(Clearwisdom.net) Today I heard shocking news that a Dafa practitioner passed away as a result of persecution. Upon hearing the news, my lax mindset was deeply touched. I knew that I was feeling regretful. When my fellow practitioner was relentlessly persecuted, what had I done for that practitioner? Nothing. I've been in an indifferent state for a long time: I seldom get up to send forth righteous thoughts at midnight, and I have been apathetic when fellow practitioners have been arrested, detained, and persecuted. Not only did I not do well with my responsibility in the one body, I also did not clean up the dimension that I am responsible for. My slacking off indirectly intensified the pain that fellow practitioners suffered. As a particle of the one body of Dafa practitioners, I should be held responsible for my fellow practitioner's being persecuted to death. I calmed down and started seriously reflecting on myself. I looked inward in search of my existing problem and found the human notions that are hindering my advancing diligently in the Fa.
Selfishness of Protecting Myself
I had been persecuted myself and had left their clutches with difficulty. Since I returned home, the mindset of protecting myself and not wanting to be persecuted again has continuously arisen and multiplied. It has made me overly cautious and unintentionally makes everything start with me. I first make sure I don't get hurt or that my interests are not hurt before deciding whether or not to do something. When doing things to validate the Fa, I try to pick things that are not dangerous. Facing relatively risky things, I am conservative and use safety as an excuse to hide my selfishness of protecting myself. For example, I would try to clarify the truth face-to-face instead of distributing paper materials in order to not leave evidence for the authorities to persecute me. Being a coordinator is dangerous, let somebody else do it. All kinds of self-protective mindsets have made me go backwards. Although I have been doing the Three Things, my state of mind has not been good. I always feel I have not been diligent and am slacking off. It seems there is something that is hindering my advancing in the Fa. Actually, it is the selfishness of protecting myself that has blocked my road forward.
The Attachment to Comfort
Having not clearly realized the selfishness of protecting myself and not eliminating it through cultivation, my attachment to comfort has been nourished. I started to get attached to everyday life, to family life, i.e., how to live better, how to make my family live better and enjoy life. My focus started to shift, and I started to spend more time on my career and family life. I started to enjoy life and it intensified my mentality of pursuing fame and profit, my attachment to lust and jealousy. I was not diligent in studying the Fa and doing the exercises. I could not study the Fa with a clear mind. The persecution of fellow practitioners is not enough to touch my indifferent and slacking off mind, let alone to spur me to send forth righteous thoughts to disintegrate the evil and rescue fellow practitioners. These human mentalities have formed a screen between the Fa and myself.
Fear
With the selfishness of protecting myself and the attachment to comfort, naturally comes the reluctance to lose what I have. I have not been willing to be persecuted, to suffer and give up my comfortable life. The fear of hardship and the fear of loss has intensified my fear. Every day when I go to work I look around to see if anyone is following me. For a while I dreamed about being kidnapped and persecuted in the evil's den. All these things have added to my fear. When the mind is not righteous, evil will come. One day, the evil police came for me. With Master's benevolent protection, I was able to escape. This was really a wake-up call to me as I was not diligent and deviated from the Fa.
I Did Not Put the Fa First, Trust Master and the Fa, and Truly Cultivate Myself
Regarding my situation, Master has often given me hints and fellow practitioners have often reminded me. I have also looked inward. In the process of looking inward, I found that my foundation has deviated. I also found a lot of attachments. From the Fa I know that I should get rid of my selfishness, that I should be selfless, that I should validate the Fa and save sentient beings. But I always feel there is a screen between myself and the Fa that I cannot break through. I often feel troubled and helpless. I often ask myself: "Why am I not compassionate to sentient beings? Why can't I touch peoples' hearts when I clarify the truth to them? Why can't I let people feel the benevolence of Dafa practitioners and truly feel the beauty of Dafa?"
That fellow practitioner's passing away has made me look inward and cleared my mind in the Fa. It also made me think of our whole body.
With Master's benevolent guidance and protection, our whole body has endured difficult tests and has gradually matured. I also thought of those coordinators who have worked tirelessly these years to enable practitioners in Dalian to do better in validating the Fa and saving sentient beings. During the intense persecution, when our whole body is suffering losses, many coordinators have come forward. In recent months, evil factors have madly persecuted Dafa practitioners and sentient beings. Our whole body is facing difficult tests again. All this persecution is related to problems that exist in the whole body. So what are the problems? Since I don't have broad contact with practitioners, I will only write about the ones that I know. These are problems that I noticed and they are not intended to be comprehensive and may not be accurate. This is for exchanging ideas with fellow practitioners and hopefully will be of help to my fellow practitioners and our whole body.
(1) Practitioners rely on and idolize coordinators, while coordinators have the attachments to self and validating self
From what I know, the practitioner who passed away had problems in cultivation. I think practitioners who have relied on and idolized this practitioner should do some self-reflection. This attachment significantly affects the coordination of the whole body. Many practitioners' dependence on and idolization of a practitioner would have the old forces take advantage of the loophole and put the practitioner in danger. If we rely too much on material sites or rely on and idealize the coordinators, we are actually harming those practitioners.
(2) Focusing on doing things instead of solidly cultivating onself in the process of validating the Fa
The diligent fellow practitioners around me are all very busy. They have many things to take care of in the whole body coordination and cooperation. I also noticed, however, that some practitioners focus on doing things and take that as cultivation. Because they are busy all day doing things, their Fa study and sending forth righteous thoughts are interfered with, and they do not pay attention to cultivating themselves and upgrading xinxing while doing things. Because of this, there have been many losses.
(3) The attachments of self-protection and fear hinder the formation of an effective whole body
The evil persecution has certain impact on some practitioners, leaving a shadow in their minds. Some practitioners formed the attachment of self-protection to avoid persecution. This kind of fear artificially creates separations among practitioners and prevents us from forming an effective one body.
(4) Being hesitant in validating the Fa as one body, accusing others, and requiring others to do well
I think the current persecution in Dalian is relevant to every Dafa disciple, and every disciple is responsible for it, because the situation of a certain region reflects the overall cultivation state of local practitioners. Of course, when problems arise we should not look for who's responsible, we should check how we ourselves did and how we will do well in accordance with the Fa.
Master said,
"if every one of us cultivates his inner self, examines his own xinxing to look for the causes of wrongdoing so as to do better next time, and considers others first when taking any action, human society would become better and ethical standards would again rise. The spiritual civilization would also become better, and so would public security. Perhaps there would not be any police. No one would need to be governed, as everyone would discipline him or herself and search their inner self." (Zhuan Falun)
As Master's disciples, we should follow Master's words. We should not look outward to seek help and depend on the whole body. When facing problems, we should search inward from the Fa's perspective to find our own shortcomings and how to do well. If inside the whole body's coordination and cooperation, every individual conforms to the mechanism of searching inward, our whole body will constantly harmonize and improve, catch up with the process of Fa-rectification, and do well in validating Dafa and saving sentient beings.
Master is rectifying the Fa and saving all beings in the whole cosmos. Dafa disciples assist in Master's Fa-rectification and fulfill the mission of validating Dafa and saving sentient beings. As Dafa disciples, we need to handle ourselves correctly in relation to Dafa, to the whole body, to fellow practitioners, and to sentient beings. To Dafa, we should place the Fa first and treat the Fa as teacher; to the whole body, we should harmonize it and take responsibility as a particle of it; to fellow practitioners, we should be considerate and think more of our own shortcomings; for sentient beings, we should offer salvation with compassion.
I think that no matter what problems arise at the level of the individual or the whole body, they are caused by our attachments and reflect our cultivation states. We must correctly handle the different relationships, place the Fa first, treat the Fa as Master, eliminate the attachments, and advance diligently. Only by doing so can we validate the Fa well and fulfill our vows to save sentient beings.
Oct. 5, 2009