By Falun Gong practitioner from Mainland China

(Clearwisdom.net) After I started cultivating Falun Dafa, I read several articles on the Minghui website regarding people's understandings of "fundamental attachment." I was always thinking, "What are my fundamental attachments?" Recently, a small thing helped me to come to an understanding.

Although I am married, I have never been pregnant. My relatives worried about it and advised my husband and me to see a doctor. At first I thought that, as a practitioner, I did not have any disease, and I should not go. But my non-practitioner husband could not accept this. In addition, my family members insisted that we should see a physician together. I discussed this with a fellow practitioner, who suggested that I treat this as a chance to validate Dafa, that I should go for a checkup in a dignified and upright manner, and let go of the attachment of fearing attachments. I went to the hospital and had a checkup with my husband.

During the visit, I kept sending forth righteous thoughts. I asked for Master's support to eliminate all the evil interference so that I would pass the examination. The examination results showed that my husband was completely normal, but I had some trouble. I realized right away that there was a problem with my xinxing.

I looked into my thoughts surrounding the event. Initially I was unwilling to have a check up since I thought that it was impossible for me to have any health problem, so only my husband needed to have a checkup. I thought it must be entirely his fault that we did not have a child. After we arrived at the hospital, although I kept sending forth righteous thoughts, the focal point of my thinking was not right. I kept thinking that my exam results should be normal: I focused on my exam results. This was actually validating myself, instead of validating the Fa.

Being genuine Falun Gong practitioners, we don't have to think about this. If we behave righteously, everything will be arranged by Master. What was the fundamental attachment behind my attachment to the exam results? I was moved by the changes I had experienced after practicing Falun Gong, and was seeking the beautiful future a practitioner could look forward to. My desire to seek the happiness and comfort of an ordinary person's life became the attachment to Consummation and the rewards of reaching a higher level. After careful analysis, I discovered that all these superficial attachments came from a fundamental attachment, an attachment to myself.

After realizing the fundamental attachment, I discovered that all my attachments since the start of my cultivation were connected with this one. For example, after cultivating for some time, it seemed that I had let go of the attachment to having a child. But I always had the notion that, although ordinary people's things are useless, after Consummation, my situation would be beyond imagination! Normally, I pay no attention to ordinary people's things. I have a high opinion of myself, regard myself as being correct, and think that nobody is better than I am.

While sharing with fellow practitioners, I always wanted to talk to the earnest ones. I felt they could help me to improve. I was unwilling to share with practitioners whom I thought were not earnest enough. I thought that, since their understandings were not high enough, there was no need to share with them. This behavior of thinking about myself and ignoring others came from the attachment to myself, which resulted in another shortcoming. Even if I discovered that other practitioners' behaviors were not in accordance with the requirements of the Fa, I was not willing to point it out to them. I did not follow Master's words , "the next person's things are your things" ("Teaching the Fa at the Washington, D.C. Fa Conference, July 22, 2002") Sometimes, I even complained about their poor cultivation, without thinking that my behavior was, at same the time, very disappointing. Many of my attachments emerged, such as competitiveness and regarding myself as correct.

While doing Dafa work, such as clarifying the truth and urging people to quit the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), I also possessed the same fundamental attachment. Whenever I had successfully convinced a lot of people to resign from the CCP, I would feel happy. My show-off mentality would emerge. When I met fellow practitioners, I told them the results immediately, but my intention was not for sharing experiences. I felt that if I did not tell them, nobody would know. I treated the number of people as my cultivation "score", forgetting that "Cultivation is up to you, gong is up to the master." (Zhuan Falun English version 2003) Master and Dafa helped me to come to a good understanding. All I had to do was to follow the requirements of Dafa. If my behavior met the requirements of Dafa, Master would help me achieve it.

I realized that "righteous thoughts" is to make sure all our thoughts are concentrated on the Fa and meet the requirements of the Fa at all times. While we are doing Dafa work, good results come about because of our strong righteous thoughts rather than supernormal capabilities or methods. I understood this issue before but not very clearly. After I found my fundamental attachment, everything became clear. Now I have a deeper understanding of cultivating myself.

Posting date: 11/29/2006
Original article date: 11/29/2006
Category: Practitioners' Insights
Chinese version available at http://minghui.ca/mh/articles/2006/11/15/142432.html

 Yearly Archive  Printer Version