(Clearwisdom.net) I heard that fellow practitioner A was sent to the hospital by her family because of a stroke. My first reaction was, “How come? She has such strong righteous thoughts. Why was she interfered with by illness karma?”
With these questions in my mind, I talked to practitioner B, who told me, “Although it happened to her, every practitioner who has had contact with her should look inside and think about why our Fa study group has such a loophole. When a practitioner is persecuted by the evil forces with illness karma, we should look inward and see if we have the attachment of envying practitioner A, the attachment of relying on practitioner A, or other attachments. Why did this happen at this crucial moment of saving sentient beings? How big of an impact does this have on saving more people, especially her relatives and friends?”
The words of practitioner B cooled me down and made me think about my attachments. I did not consider that my attachments of envying and relying on practitioner A could cause illness karma. When I initially heard about practitioner A being sent to the hospital, wasn't my first reaction a manifestation of my envying her? Starting from there, I came to think about other practitioners with a similar mindset. Practitioner A previously escaped from detention due to her righteous thoughts. She was warm-hearted and willing to help practitioners in all kinds of matters. She would have practitioners stay at her home all the time. She had a very clear understanding about illness karma. When a practitioner had illness karma, she would go to share her understanding and help that practitioner correct any misunderstanding of the Fa. Gradually over the past few years, fellow practitioners became very much dependent on her. Therefore, more and more attachments were focused on her and all the evil in other dimensions was watching each and every thought of practitioners. Under certain circumstances, the evil brought about the persecution of her for the purpose of getting rid of the attachments of the practitioners around her. This caused irreparable damage to the cause of saving people. I had read related articles sharing an understanding in this aspect of cultivation in the past, however I had never put myself in that context and paid adequate attention. Now it has actually happened to me and the practitioners around me. We all feel regretful that our attachments have given the evil an excuse to persecute our fellow practitioner. Our attachments brought about more difficulties for saving sentient beings. It is a life and death lesson for us all to learn.
In painfully looking for attachments in retrospect, I found the following attachments:
1. Facing difficulties in our cultivation, we always look for answers and advice from other practitioners, especially those that we think are in a good cultivation state and have a clear understanding of the Fa. Instead of studying the Fa in a down-to-earth manner and looking for answers in the Fa, we always just consult other practitioners. This is a typical mistake, namely learning from a person instead of the Fa. Of course, this does not include normal experience sharing without attachments.
2. In our Fa study group, we would have a sense of loss if few people showed up, thinking, “What is the point of coming to the group study? It is no better than just staying home and studying by myself.” Fa study is not a superficial process, nor can it be done by following the crowd. No matter who comes and who doesn't, we should consciously maintain our group study. Even if there are only two people, we should keep up the Fa study with all our heart and mind.
3. I also found the attachment of fearing that practitioners might lose face. In our daily interaction with practitioners, we know pretty clearly what kinds of attachments each of us has. Sometimes when we point them out to other practitioners, they do not accept our words calmly. And sometimes they even try to cover up the attachments. Gradually, we end up accepting the situation passively and do not point out the attachments anymore, leaving it all to the practitioner him/herself. For instance, some practitioners dozed off while sending forth righteous thoughts and thus their hands fell flat. When other practitioners pointed it out, some practitioners did not look inside for improvement, but instead covered it up by finding excuses.
4. The pursuit of comfort and ease is very common among practitioners. When facing a certain difficulty, one will first wonder if there is a shortcut to bypass it or make it easier. Sometimes one will even take risks to get around difficulties. For example, it is risky to make phone calls from one cell phone to another cell phone. Also, it is risky to carry a cell phone while doing truth clarification work just for the convenience of communicating with family. Some practitioners don't pay attention to safety concerning the use of cell phones and it poses a big risk for the whole group's truth clarification work. The attachment to comfort and ease is manifested in various aspects and should have practitioners' full attention. Also, the issue of cultivating speech is important.
When fellow practitioners are suffering from illness karma, it often has to do with the practitioners around them. When we see their attachments in our daily contact, what should we do? If we can act according to the Fa and point out their attachments with a benevolent heart, the evil won't have any loophole to find, we will walk our righteous path, and our fellow practitioners won't be persecuted and interfered with by the evil. If we try to find fault with the practitioner who is having illness karma, we are actually on the side of the evil and sending forth righteous thoughts won't work, because we have accepted the evil persecution of our fellow practitioner. Teacher told us to look inside and cultivate ourselves. We should all follow this principle strictly, looking inside for our own attachments instead of doing things superficially. Only through cultivating ourselves can we form a solid whole body and a true cultivation environment, thereby reducing the evil interference—all of this comes from the Fa. So we must be clear on this: only studying the Fa can keep us improving ourselves and maturing in our cultivation.