(Minghui.org) I have been practicing Falun Dafa for 22 years and have run into countless tests and tribulations during that time. When I pass some tests well, it means that I have obtained the right understanding from the Fa's standpoint, whereas not passing a test well means that I have failed to treat myself as a Dafa disciple.
My Human Sentimentality
Since the persecution of Falun Dafa began in 1999, I have been incarcerated ten times. My latest arrest was in 2013, when I was given a four-year sentence and detained in a women's prison. Because I refused to renounce my faith in Dafa, the prison authorities refused to let my family visit me.
My family wrote letters, called, and talked to the prison in person. They also asked other practitioners both inside and outside of China to help me. After all these efforts, they finally were allowed to visit me in prison. Their righteous thoughts came from their understanding of the facts of Dafa, the evil nature of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), and its persecution of Dafa.
This situation led me to develop a strong sentiment for my family and husband – I was grateful for them and felt very proud of them.
My Husband's Affairs
My husband and I had been married for more than 20 years, and we had always gotten along very well. A year before I was released, however, I began to hear rumors that my husband was having an affair with another woman.
When I first heard the rumor from an inmate, I knew right away that the evil forces were trying to use this to break my determination and spirits and to tear my marriage apart. From what I had learned in prison about the CCP, I knew that everything the evil forces did to me was aimed at destroying my righteous belief in Dafa. Therefore, I was very calm when I first heard that rumor; it was as if they were talking about someone else.
The inmates were surprised to see how calm I was, so they added more details about my husband's affairs, such as how my husband stayed in different hotels with that woman, spent a lot of money on her and her family, etc. I wanted to believe that my husband would not do anything like that, but my instincts told me that everything they said was true.
I read the Dafa teachings to understand this matter. My husband had always been on my side since the beginning of the persecution and had sacrificed a lot for me. He supported Dafa and my cultivation and resisted the persecution. He also helped expose the evil forces and filed a lawsuit against Jiang Zemin using his real name. He had demonstrated in many ways the integrity of his righteous character and should be a life that can enter the future. Because of his valuable merits, I should treasure him.
Master Li told us in “Turning the Wheel Towards the Human World:”
“...during the Fa-rectification I don’t hold the past faults of any sentient being against him, and that I look only at a sentient being’s attitude toward Dafa during the Fa-rectification.”
So I decided to focus on his merits and disregard his shortcomings. I continued to write to him. I knew that the evil forces took advantage of his lust to try to destroy us, but I had to let go of my sentiments so that the evil forces wouldn't succeed.
Forgiving Them
I told him that I knew of his affair the night I was released. He was shocked but then told me the truth about everything.
I told him that he was a man with righteous thoughts because he resisted the persecution of Dafa and had used his real name to sue Jiang Zemin. He had proven to be a person of integrity.
“The evil forces took advantage of your lust and caused you to make such a huge mistake. Their goal was to drag you and the woman to hell to destroy you,” I said. “Now that I'm home, you'll have to make a choice – you can either come home or stay with that woman, because you can't have both.”
He acknowledged his mistake and promised that he would break up with her, but he said he needed some time to do so. I told him that he could remain on friendly terms with her but nothing else, and he agreed.
I did not want to harm that woman and considered the situation from her perspective – how would she feel if she had to break up with my husband right away. After learning more about her, however, I realized that I was very naive.
My husband told me that she had lived overseas for many years and had dated a young man her son's age. She persuaded my husband to spend more than 200,000 yuan to buy her designer handbags, shoes, clothes, and jewelry. She also asked him to give her money. She called my husband “old man” while she was his “old lady” and then claimed that it was normal for a husband to spend money on his wife. She even had my husband pay her entire family's living expenses. She convinced my husband that she loved him and that she wanted to spend the rest of her life with him.
After realizing the true nature of that woman, my husband decided to break up with her, but she still asked him for 20,000 yuan. When he refused, she reduced the amount to 4,800 yuan, adding that she should have gotten the investment returns on my husband's 20,000 yuan a few days earlier.
The Beginning of the Real Test
It seemed that I'd done a good job handling this, but I had actually just started to resent everything. After my husband broke up with her for good, I began to let up in my cultivation. As a result, all kinds of human emotions and sentiments surfaced.
A mixture of different emotions stirred up within me every day, and I blamed my husband for everything. Almost any topic presented an opportunity for me to reprimand him. I was arrogant and aggressive in expressing my hatred. Sometimes my husband quarreled with me when he could no longer stand my resentment, but I became even more resentful afterward.
Every time I checked his mobile phone and saw his bank record of transactions of various amounts to that woman or pictures that he posted in social media or messages to our relatives and friends bragging about their relationship, I would fight with him.
My mind was full of resentment for how he had treated me unfairly, and I thought about how much fun they had together while I was being brutally tortured in prison. I spoke to him as if I were a prison guard interrogating a prisoner. He said that I was using 610 Office methods on him and that I was acting like the vicious CCP. We hurt each other like that every day.
As a result, I could hardly do anything, and I was unable to focus when I read the Dafa teachings.
Getting Rid of the Attachment
I was unable to extricate myself from this hatred. At this time, the book The Ultimate Goal of Communism was published, and a fellow practitioner came to talk to me and help me to realize my faults, as well as the CCP's influence on me. She said that the evil forces wanted to ruin my family to reach their goal of persecuting me. I could only overcome this tribulation by studying Dafa's teachings well.
She helped me send righteous thoughts to clear the evil's interference. I gradually became more awake and alert. The four years of imprisonment in that evil place had put a lot of evil factors into my space. My mind was full of violent ideas and hostility. Only by carefully studying the Fa could I fix all the defects and bad factors inside me. And Master could only help me when I studied the Fa well.
Under Master's compassionate care and with the help of fellow practitioners' righteous thoughts, I began to increase my Fa-study, memorize the Fa, look inward, cultivate my xinxing, and remove the Party culture that was instilled in me. I was gradually able to separate myself apart from my human sentiments. I stopped feeling pain over my husband's affair, and I no longer fixated on the monetary losses. I also dispelled the fear that my husband's extramarital affair had made me lose face.
All these worldly matters became so trivial to that they gradually just drifted away.
Forgiving Ordinary People's Faults
When I immerse myself in the magnificence of Dafa, I can feel that everything in the human world is just a play on a stage. When the show ends, people will leave and go their separate ways. Everything in this world is illusory, so why am I so attached to sentiment, hate, and fame?
My husband had failed to do well, so he would face the consequences. Why should I be so irritated about his behavior? If I cultivate well, I could help him to rectify his deeds, but if I did not do a good job with my cultivation, not only would I drop down, but he would also not be saved. It is my responsibility as his wife to wake him up when he is lost. I should offer him my hand and bring him back onto the right path after his fall.
But the evil forces were not willing to be purged so easily. Even as I was memorizing the Fa, thoughts of resentment and imbalance would appear and trouble my mind. I sent forth righteous thoughts to strengthen my main consciousness and recognized that those thoughts were not my own but, in fact, the human notions acquired in this dimension. I rejected all the interference.
Sometimes when I did the exercises, memories of their photos would appear in my mind. I immediately reminded myself to reject those memories and destroy them – any ideas that prevented me from learning Dafa, practicing the exercises, and sending forth righteous thoughts were not my own. Sometimes I became sleepy when memorizing the teachings. I overcame this difficulty by resisting the interference and would be fine after a while.
When I measured everything from the standpoint of the Fa, I learned that we were simply playing our roles as husband and wife in this human world and that the fate of our past lives has contributed to how our relationship plays out in this life. It is very possible that I had caused him suffering in a previous life and he had come to get his compensation.
Master told us, “So the beings you owe will come for payback...” (Zhuan Falun) I must have hurt him more in my past life.
Master does not count our past misdeeds and saves us unconditionally. He bears boundless sins for us, gives us the most wonderful things in return, and bestows upon us the title, “Fa-rectification Era Dafa Disciples.” As a disciple of such a revered master, there's really no reason why I'm not able to forgive an ordinary person!
A Good Cultivation Opportunity
Through this ordeal, I was able to see more of my human attachments and eliminate them. It was actually a good cultivation opportunity for me. It was Teacher’s plan to use this test to help me improve. My husband and that woman were both stepping stones on my cultivation path, and I am now sincerely grateful for both of them for giving me a good opportunity to expand the capacity of my heart.
To help my husband, I downloaded Chinese traditional stories about the consequences and punishments one would incur as a result of lust and extramarital affairs. I also showed him articles on how controlling one's lust could bring one happiness. I told him to recite Master's poems. He finally realized the harmfulness of his behavior and promised before Master’s portrait that he would never do that again.
After a while, he began to read Zhuan Falun. Now he is reading Master's other lectures to purify himself with Dafa's teachings. He has understood the facts of Dafa and knows that his support of Dafa has laid a good foundation for his future.
I am sincerely grateful for Master's help and for teaching me the principles of the universe. It's with these principles that I am able to see through the fog in the turmoil of the world and return to my original, true home.
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Category: Improving Oneself
