Breaking Through the Old Forces' Arrangements and an Understanding Of "One Body"
By a Western Practitioner from Canada
A little while ago I had a great breakthrough in my cultivation. I could see many shortcomings
and a few fundamental gaps and deviations in my cultivation. They seemed quite big when I
enlightened to them and I could see my past cultivation over a certain period of time. It was quite
difficult to bear seeing my many shortcomings and the problems I had caused. It was stirring in my
heart making me very angry. I was trying to send righteous thoughts to eliminate the evil anger
inside. It helped me to calm down. I left home to run some errands. I was driving on my own and began unintentionally reflecting. I
kept seeing my shortcomings and the problems I had created from many different perspectives and my
heart kept breaking time and again. I knew that I was just breaking through another level and it was
natural to feel that way. This did not ease the pain because the majority of the pain was out of
deep regret of letting the old forces use my attachments to interfere with Master's Fa
Rectification. I had only seen a certain segment of my cultivation. I saw it as a cycle of my cultivation. I
call it a cycle, as it is something I feel that I have gone through many times. The cycle refers to
a process of my cultivation state that I have gone through time and again. At the beginning of the
cycle my attachments are strong. They gradually become weaker and then they're gone. At the end of
the cycle I always break through with an enlightenment in my cultivation. Then I would wake up the
next morning and feel as though I was back at the beginning of my cycle and starting all over again. While driving my car my broken heart turned back to anger as I began to see many of my past
cycles all at once. It was all very clear and frustrating as I could see the many times the old
forces had used any and all of my shortcomings at any point of my process to interfere. This was not
only heart breaking, making me cry, but I was extremely angry and began punching my car steering
wheel to alleviate the pain and frustration. I felt as though I was a pond of the old forces. This was emotionally difficult to bear and found
myself going to extremes. Although I calmed down and was able to see things in a more balanced way,
I still felt like this cycle was something that was beyond my control. For the next few days I felt very discouraged as I lingered in this state. I used to accept this
cycle as my "process of my cultivating into a divine being", but I couldn't anymore. Our cultivated side is separated from our human side. Yet our human side is given to us so that
we may be here and take part in the Fa Rectification and save sentient beings not so the old forces
can use it at every chance to cause interference. I have had many conversations with the old forces before but they are all almost the same. They
consisted of me telling them that they should not cause interference whenever I notice it. Then they
would follow with some excuses that almost deceived me a number of times. Then I would remember that
we are involved with the establishment of the future universe and the future of all sentient beings
and the excuse of a practitioner having a shortcoming is never good enough to justify the loss that
is suffered from the old forces' interference. They never had any response after that. They angered me because the old forces used the parts of practitioners that were not cultivated,
or the human things that were simply part of the cultivation process, to interfere with the Fa
Rectification. Master said, "I told them not to do this a long time ago. For any being, let alone human beings, no
matter how high a being he is, as long as he's a being within the cosmos, I can rectify him during
the Fa Rectification, from his fundamental nature, from the origin of his existence and from all the
elements that constitute his being eliminating the impure and turning those things around." Master has told them this. They have chosen not to listen, so each time I saw this I was very
indignant towards the old forces and told them directly that I don't acknowledge what you have
arranged. Yet not accepting their interference or their arrangement wasn't good enough. Not
acknowledging them is what Master said in Philadelphia, "I don't even acknowledge you." When I was preparing this sharing for another group sharing several months ago, I stopped typing,
closed my eyes and told the old forces that I don't even recognize them. In an instant I found
myself in nothingness. I was a little scared. What was there for me to believe in? I asked myself.
After a little discomfort I thought of Master and became more scared. Quickly I told Master that I
completely believed in him and nothing else. At this point I felt gong rush through my body, the
dimension of nothingness filled with shining gong and I saw a Chinese character shining in my Tianmu.
I examined it carefully and then wrote it down, as I didn't know what it meant. Later some practitioners told me it meant life and birth ("Sheng"). This was a new
beginning for me. To realize that I need to have faith in Master may not sound like a realization worthy of a
practitioner who has been cultivating four years during the final stages of the Fa Rectification.
After not recognizing the old forces at all I found myself floating in nothingness and I was a
little scared because I honestly didn't know what to believe in at first. After searching within
myself, I saw why. My faith had never been that pure. When I first read the Fa and watched Master's nine day
lecture, it just made perfect sense to me. I didn't need to believe. I always told people that even
if I don't believe it, it is still the Law of the universe. Even if I don't believe it, it is the
truth. Master is in this world, his book is in my hands and it makes complete sense. After Master lectured on the Fa I would just implement the principles and see their power. If I
didn't understand, I would just wait until I did. Yet I never had absolute faith. When I was sitting
in this dimension of nothingness, and had nothing, I saw that I hesitated to believe in Master
without first giving it some thought. But once I did, I was renewed and reborn. It seemed that fundamentally I had faith in myself to harmonize myself with Dafa. I was like the
old forces, using Master's grand efforts to harmonize the things that I wanted during this
time. Yet even with all my effort to do what I wanted, it still was not enough. I saw this most
clearly while I was floating in nothingness. Even though I could do the right things to oppose the
old forces, in the end it was still just me, all by myself, with nothing. Yet with complete faith in
Master, I became a new being. Since then I have had other experiences of breaking through the old forces' control. I had done
something wrong in my cultivation that I shouldn't have. The following morning I woke up and began
to study Dafa intensively. I knew that I had to get up quickly after falling. It was very
uncomfortable to read but I didn't stop. I just gritted my teeth and kept reading. While studying I
had consistent interference, and my heart kept hurting as the Fa I was studying showed me the
shortcomings I had that caused my fall. Despite the pain and discomfort, I clenched the book tightly and just kept reading. I knew the
failed test was a result of the old forces taking advantage of my gaps that I had left uncultivated.
I kept facing the attachments I saw righteously. I admitted my fault and promised to improve. Then
my failed test was traced to its root and I could see the root of the problem. When faced with a test to let go of something I wanted to hold onto I would let the surface thing
go and tell Master that I wanted Zhen Shan Ren instead. This addressed the problem at the time. Yet
I was failing to change the part of my heart that wanted the attachment. Even though I could tell
myself not be lustful, that I am a practitioner and that I don't follow such attachments; still, the
part of my heart that wanted those things was being left alone only to surface again. Now I could
see how fundamentally important it was to eliminate the deviated matter in my heart instead of just
refraining on the surface. It was like "changing the soup without changing the medicine." This was very important to me as it helped me take more grounded steps in my cultivation again. I
felt very grateful to have seen this about my cultivation state and felt very warm and grateful
towards the old forces. The instant this feeling arose I knew right away that it was wrong. I sat
confused for a moment as this enlightenment was dear to me but the old forces had guided me to it by
interfering with me. They were even smiling on me and they were happy for me. I then thought of Master and knew that my Master is Li Hongzhi. This is whom I follow. I did not
like feeling grateful to the old forces, so I told Master that I followed him and directed my
righteous thoughts at the portion of my heart that felt grateful to the old forces and treated it as
the "medicine" that needed to be removed. All the muscles in my body tightened to the
extreme. My body jolted forward and my head was pushed all the way over to the right. My ear smacked
into my shoulder and I heard and felt a loud crack in my neck. Once my body relaxed I sat to start reading again and I could see some old force beings confused
and very indignant, discussing with themselves as they were frustrated with me. Over their shoulders
I could see my Master watching and smiling. I really could understand their pained hearts as they
really felt that they were helping me and then I destroyed the gratitude for them. They are watching
a cultivator treat them this way and they are Gods. How could they accept that if they didn't
believe Master? They just can't. Although I saw this situation I didn't think much about them as
sentient beings, nor was I concerned for them, as they were just some kind of interference. Besides
I was happier that Master was smiling at me. There was another instance when I was going to send righteous thoughts before going to meet a
practitioner. The three days prior I had studied very little or not at all. That had never happened
to me before. When I closed my eyes to clean myself it was virtually impossible. There were far too
many ordinary thoughts and my mind was rushing everywhere and going nowhere. Then came time to send
righteous thoughts and it was impossible. I knew that it was exactly because of my lack of Fa study.
I knew that tests and interference with me was for my personal cultivation, while my righteous
thoughts where for Fa Rectification, and that nothing can be compared to the importance of the Fa
rectification. I told the old forces that although the most important thing for me to do was to study the Fa and
that I was wrong for not doing it, it was not an excuse for them to persecute me. Even though I was
wrong for not following Master's requirements, it was they who were doing the greater wrong, and I
told them that I don't accept them at all. At this point it felt as though an invisible force began
to push down on me. I can only describe it as direct pressure, with rapidly increasing intensity
from all directions. In less then a second the intensity increased to an unbearable point and I
cried out in my mind as loud as I could for Master. In an instant I was able to bear it, remain
calm, oppose the old forces and have very pure and strong righteous thoughts for the remaining time
of sending righteous thoughts. After I finished I felt like a completely different person. It is one thing to describe this but
to experience it was quite traumatic. My mind was empty and my heart was sad as I paced, waiting for
a fellow practitioner. My eyes welled with tears as I could feel Master's compassion, but what
really broke my heart was the things that had happened that were not necessary. I felt if I just had
studied the Fa properly that it didn't have to happen that way. If I could have cultivated myself
better in the past, these times of interference wouldn't have happened and the beings that caused
this interference wouldn't have damaged their futures. Although this thought was a compassionate
thought toward the old force beings, it was still wrong as it acknowledged the old forces and how
they use excuses to persecute Dafa practitioners. I still felt sad for the beings that had to be eliminated. I do not think about it too much, but
it was good that I no longer hated the old forces, yet I shouldn't feel close to them either. I
should just not acknowledge them or their arrangements. I had felt that these experiences helped me to better understand our relationship with the old
forces and begin to understand how to break through the old forces' arrangements. Yet this was all
in relation to myself. My lack of ability to coordinate well with other practitioners still remains
a significant difficulty in my cultivation. A few fellow practitioners and I had been given the opportunity to give a presentation to a
committee in our government, and I had volunteered to coordinate the presentation. On the last day
before our presentation, the agenda completely changed, and based on the group's decision, the
entire presentation had to change as well. Although we had weeks to prepare, we were on a conference call past midnight trying to decide how
best to handle this change in the agenda. When I look back now, I see that it was just an
opportunity for us to see the manner that we coordinate things was not meeting the standard of the
Fa. Almost everyone on the call didn't seem to hold too strongly to their own desire for what should
be done, and each practitioner was doing their best to be responsible for the next day's events, but
most of us seemed to be just "getting the job done" and not really sincere in our hearts.
Each time we had one arrangement, there was another aspect that was not resolved, so then we would
rearrange the presentation and still another aspect was left undone. This happened a number of times
until we had a resolution to the problem, but it depended on one practitioner stepping forward, but
this practitioner did not. So then another practitioner and I both attacked the one who chose not to
step forward in this particular way. We told him that if he didn't do what was needed of him, it was
as if he were admitting that he didn't want to validate the Fa. This surely hurt his heart. We were tired and frustrated and tried to manipulate him. Other practitioners quickly jumped in
and corrected the situation. I immediately felt terrible, and along with the other practitioner, we
apologized. We eventually finalized the agenda for the presentation. I was to prepare slides for the main
speakers, so once they emailed them to me, I began to prepare slide shows for their short speeches
on my computer. Early the next morning I finally finished the presentations and began to burn them onto a CD.
When the CD was finished burning, it was impossible to read any of the information from it. I
destroyed my last two CD's trying to complete it. I had no time to shower, shave or eat, so I just
grabbed my shaving equipment and decided that if I had time, I would shave in the basement where I
was headed. I didn't want to clarify the facts to government official's unshaven, as this would not
be representing Dafa properly. I was stuck in traffic and began to get frustrated that a whole night's work was gone with
nothing to show for it. When I searched my heart I saw some attachments to my own accomplishments,
making a name for myself and not truly being responsible for validating Dafa. I ended up arriving at the meeting late. I saw a practitioner waiting in the lobby so I figured I
could take the time to quickly shave. I went to the basement to shave my face in the washroom but
when I was finished I cut my finger very deeply with my razor and began to bleed and I couldn't stop
the bleeding. Then I got blood on my pants. I was very tired and was trying my best not to get
frustrated, but everything just kept going wrong. When I saw the blood on my pants I quickly cleaned
it off, but in the process got blood in a more revealing spot. I thought to myself, "Now how am
I going to look?" Then I realized again that I was really more concerned about my appearance and my own reputation
and not really the reputation of Dafa and Dafa practitioners. In Master's article "No Politics" it states, I am a cultivator yet it seems that I have not fully melted into the Fa when doing Fa
Rectification because I still carry that desire to make a name for myself and harbor selfish gains.
There are still too many times that I am holding onto what I want when I work on Dafa projects. I
was very embarrassed to read the part of Master LA lecture that stated: "They've considered their choices the most essential, and have thought that
everything I do should harmonize everything they want--they've completely reversed it." I see now that whenever I hold onto what I think is right, or do things with attachment, it is
often because I want something and I am not willing to let it go. When I look deeper I see that I am
in fact using this set of circumstances, the Fa Rectification, to get what I want. It is just like
the old forces. In one instance I can let go of what I want and quietly fill in gaps, then the next
moment I am insisting on what I want, or trying to satisfy an attachment, thus trying to harmonize
what I want. I saw this and vowed to further eliminate my incorrect notions, wrapped some tissue around my
bleeding finger and headed upstairs. My fatigue and worn out patience began to take away my
confidence but while I climbed the stairs I told myself that those were all my personal cultivation
issues that I must work through, but they are nothing compared to the Fa-Rectification and that the
morning events would not discourage me from fully taking part in the day's events. Master is with me
and I will support my fellow practitioners with all of my heart and mind and send pure and strong
righteous thoughts. As I arrived at the floor of the meeting room I felt very touched in my heart
and void of attachment. Once I walked in the room though I didn't see any practitioners there. I sat for a few moments
and kept looking around but no practitioners could be found. I left the room to take a look around
and I found all the practitioners standing in the hallway speaking to a supportive government
official. At the end of it all, the presentation had been canceled. When I saw the group out in the hallway, I was reminded of the importance of being one body, and
of proper coordination. It was not enough for me to be cultivating sincerely, but we had to really
form a harmonized Dafa body by coordinating well. I do not understand this completely, but would
like to share some thoughts on this issue. The issue of true harmonized coordination has been weighing heavy on my heart for some time. In Master's article "No Politics," it states Yet we don't have politics in Dafa. Master has said we take the "great way without form." Master also said,"We don't talk about the 'unity' everyday people do, which is a forced, superficial
thing." Master also said in his comments to a practitioner's article, "Different approaches are in fact the all-encompassing way in which roles are dynamically
distributed in the operations of the Fa, and the Fa-power is a reflection of the one body." When I think about it, each of these statements is very profound and gives me some understanding,
but actualizing them is very hard. I can only appreciate the importance of doing so. The manner in which beings interact, work together and accomplish things becomes a critical
feature of lives at this level, and is also a major factor for the Fa at this level. So our laying a
foundation for the future beings in how we coordinate is critical for the future of beings at this
level, how they will work together and for the eternal existence of this level. This is the level
where humans, and fallen sentient beings in the universe can cultivate back into Gods and truly go
home. In Master's Question and Answer period in Los Angeles he said, "Do you know how important this form of cultivation of today's Dafa disciples is? In the
time to come, here where humans are, a human becoming a God will no longer be a myth." If laying a proper foundation isn't done right it can cause greater problems for future beings
who need to cultivate and go back to their heavens. Then it's not just a matter of this level but an
issue for the many levels they need to return to. This is only understanding it from the perspective of the future. Just as politics makes up much
or our environment for beings at this level today, our coordination or the lack thereof is what
makes up our Dafa body today, and as we cultivate, our ability to improve our coordination will make
our Dafa body better tomorrow. I would like to end with a quote from Master's Question and Answer period in Los Angeles. Master
Li said, "it's just like what the student who submitted the question slip brought up, how are we to
do a good job cooperating and coordinating with each other--that's what Fa-rectification needs the
most from Dafa disciples."
Chinese version available at
http://www.minghui.cc/mh/articles/2003/4/26/49007.html
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