(Minghui.org) Master published the new article “On the Waves Stirred Up by the Article About the Assistant Spirit” today. In order to better understand the new teachings, I immediately downloaded the 7-part series that Master referenced.
The moment I opened the downloaded package, I suddenly realized my big problem on cultivation–I did not position Dafa correctly. I realized that I need to grow more mature in cultivation.
I am not saying that that practitioner shouldn’t have written the series on the assistant spirit or that the Minghui website shouldn’t have published this series. However, when some practitioners were stirred up by the articles, they did not look inward and instead followed along with their attachments. Thus, it caused more disturbance among practitioners.
All the practitioners who were stirred up by the articles should look within for the reasons. I examined myself and found my problem: I was unable to position practitioners' sharing properly.
My heart was moved when I read some of the articles on the Minghui website because they attracted me and echoed my attachments, not because I learned something from them. I treated them more importantly than the Fa to some degree. We have learned from Master's teaching that the cultivation path of every practitioner is different. Practitioners' sharing their experiences is only for our reference. Our true improvement is based on the Fa.
When I read sharing articles, I skipped through Master's words quoted by the authors since I thought that I understood them already. Instead, I read practitioners' experiences and understandings more seriously, especially any content related to other dimensions. Sometimes, I spent more time reading practitioners' sharings than reading the Fa. I read those sharing articles every day before I studied Fa. If there was no time left for Fa study, I skipped it.
It was even worse when I or other practitioners ran into problems; the first thought that came to mind was practitioners' articles and how they solved these problems. I did not think about the Fa and Master's teachings first. I subconsciously used practitioners' sharings to guide my cultivation.
If this continued, it would lead to the situation of my learning from practitioners instead of the Fa. Using their understanding to guide one's cultivation would do harm to oneself and others.
As a cultivator, when one runs into problems, if one's first thought is not from the Fa or Master's teachings, it is a dangerous state. No matter what attachments are behind it, the root cause is that one has not positioned Dafa in the right place in his/her heart.
Another problem I saw was that some practitioners placed more emphasis on the old forces than on the Fa. This was also a reflection of not positioning Dafa correctly.
I left home in 2000 to avoid persecution. A year later, I was arrested and taken to a detention center. I had not been in contact with fellow practitioners for more than a year, and had not had the opportunity to read Master's recent articles. I was not aware of the latest situation of the Fa-rectification.
Several practitioners were put into my cell a couple of days after my arrest. I was really happy to meet them. However, they told me that everything was arranged by the old forces, including a single thought or the expression of one's eyes. I felt their helplessness. The old forces were like mountains in front of these practitioners. It was as if there was no hope of getting over them. They made me feel that everything I had done before was arranged by the old forces.
After listening to them, I felt lost initially since I had not studied the Fa for a long time. But I restored my righteous understanding shortly afterward. I told them: if we do things according to Master's teaching and according to the Fa, any other arrangement has no effect on us; we can persevere until the end. One of the practitioners shook his head after listening my words.
I enlighten now that if we take any interference too seriously, we have already unknowingly drifted away from the Fa.
Zhuan Falun vs. Other Lectures
I also see another problem among practitioners, including myself, which is paying more attention to reading Master's other lectures over reading Zhuan Falun, believing that we all know Zhuan Falun too well.
For some time, I loved to read Master's lectures and rarely read Zhuan Falun. My Fa study was replaced by reading Master's lectures. When I gradually noticed my thought of rejecting Zhuan Falun, I was alarmed immediately.
I began to force myself to read Zhuan Falun. But I felt that I did not learn anything from it and did not want to read it. I realized that that thought was incorrect and tried to repress it. I kept reading Zhuan Falun. My heart gradually settled down, and I found myself enjoying reading it more and more. Later, I began to memorize it. I gained profound understandings while memorizing and reciting it and realized that Master's lectures were all inside this book. I found out that everything in my cultivation was inside Zhuan Falun, including what I would do today, how to do it, and how to deal with problems.
In Master's recent lectures, he also repeatedly emphasized that Fa-study should mainly involve reading Zhuan Falun. I think that many practitioners have not really understood Master's words: “I have compressed everything I can give you into the book of Fa” (“Teaching the Fa at the Fa Conference in Australia”). They do not realize that reading Zhuan Falun is most important and that it is the key to guiding our cultivation, nor that the true cosmic Fa is Zhuan Falun and that other lectures explain Zhuan Falun.
This is my personal understanding; please point out anything inappropriate.