My Understanding about "Righteous Thoughts"

By Fei Yu, a practitioner in China

(Clearwisdom.net) "Righteous Thoughts" is a term that's constantly on our lips. Some practitioners regard righteous thoughts as exercising the "divine power of Buddha Law," which imparts the courage to carry out Fa rectification, to not fear the evil, to face danger without panic, the ability to break out of the evil dens, and so on. In my opinion, such an understanding is rather narrow in scope.

As a matter of fact, when we validate Dafa and save sentient beings, our righteous thoughts have already manifested themselves, and therefore I believe that righteous thoughts are not limited to those aspects mentioned above. When facing various situations, being able to correctly consider, handle and treat everything we encounter according to the requirements of Dafa is an expression of righteous thoughts. If our thoughts do not meet the standard for a Fa rectification Dafa practitioner, then we do not have righteous thoughts, or our righteous thoughts are not adequate.

I know a practitioner who once took a taxi carrying a full load of Dafa materials to distribute out of town (He often distributes Dafa materials there). He was fearless and introduced Dafa to the driver, telling the driver that he was a Falun Dafa practitioner. In my opinion, his conduct was not prudent. Another practitioner said that his thoughts must have been very righteous to promote the Fa to the driver while carrying a full load of Dafa materials. I don't look at it that way. I don't think it is righteous thoughts if one merely has the guts to do Dafa work. If we only do things based on this one-dimensional perspective without considering the circumstances, that is not sensible, much less righteous thoughts.

Everything we do, we must put the Fa first and consider whether it has any impact on the Fa. Every thought or idea of ours should be based on the Fa. It is a righteous thought only if we conduct ourselves in a sensible and considered manner. We must look at the big picture and take into consideration the impact on the whole. In a wicked environment like that in Mainland China, it is quite perilous to tell the driver that you are a Dafa practitioner with a car full of Dafa material. In such a situation, it would have been better to promote the Fa from a third person perspective, which can help people just the same. Therefore, before spreading Dafa to the driver, one should first think about the large amount of materials. If anything bad happened, it would have been a heavy loss, even impacting the production of future material since that practitioner is responsible for the printing of Dafa materials.

At the same time, the loss from his indiscretion would impact the local Fa rectification negatively, as he shoulders such an important mission. Under such circumstances, it is easy for the evil to exploit the loophole of his injudiciousness and cause interference. The thoughts that impel him to do it that way are already improper and don't conform to the Fa. How could they be regarded as righteous thoughts? This is the very reason why some practitioners were kidnapped even though they thought they had more than adequate righteous thoughts. Their "righteous" thoughts were in fact not righteous.

I recall that there were several practitioners in our area who thought that their thoughts were very righteous and feared nothing. They threw caution to the wind and had no qualms about using risky words in their phone conversations. For instance they would say, "Give me some truth-clarifying material, or give me some material from Minghui" and so on. I reminded them of the need to be prudent when making phone calls. They said, "That is your attachment to fear and lack of righteous thoughts. The Falun turns automatically so the evil cannot hear what we say." In fact, when they said this, they were already not sensible and had no righteous thoughts. Not long after, the police traced their addresses and arrested them because their phone calls were tapped, and they made calls using the public phone in the building where they lived. I hope that fellow practitioners who make similar mistakes can draw from this lesson and reduce Dafa's losses.

A practitioner in Changchun City is very rational and clear-headed in doing Fa-rectification work, and plays a major role in Fa rectification in the region. Since July 20, 1999, he has persistently been at the forefront of Fa rectification, and has persevered through countless difficulties. Fellow practitioners around him have been kidnapped one after another but the evil could never touch him. One practitioner who just got out of a forced labor camp asked him, "In all these years, the evil could never get you, how did you manage that?" He answered, "In all these years, I have been paying meticulous attention to studying the Fa. No matter how busy, I must study the Fa before I start on other things. At the same time, I look within whenever I encounter problems. I remain rational and clear-headed when doing anything, and put the Fa as top priority. My every thought must be righteous and meet the standard of a Fa rectification Dafa disciple."

Then, he told him a story that happened while doing Dafa work.

He once rode a bicycle in the wind and snow to deliver a large bundle of Dafa books to a fellow practitioner. Upon getting to the building where the practitioner resided, he saw several parked police cars and a number of policemen walking back and forth. His immediate thought was, "Did anything bad happen to the practitioner?" However, it seemed unlikely. He was about to go upstairs to meet with the practitioner, but stopped and asked himself, "Why do I insist on getting upstairs under such circumstances? Is it to show that I have no fear? If I don't give him the Dafa books today and give them to him tomorrow instead, would it affect Fa rectification? If I insist on going upstairs in such a precarious situation, would it not cause losses to Dafa, should something go wrong? Then, why don't I turn around and go home? Isn't it an attachment that I insist on going upstairs?" He finally figured out that the attachment was laziness. If he didn't deliver the books that day, he would have to come back the next day and put up with the bad weather again. After he found his attachment, he turned around without hesitation and went home. Next day, he delivered the Dafa books to the fellow practitioner without a hitch.

This incident showed that the practitioner didn't have fear when he stopped going upstairs under the circumstance, but that he was rational and clear-headed in determining if he was acting according to the Fa, if his action would bring any harm or loss to Dafa, if he had put the Fa as top priority for everything he did, and if every thought was based on the Fa and met the standard of a Fa rectification Dafa disciple. Such is the true meaning of righteous thoughts and truly strong "righteous thoughts."

The above is my personal understanding. Please point out any thing improper.

Chinese version available at http://minghui.org/mh/articles/2004/2/29/68876.html

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