(Clearwisdom.net) I had an argument not long ago with my younger sister, a fellow Falun Dafa practitioner. With a hot temper like an ordinary person, I used many ordinary people’s words in the quarrel.
I thought that I was a diligent practitioner. I did all the three things and could always see others’ shortcomings. Being particularly strict with my younger sister, I often criticized her in a less than compassionate way upon seeing her problems because I thought that as her sister I should be stern with her. One day, I went to her residence to share experiences with her. I pointed out to her that she should be more diligent, and asked her to let go of human attachments. I had only spoken a few sentences when she got angry at me, "You always see my problems. What’s the good of you? How well do you cultivate anyway? Always finding fault with me!…"
At the moment I told myself to endure. I shouldn’t get angry despite her harshness. But her words became even harsher, and some words seemed to penetrate my bones and hurt my heart. Eventually, I couldn’t endure any more, and just like a regular person, I argued with her with a voice even louder than hers. In my anger I walked out taking my bicycle with me. She yelled at me while I was leaving, "Go back and look inward at yourself!" I got so mad that my heart beat fast and my whole body felt as if it were on fire. I said to her in my mind, "You can do whatever you like. Whether to cultivate or not is your own business." Though I knew it wasn’t right for me to get angry, my heart was still seething after I had got on the bicycle. But I said to myself, "I’m doing this for her benefit. Why doesn’t she look from the perspective of the Fa? Why can’t she treat herself as a cultivator?" I was still pushing the problem outward as I left, thinking about the mistakes that she had made.
I calmed down a bit after I got home. I realized that getting angry was a demonic outburst, not a cultivator’s behavior. With such a serious demonic quality after years of cultivation, I really need to cultivate myself to get rid of it. But I couldn’t focus on Fa study, sending forth righteous thoughts, or my work. I tried lying in bed to calm down, but it didn’t work. I realized that I must be having a problem, but I couldn’t find out which human attachment had caused it. I thought, "We had a harmonious relationship before we practiced. We got along well. I used to do well financially, and I helped her in many ways without complaining or regret. We should have had a better relationship after we practiced. Why would our relationship get worse?"
Before this I had to leave my own home to go into hiding due to the persecution. It’s been six years since I came to my sister’s by following Master’s hints. We experienced a lot of hardship together during the past six years. I overcame many xinxing tests. Sometimes, I passed well, sometimes I didn’t pass. I really should check where I had a problem. I was determined to find the root of the problem.
I pleaded with Master to strengthen me. Even if it were deeply hidden granite or a hard stone I would find it out and eliminate it, and I would not let it hinder our cultivation diligence. At this time Master opened up my mind. In my mind I saw our past experiences of coming across one barrier after another and the twists and turns during the past six years. I remembered in each xinxing test what my sister had said or accused me of, how I had felt, what words had been difficult for me to accept, and what words I hadn’t been able to accept or let go of for a long time. Then, I remembered how well I had gotten along with other practitioners - even when there was a xinxing barrier I passed it very quickly. So why did I still remember what my sister had said? Upon thinking about this I still felt uncomfortable about her words. Sometimes I would think, "I am her sister and treated her so well in the past. How could she treat me like this just because I hide in her place during the tribulation?" I felt deeply hurt.
When these thoughts arose I recognized that they were human thoughts and that I didn’t want them. I also continually tried to eliminate them. But why did they continue to come up? I couldn’t discern what attachment caused them. As I didn’t grasp the fundamental attachment it stayed in my mind for a long time. Then, as soon as I compared my sister with other practitioners, my heart shook, and I thought, "Isn’t this the attachment of being unable to forgive? This is the attachment that has hindered our diligent cultivation together. There are still many people waiting for us to save them. Yet, as we often couldn’t coordinate with each other, we haven’t been able to go to the places that we planned to go for various reasons. The attachment of being unforgiving derives from sentimentality, and it has entangled me. It’s a regular person’s attitude toward another everyday person. If you don’t treat me well I won’t treat you well either. It’s not looking at a problem from the perspective of the Fa. In other words, it is the human notion that makes me feel that my younger sister should follow my suggestions because I’m her elder sister. For me, xinxing tests associated with affection for family are hard to pass. In particular, when the entire family practices Falun Dafa and when one family member isn’t strict with himself in cultivation, it can be difficult for him to look within the Fa to solve the problems with the family. He may often look at things using human attachments, and as a result become trapped in demonic tribulations for a long time.
Are other practitioners having the same problem and becoming trapped in it? If we can let go of human attachments and jump out of sentimentality we can pass the tests by treating our family practitioners as fellow practitioners. Otherwise, we would always wander around with the attachment to sentimentality. I hadn’t found this human attachment of mine during the last five years. Upon finding this attachment I remembered a dream that I had four or five days before. In the dream a male acquaintance came up to me. He tried to stab me with a small knife. I neither tried to avoid the stabbing nor was I scared. In the dream I forgot that I was a Dafa practitioner, nor did I remember Master. I thought that I would fall to the ground soon. But I neither felt pain nor fell. At this time I suddenly woke up. My heart was beating fast, so I sent forth righteous thoughts for a moment. Then, I enlightened that my younger sister’s words were like a knife that scoured my heart and penetrated my bones. After I found the root of my problem, a disgusting scar the size of a basin appeared before my mind when sending forth righteous thoughts. This is what has troubled me. Now that I’ve known it and seen it through, I feel that I see flowers and light after a shadowy and dark period. My heart is clean when sending forth righteous thoughts, and my body feels very relieved.
At this time I enlightened that when we don’t take a step well or pass a test well it’s because we don’t do things according to the requirements for cultivators, we have xinxing problems, and we don’t understand Fa well. Essentially, it’s because we don’t study the Fa enough. When this happens you are in a state of delusion, and you are a human because a human does everything for himself. This caused me to be attached to being unable to forgive, which I didn’t notice for some time. My human attachment surfaced whenever something came up. I didn’t dig out the root because it was hiding slyly. My superficial understanding was that I had sentimentality about her and worried that she couldn’t cultivate diligently. What a beautiful cover! Actually, underneath the sentimentality a more serious attachment was hiding more deeply, the inability to forgive. In other words, one attachment covered up another.
Now that I’m clearer with the Fa principles that Master taught and have discovered the attachment I can understand the deep, predestined relationship between my younger sister and myself. This relationship was made throughout numerous lifetimes. Nothing a cultivator encounters is by chance. My Fa-rectification cultivation path was arranged by Master long before. Then wasn’t my younger sister coming from far away Northern China to settle down here paving the way for our Fa-rectification cultivation?
After understanding the truth of the Fa I regretted my selfishness even more. My mind believed that my own self-respect shouldn’t be hurt, and that I didn’t want to suffer or endure. I only wanted to live a good, comfortable life. I didn’t think like a practitioner. To protect me she had to take pressure from the family and society. She protected me in the onslaught of persecution. Her level was high. Yet I was unwilling to be hurt a bit. How selfish was this attachment of mine! The new cosmos is without selfishness. We all cultivate compassion. Yet, my selfishness was very serious. We all signed pacts with Master before we came down for sentient beings. Why can’t we help each other so we can go back together? It is Master’s and all sentient beings’ expectation that we be strict with our every thought, every word, and every behavior, and upgrade together, do the three things well, and realize the grand vows that we made before history.
Whenever we don’t pass a test well we must find the root. It is not just restraining bad thoughts, as upon restraining them there will be an outburst sooner or later because the substance is still there. With time you will be cultivating in demonic tribulations, which will affect your ability to upgrade your xinxing. Master said
"When you cultivate an upright Fa and [are achieving] righteous Enlightenment, you are to restrain and eliminate your demon-nature. In the past, cultivation in Buddhism was about restraint--restraining demon-nature and enabling Buddha-nature to come into full play. In the end, when one's power of restraint had grown very strong, the person's demon-nature could no longer have any effect, as if it had been locked up. This Fa-rectification is to effect fundamental changes throughout the entire cosmos. That is why during Dafa disciples' cultivation things are being adjusted for them anew, starting from the microcosmic level, and whatever isn't needed is removed directly. It changes the state of a being at a fundamental level. It's different from how things were when people cultivated before." ("Teaching the Fa in the City of Los Angeles" in 2006)
I indeed feel that cultivators should study the Fa more, and that looking within is fundamental for upgrading and is the only sublimating way for cultivating the heart and letting go of attachments. Master talked tirelessly about the importance of studying the Fa. But I wasn’t following Master’s words. Now I realize that I’ve always looked outward, seen others’ shortcomings and thought that I was good. How could I make progress without seeing my own shortcomings? By always accusing fellow practitioners of their shortcomings, in the long run it may add to their psychological burden, which becomes their omission that can be found easily by the old forces’ dark minions, rotten ghosts and Communist evil specters to keep fellow practitioners from cultivating diligently. In actuality, I have added bad substances to the other practitioner’s dimensional field.
Master said,
"…What I am saying is that the overall cultivation form of Dafa disciples has to be one where each person looks within! (Applause) The overall environment of Dafa disciples must not be one where people improve by criticizing and blaming each other! (Applause) So as your master, I can only encourage you to look within, and to, when problems arise, try to find your own shortcomings. If everyone could do this, that would be the best. When a person can't recognize an issue, of course it's not wrong for him to point it out. But when you point something out, it must be done with kind intentions. You are cultivating compassion, so you must have kind intentions. So you need to be mindful of both of these things and be able to do both. Then, I think, you will be able to resolve a lot of problems with ease." ("Teaching the Fa in the City of Los Angeles," 2006)
Today, I am writing down this experience of falling and enlightening, hoping to be of help to fellow practitioners, so that we can upgrade as a whole body and do the three things well to live up to Master’s earnest expectations for us.
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