The Yardstick in One's Heart

By Yichun

(Clearwisdom.net)

There is a joke, a real classic that has been passed down for generations: A father and his son both rode on the back of a donkey. People on the street pointed the finger at them: "This father and son are really cruel, they work the donkey so hard it can hardly catch its breath." So the father dismounted. But then people on the street pointed a finger at the son: "See how disrespectful the son is. He is riding the donkey while his father walks." So the son dismounted and let the father ride. People then said: "Look how mean the father is, letting his son walk and riding the donkey himself." So the father dismounted once again and walked with the son leading the donkey, thinking: "This time, we should be beyond reproach." But before long, passers-by said: "Look how silly both the father and son are. They walk the donkey rather than riding it; so stupid."

What is the right thing to do? It is simply impossible to state at the level of the everyday society.

If a Dafa practitioner with a benevolent and good heart sees this, his words will reflect his benevolence-- When he sees that the father and the son both ride the donkey, he will say: "What a good donkey. It carries a heavy load quietly with no grievance." When he sees that the son riding the donkey and the father leading it, he will say: "The father is so kind. He lets his son ride the donkey." When he sees the father riding the donkey and the son walks along, he will say: "The son is very mature. He is unselfish and thinks of others." When he sees both of them walking leading donkey, he will say: "The father and son are so kind, they do not want the donkey to get too tired."

Why do people reach different conclusions for the same event? It is because people lack benevolence. They always see other peoples' bad side and seldom see their good side. But Dafa practitioners, who cultivate benevolence, always have compassion in their hearts, and always use their eyes of wisdom and heart of benevolence to discover other peoples' good sides. So they arrive at different conclusions.

A benevolent person has a benevolent yardstick in his heart to gauge things. Every thing in his eyes is poetry in motion, beautiful scenery and the blossoming of spring. A vicious person has a bad yardstick in his heart. No matter how good a thing is, he always views it with hatred and grievance as though he cannot wait to get rid of it; the tolerant and benevolent Dafa practitioners become "immolators" and "murderers" in their eyes; how ridiculous!

The lucid, the murky, the good, and the vicious will all remain so respectively. I hope that every one has a benevolent yardstick in his heart to gauge the genuine good and the bad, the clear and the murky, and to determine clearly the true from the false.

2003-6-15

Chinese version available at http://www.minghui.org/mh/articles/2003/6/27/52860.html

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