A Bitter Lesson from Having a "Doing Things" Mentality and Failing to Study the Fa with a Calm Mind

By a Dafa practitioner in China

(Clearwisdom.net) Master said, "Validating the Fa isn't something ordinary people do; only Dafa disciples are worthy of doing it. So now study and study the Fa more, study the Fa more. Also, whatever we do, we have to do it in an upright way, to really do it like a cultivator. Don't let the old forces take advantage of any gaps. When they take advantage of your gaps they'll do those kinds of things [you mentioned]." ("Explaining the Fa During the 2003 Lantern Festival at the U.S. West Fa Conference") Because I failed to strictly discipline myself according to Master's teachings, I did not pay enough attention to Fa-study, which led to many gaps in my work in validating the Fa. These gaps were taken advantage of by the evil and have caused heavy losses to Dafa. A number of Dafa practitioners were kidnapped at an experience sharing in late May, and suffered persecution. This was a bitter lesson to learn.

I was released in March of this year after three and a half years of persecution in prison. While in prison, I was unable to read Dafa books except for some of Master's scriptures and Fa lectures. As a result, there was a lack of understanding on my part about Fa-rectification and how to do well in Fa-rectification work, and I did not have much experience, nor had I learned much about truth-clarification. I was clearly far behind Master's requirements for Fa-rectification. Under such circumstances, I should have carefully studied all of Master's Fa-lectures several times, and read some of the articles from Minghui to rapidly improve myself and catch up, so that I could adapt to the requirements of Fa-rectification. At the time, a number of practitioners kindly pointed out to me that I should spend some time studying the Fa. But I did not pay enough attention to their advice, and when I saw many practitioners vigorously doing Fa-validation work at the risk of persecution by the evil, I could not keep calm and unconsciously developed a mentality of doing things for the sake of doing them. This mentality was immediately taken advantage of by the evil. I spent little time studying the Fa each day, and even when I did study the Fa I treated it as if it were a task I had to fulfill, and I could not keep a calm mind. I studied the Fa while having my mind on doing other things, and therefore even though I studied the Fa, I did not gain anything, and sometimes I was too busy with other things to study the Fa for a whole day.

Master said, "When you study the Fa, don't do it while holding on to some attachments. You have to calm your mind and be truly studying the Fa. Don't study with a goal in mind. When you study the Fa, you can't let your mind wander or think about other things while studying the Fa, you can't do that or you'll learn nothing." ("Lecturing on and Explaining the Fa at the Metropolitan New York Fa Conference") The more I felt I did not have time to study the Fa, the more things I had to do. Obviously the evil old forces took advantage of my attachment of doing things and were continuously enlarging my attachment. At the beginning, some of the things I did appeared, falsely, to be smooth running, which further developed my showing-off and complacent mentality. Along with the attachment to doing things, I also unwittingly became more and more impatient for quick success. As a result, when I organized a number of practitioners for an experience sharing in late May, the evil took advantage of my attachment and gaps, and quite a few practitioners were abducted, and suffered persecution. I myself and another practitioner were forced to jump from the building to escape persecution, which caused serious injury to my feet. At the moment, I am still unable to look after myself in daily life, and have become destitute.

Master requires us to do three things well: study the Fa, send forth righteous thoughts, and clarify the truth. However, I neglected the most fundamental of the three things, that is to study the Fa well, and because of this I have caused grievous losses to Dafa, to fellow practitioners, and to myself.

Master pointed out in "Towards Consummation"

Please kindly point out anything improper.
Chinese version available at http://www.minghui.cc/mh/articles/2003/6/28/53009.html

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