Some Thoughts on Hesitation, Waiting-and-Seeing, and Indifference
By a Dafa practitioner from Mainland China
(Clearwisdom.net) During cultivation, because we have taken a long time to
let go of the human mentality and notions formed over long years, they would
play a role at certain times, and sometimes they could even destroy a
cultivator. This is a very serious issue. Talking about the issue from this dimension where our main body is, the cause
of the problem actually lies in ourselves, because we have not let go of the
attachments and notions we should have and that the part of us that needs to
assimilate to the Fa has not done so. Those bad notions and attachments came
from the old universe, yet we are to enter the new universe, so why don't we
cultivate more diligently and let go of these elements through cultivation? Master has told us all the Fa principles, yet we are held back by our
restricted vision and limited capacity, and are thus unable to rationally
comprehend the Dao according to the Fa. For example, Master has told us many times to study the Fa more, and that all
the truth is contained in Zhuan Falun. But because we have not
relinquished our acquired notions or because they are deeply covered up, we
cannot see the truth of the universe and life, and we are obstructed by karma
and notions. Under such circumstances, our way of thinking has omissions and it
is not harmonizing. Because our decisions are interfered with by the acquired
old elements and these old thoughts, mentalities are based on selfishness and
they are afraid of being touched or harmed, therefore their logic of thinking to
protect themselves would further permeate our natural way of thinking and
influence our assessment of a situation. We would think of protecting ourselves
first before we do anything, or, to put it in other words, we assess a situation
or make a decision on the basis where there is already a notion of "self." Such
a mode of thinking would become a fixed notion over time, and it would become
part of our life, making us believe that this is our self, and we would become
used to looking at things with this notion. Over time, we would enrich and
accumulate various notions to protect our "self," and step by step, we would
form and consolidate our selfishness. This type of notion would eventually
become very stubborn and would completely control our life, causing us to
completely lose our nature until we end up with poor enlightenment quality. If we cannot see these things clearly, and view them as ourselves and go
along with them, we would be completely destroyed. We would not be able to
improve, we would have doubt about Master and would show attitudes of
hesitation, wait-and-see and indifference, and we would have a strong attachment
to when all this would come to an end. We would pay attention to how much we
give and endure, or we would only think of "me" and not see the sacredness and
solemnity of the Fa. These are themselves manifestation and limitation of
notions and human mentalities formed in the degenerate old universe. We all know that Master requires us to read the book often, and that all is
contained in the Fa. However, some practitioners simply believe they can see
things most clearly. They may read the book a few times when they had doubts,
and when they did not experience what Master said, they would say that Master
was over-exaggerating, and some even used reading the book as a way to avoid
persecution. This is in fact resisting assimilating to the Fa. Some practitioners do not pay much attention to rectifying their own
thoughts, and some even take an indifferent attitude toward their bad thoughts,
thinking it is nothing to have bad thoughts, as long as we know they are bad and
we could do better in the future and so on and so forth. This is a manifestation
of our main consciousness indulging old notions and human mentalities, and it is
in fact a very important issue. Why is it that some of us cannot improve for a
long time and have doubts about the Fa? Why is it that some of us, because we
cannot see the profound inner meaning of the Fa in Zhuan Falun due to our
delimited boundary, would stop believing in Master and take this heavenly book
lightly? In fact, for a diligent cultivator with good inborn quality, his
knowing side knows the value of this boundless Fa. Don't deny the importance of
studying the Fa simply because you cannot see anything when you study the Fa
with a human mentality. How can we expect the broad and profound inner meaning
of the Fa to conform to the notions of us insignificant human beings? Master has long made it very clear in Zhuan Falun, "Without knowing the Fa at high levels, one cannot practice cultivation.
Without cultivating one's inner self and one's xinxing, one cannot increase
gong." Let each of us calm our mind and think it over carefully. In fact, these few
words have covered it all. If we see the true inner meaning of the Fa (not with
the word-by-word reasoning of human mentality), and when our enlightened nature
has become integrated with our life in the human world, then even if we cannot
do things perfectly in the present as we would when we are enlightening properly
to the inner meaning of the Fa, we would not be as passive and indifferent. Some practitioners say, "I understand the Fa principles"; in fact, even
though they say they understand the Fa principles, their understanding is
different and is far from the ultimate manifestation of the Fa principles. Some
things shared by fellow practitioners are very inspiring, with every word used
precisely and appropriately, and they are able to break with many attachments
and notions. They are very beneficial to others. Their effectiveness is not due
to being written out in words or composed with colorful phrases. They are
enlightenment of fellow practitioners from solid cultivation. They are simple in
language (It is difficult to express the state of mind and feelings of a
cultivator in language when he is in a state of righteous enlightenment). On the
other hand, some other articles are plain and ordinary but with little
inspiration. Sometimes, practitioners write articles for the sake of writing
them, and there is not much inner meaning in depth between the lines and they
cannot touch people's hearts. We often say that we understand what is said in Zhuan Falun and the
examples given in the book. Then why is it that when it comes to actions, we
would do things according to the acquired set of notions and habits? When we look at things with acquired notions, we may feel that the examples
Master gave in Zhuan Falun are very simple, but the fact is that the same
sentence would represent profound inner meaning to some fellow practitioners.
The reason that some other practitioners cannot feel anything is because their
thoughts and hearts are not pure and calm to the required standards. "Lunyu" [preface of Zhuan Falun] covers the whole book of "Zhuan
Falun." Take the line "humankind must fundamentally change its conventional
thinking" for example. These few characters have covered many of the common and
individual problems we have today. It depends on how much we can enlighten to,
how much we can let go of our "self." We always habitually judge things with our
acquired notions formed over thousands of years or even longer time, and we
always crawl along within the boundary delimited by our own ignorance. Some practitioners have a strong attachment to time, and have developed a
feeling of fear and indifference in the face of the evil persecution. In fact,
longing and fear are two major material factors that hinder cultivators from
elevating, and would cause serious interference and obstruction. This is not a
simple spiritual element, but a material existence, and a life that has a
certain form and capability in other dimensions. They are actually stumbling
blocks, or demons by another name, on our path to Dafa. Their existence would
seriously interfere with our righteous thoughts and breaking through levels, and
it could seriously interfere with our righteous decisions and badly weaken our
will. Only by constant improvement in our xinxing, and by eliminating them with
righteous belief and thoughts can we be more diligent, assimilate to the Fa and
save sentient beings. The above is a bit of sharing at my level. Please point out anything
improper.
Chinese version available at
http://www.minghui.org/mh/articles/2003/11/4/60030.html
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