By a Falun Dafa practitioner from China

(Clearwisdom.net)

Recently, some problems emerged among local practitioners when doing Fa validation work. Several practitioners could not face conflicts with tranquil minds and just clung to their own personal ideas. Such attitudes will inevitably lead to impasse and have negative effects on group efforts to validate the Fa. Teacher said,

"Recently, I have often stressed the issue of cooperating and coordinating well with each other. Whether or not those bad attachments of yours have been removed, you have to cooperate well with each other just the same. Why is it that at times you see arguments coming up a lot, and sometimes the arguments go on and on? Why is it that in validating the Fa, disciples' opinions are time and again not unified? This is something that's been quite prominent recently in Mainland China. What's the real problem? It's very simple-it is a question of whether you are validating the Fa or validating yourself. If you are validating the Fa, no matter what another person says about you, you won't be affected inside. If someone counters your opinion and you get riled up and don't like it, if when other people raise an opinion opposite yours based on some problem you have or disagree with your opinion and you don't like it, and you stand up to oppose it and argue on your own behalf, and when this leads to your going off topic and not listening to others, [in all such cases] you are-even if you are defending and explaining yourself with the best of intentions-still just validating yourself. (Applause) That is because you didn't put Dafa first, and at that time the thing that you couldn't let go of most was self." ("Teaching the Fa at the 2004 International Fa Conference in New York")

It's normal that practitioners have different views. But when conflicts arise, the key is to put the Fa as the most important and look inward according to the standard of the Fa. When stalemates occur, the major reason is that we are not studying the Fa well and not looking inward to find out our own problems, but instead blaming others.

Not long ago, something happened to me. Practitioner A called me to ask for practitioner B's number. A and B do not have much contact. I thought that without B's permission, I should not give the number to A. So I told A, "I'll contact B immediately and ask B to contact you so you can meet." Shortly after I hung up, A called again and was very angry. She thought that I did not trust her and was creating gaps between practitioners. At first, I argued with her. Just like Teacher has said,

"But normally when a problem arises, if it does not irritate a person psychologically, it does not count or is useless and cannot make him or her improve." (Lecture Four, Zhuan Falun)

Then in an accusatory tone she asked, "Why do you keep all the phone numbers to yourself? Are the numbers just for you to use? What secrets are you hiding over there?!"

What? I was saddened at these words. In my mind, I complained, "Isn't it normal to safeguard cell-phone numbers of fellow practitioners who are in charge of the truth-clarification material sites? As a practitioner, why don't you understand this? Why are you so unreasonable?!" I thought that I was in line with the Fa, but my mind was not balanced. I knew it was not right, but I could not suppress my thoughts, and thought that I should argue with her sometime later.

Why was my mind like that? The root reason was that I had not looked inward. I should have thought, "Why is she angry with me and not understanding? Why am I so upset? I even used the Fa to blame her and cover up my own attachments." I knew this was not a random event. After calming down, I told myself to study the Fa and look inward.

When reading Teacher's "Teaching the Fa at the 2004 Chicago Conference," the following paragraph jumped out at me.

"Right now a lot of students don't recognize [these problems] at all. With Master not having addressed this type of issue for a while, a lot of people are really indulging these things. I talked about these things in Zhuan Falun long ago, and they are things a cultivator needs to take care of right at the beginning. 'Not hitting back when attacked, and not talking back when insulted' is not just something you say, rather, you should be completely unaffected, and it's something you come to understand from the Fa. I've told you to study the Fa a lot, to study the Fa, study the Fa, study the Fa... When you don't give weight to Fa-study, those things are bound to be indulged. You don't want to hear displeasing things, you only want to hear pleasing things, and [you say or act like] 'I can't stand it when other people irritate me.' Think about it, everyone, isn't it ordinary people who, living in the ordinary world, care about enjoying those pleasing things and who enjoy hearing pleasing words? You're a cultivator, so do you want those ordinary things? Let me tell you, since you're cultivators and you're among ordinary people, you just have to listen to those displeasing words, and you have to be able to listen to those displeasing words. (Applause) Otherwise, when you haven't even resolved this most basic cultivation issue, how could you call yourself a Dafa disciple?"

After reading this part, I felt ashamed. Teacher has directly pointed to our hearts. So why was I upset? In one word, I had not studied the Fa well. If I am selfish, I cannot make progress. If I can overcome my selfishness, I will find out that even though the fellow practitioner may have her shortcomings, if I just focus on her shortcomings and do not want to change myself, how can I truly resolve the problem? Of course, we cannot just focus on solving problems. If we keep on rectifying ourselves with Dafa, the problem will dissolve by itself, and things will turn out well.

Looking at the issue once more: are my thoughts really so pure? Am I really very compassionate to the fellow practitioner? Doesn't my selfish attitude hurt her? Do the bad elements where "one becomes angry as soon as being criticized" exist in my personal field?

So my problems were there. I might be right to consider fellow practitioners' safety. But as a coordinator, I should handle the issue better so that fellow practitioners will understand and not generate gaps between us. That's the key issue. Actually, when she was angry, she was hurt and needed help at that moment. But with my unbalanced mind and spiteful words, how could I change her?

Looking from another angle, I do care about others' attitudes towards me. When others blamed me, I became angry. That's not how a practitioner should be.

I thought of a story: One day, a cultivator and his teacher sat face to face. The teacher asked, "I heard that your former teacher left a poem when he became enlightened, do you remember it?"

"Sure," the student replied and recited the poem. After hearing the poem, the teacher laughed loudly and walked away.

The student was confused. He thought about it for a whole night without sleeping and still could not figure out why his teacher laughed. The following day, he asked his teacher, "Teacher, why did you laugh after listening to the poem I recited?" The teacher laughed even more loudly and told the tired student, "You are even worse than a clown. A clown is not afraid of being made fun of, but you are afraid of it!" The student then understood the reason behind the laughter.

I think that the poem is not why the teacher laughed. He just made use of that opportunity to point out the fear of being laughed at.

In my case, I realized that my attachment is a fear of being blamed, and I tended to blame others myself sometimes.

I thank our Teacher and the fellow practitioner for offering such an opportunity to help me see my attachment and to progress one step further.

Just as Teacher said,

"Gong cultivation has a way, the heart is the path
Dafa has no bounds, hardship serves as the ferry"

("Falun Dafa," Hongyin)

Now I work together with A to do Fa validation work. We were blocked by a technical problem, but after that event, it was solved. Anyway, no matter what happened between us, we should not let our personal issues disturb Dafa work, which could leave loopholes for the old forces and cause a negative effect to the Fa-rectification work.

I also saw areas that have done a good job. It does not mean that conflicts and disputes will never happen to them. It's that they put Dafa as the number one priority, and do not let other things disturb the work of Fa-validation. They solve problems through Fa-study and make progress together.

Some practitioners in an area said that the coordinators do not do a good job, while the coordinator said that the local practitioners are not very cooperative. My thought is that both sides should look inward very carefully. Conflicts should not be evaded. When you feel that other people are hard to work with, it's certain that you have problems yourself, and need to look inward and rectify yourself. When you really become selfless, a bright scene will appear in front of you.

Fellow practitioners, please do not forget that we are practitioners in the Fa-rectification period and are cultivators on the way towards godhood. Let's take the Fa as our teacher and advance together.

August 28, 2005

Posting date: 11/15/2005
Original article date: 11/14/2005
Category: Practitioners' Insights
Translated on 10/29/2005
Chinese version available at http://www.minghui.org/mh/articles/2005/8/30/109474.html

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