease when I endured, completely without anger or grievance. It made me generous and open-minded.
Master benevolently settled and solved all the un-righted wrongs and karmic relationships for me as soon as I could tolerate these impulsive offenses. The family members' antagonism toward me was also the result of my intolerance because when I had previously clarified the truth to them I had created conflicts among us. When I could forgivingly understand their behavior, disregard all their former enmity, and treat them with benevolence, everything was amicably settled and resolved. I truly appreciate Master! Master arranged one after another opportunity for me to improve, so as to raise my level and become enlightened with the Fa principles. Master really spared no effort on me. Thank you, Master, for your compassionate salvation.
I have written my cultivation experience and would like to share another point with fellow practitioners. As our cultivation proceeds, we should now be able to clearheadedly and rationally distinguish our innate true selves from postnatal human notions and attachments. If only we can clearly distinguish this, we can better and faster pass the tests of cultivation, one after another. Hasn't Master told us at the end of Zhuan Falun:,
"Cultivation practice itself is not difficult, and neither is upgrading one's level itself difficult. It is because they cannot give up the human mind that they call it difficult."
Our cultivation is precisely letting go of human attachments. We need to know what is called a human attachment and what thoughts are human attachments. Then, they are easy to get rid of and we can truly let go of them. Revered Master taught in "Expounding on the Fa" in Essentials for Further Advancement:
"For a long period of time the sentient beings in Dafa, especially the disciples, have had a misunderstanding of the Fa at various levels regarding xinxing improvement. Whenever a tribulation comes, you do not see it with the side of your original nature but view it completely with your human side. Evil demons then capitalize on this point and inflict endless interference and damage, leaving students in long-term tribulations."
As Dafa disciples who have passed through so many years of evil persecution, we now really need to see things with the side of our original nature or the side of our divine nature. When we treat things with the side of our divine nature, we can truly let go of all attachments. When we let go of all our human attachments, it is just like Master said,
"After passing the shady willow trees, there will be bright flowers and another village ahead!" (Lecture Nine, Zhuan Falun)
What I have written is my shallow understanding. Please be merciful in pointing out anything incorrect.
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