No Matter How Difficult Our Situation, We Should Put Dafa First

By a Dafa practitioner in China

(Clearwisdom.net) The practice of Falun Dafa directly targets one's mind. We can improve ourselves because we are able to get rid of human attachments. Simply losing material things does not mean that we can truly abandon our attachment to them, though we may mistakenly believe that we have lost the attachment.

We are cultivating in society during the Fa-rectification period and our righteous paths will be left for the future. Due to the evil persecution in China, many Dafa practitioners have been detained, confined in forced labor camps, imprisoned or forced to leave their homes to avoid arrest for their beliefs.

People might say that these practitioners have lost everything.

I myself have had to leave home to avoid arrest. I lost my normal study, work and living environment. My life was in turmoil, and it directly affected my validating Dafa. I also discovered that I could not truly rid myself of the pursuit of material benefits. My attachments were completely exposed during that period. When I was faced with hardships, I first thought of my own daily life. I even had thoughts of putting aside cultivating and validating Dafa, and placing my work and home life first.

I do not feel this thought was correct. In such a difficult situation, can we still look inside to find our shortcomings, can we still be considerate of others, and can we still place Dafa first? Did we lose these material things because we were too attached to them, thus leaving a gap for the old forces? Isn't it just like eating meat? We aren't attracted to eating meat, and get a stomach ache after eating it, all because we are too attached to the meat. However, we need to relinquish this attachment while we are not able to eat meat. Of course, this is only from the angle of self cultivation.

In the forced labor camps, Dafa practitioners do not have any freedom, and suffer inhumane torment. This is really difficult. However, in such a "difficult" environment, are we still able to calm down and look for our own attachments? Teacher told us: "When it's difficult to endure, you can endure it. When it's impossible to do, you can do it." We are going to enter the new cosmos, so we must achieve selflessness. We will never again degenerate. When some of the living beings in the old cosmos faced disintegration and elimination, in the face of such huge tribulations, their thoughts were on how they would preserve and protect themselves. However, what Dafa practitioners should achieve is consideration for others and saving sentient beings while we ourselves are undergoing tribulations and suffering pain. Only when we truly achieve selflessness will we meet the standard of the new cosmos!

Here, I have only begun a discussion of this topic, and am offering a few introductory remarks so that others may offer their valuable ideas. I hope we all can consider and understand problems better based on Dafa, improve our xinxing (1) and pass all tribulations.

(1) xinxing: Mind or heart nature; moral character.

Chinese version available at http://www.minghui.org/mh/articles/2004/6/2/76162.html

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