Tolerating and Kindly Understanding Fellow Practitioners

By a Falun Dafa practitioner in Toronto

(Clearwisdom.net) When I was in China, we used to have group Fa study and sharing once a week on Sunday afternoons. One sharing in particular made a deep impression on me. An older practitioner from another region joined us, and she shared with us. Everyone felt that she cultivated well when speaking on the Fa. So we all welcomed her to join our sharing again.

During that same sharing, an elderly practitioner over 70 years old from our group also attended. She clearly looked travel-weary. The weather was not good and it was very windy. After she sat down, we continued sharing. Not long after sitting down, this elderly practitioner began to take a nap. The aunt saw that. The aunt reminded the elderly practitioner that she should not sleep in such a righteous field. The elderly practitioner explained that she did not sleep well for the whole night. Her body was itchy everywhere. This morning she had visitors and had played host to them until now. Finally she rushed here without letting her spouse know. She also said that when she did not sleep well, she felt tired. She needed to be sure to sleep a certain amount of time every day. Other practitioners all realized she had many human notions. The auntie directly pointed out some of them, but the elderly practitioner kept emphasizing that she was tired due to lack of sleep. The aunt practitioner turned to another practitioner and repeated, "This is not her true self talking, but human notions." The elderly practitioner raised her voice, "Don't always say, 'it is not you talking.' I know what you mean. I am telling you, I must have enough sleep so I can be energetic." Finally, the atmosphere was a bit tense.

As practitioners, we knew that the aunt was not wrong. But why was the elderly practitioner so upset? Did we ourselves also need to look inside? In the beginning, we just felt that the elderly practitioner had strong human notions and needed to improve. Later, we began to look at the situation from the older practitioner's perspective. We realized that we were not trying to kindly understand her. Don't ordinary people talk about respecting the elderly and caring for children? Practitioners should do even better and display Dafa practitioners' kindness. Although practitioners are beyond the ordinary human level, Teacher said,

"The Dafa disciples who are cultivating are not gods, but human beings too. And when it is human beings cultivating, all kinds of human attachments surface." ("Teaching the Fa in Canada, 2006")

"Different levels have different Fa." (Zhuan Falun)

Thus, no two people will be on the same level. Of course, practitioners will have different understandings on the same issue, which is normal. We could have considered the situation from the elderly practitioner's perspective, that she was so old, felt discomfort in her body, did not sleep well for the entire night, and was busy in the morning of the next day. But she still came to Fa study in such windy weather. We could see her precious heart of steadfast cultivation in the Fa. If we did not merely condemn her, but instead tried to think from her perspective and suggested that everyone send forth righteous thoughts to eliminate the evil that interfered with her body, I think her response would not have been so intense.

Teacher said,"There are many Kings in the heavens. As you know, Sakyamuni said that the number of Tathagatas is like the number of grains of sand in the Ganges River. Think about how many grains of sand India's Ganges River has! And there's more than that--what Sakyamuni said was in a figurative sense. Every Tathagata is a Fa-King. And the Buddha School isn't the only one--the Buddha School is only one widespread type that has a huge number of Gods. How many Gods are there? How many Kings like that are there? If every King handled things the way you do when something happens, that'd be big trouble. They don't have those kinds of arguments, which aren't consistent with their levels. Of course, they can see the truth and they can see the best way, but often they, too, have certain differences in some of their views. But they would never argue. They are in a state of immense tolerance, of mercy toward all beings, and of being able to understand everything with kindness. To put it in human terms, they're always able to be understanding of others." ("Teaching the Fa at the 2002 Fa Conference in Boston")

It was good that the elderly practitioner quickly forgot the unpleasantness of the encounter and did not cause gaps between practitioners. If we do not pay attention when conflicts occur, the old forces will take advantage by creating gaps between practitioners and bringing damage to the improvement of the whole body and validating the Fa.

I will now recall the differences between my husband and I in dealing with our child. My husband shows strong sentimentality for our child. He pays lots of attention to the child's food, clothes, hygiene, etc. He concerns himself with everything from the small to the big, spends lots of time on these things, and often blames me for being reckless with our son. Once, our child showed symptoms of a cold, such as a running nose and coughing. My husband quickly gave him medicine. I felt that he made a fuss over a trifle. I also felt distressed seeing the child suffering from the illness. Nonetheless, I do not condone my child taking medicine as soon as he gets sick. Even everyday people talk about how endurance can build up a child's immunity. Moreover, the medicine itself has many known and unknown negative effects. Looking at the situation from another perspective, giving the child so much medicine will cause more harm to his body in the long run.

My husband and I do not agree with each other on this issue. I always feel he does not understand the Fa, but if I oppose him, he reproves me with his ordinary human "principles." I once collected relevant sharing articles from the Internet to show him, hoping he could improve, but he was still the same. Afterwards in order to avoid conflict, I no longer interfered and let him give medicine to our son. I wished he could improve through Fa study, however, and sometimes I felt disdain watching him give medicine to our child and silently blamed him for expressing such human notions. Now, I have seen my intolerant heart and have found the reason for the instability in our marriage after so many years. Actually I could not overcome an emotional attachment to his actions. I insisted on judging him and could not forgive him. This is a such big omission!

Only the Fa can make people truly improve. Sharing between fellow practitioners can only be used for reference. If we want to help fellow practitioners, we can support them with righteous thoughts and guide them to study the Fa more, instead of imposing our own understanding on others. Although you think your understanding conforms to the Fa, perhaps fellow practitioners have not enlightened on this issue, or have enlightened but have not acted well due to lack of righteous thoughts. It does not mean that he has not cultivated well. This experience with my husband reminded me of a question and answer in "Teaching the Fa at the Conference in Switzerland,"

"Question: Listening to others' experiences inspires and enlightens me, but I find it not as solid as enlightening to things on my own.

Teacher: That is right. Of course that's how it is. What you enlighten to yourself, which is mainly through your own cultivation, is the most solid. On the other hand, you can indeed draw lessons from what others say. That can facilitate your progress too, so it is beneficial. Fa conferences won't be held often. Our conferences do have benefits. But don't share experiences too often. You should focus your energy on studying the Fa and reading the book."

Recently, I discovered that my husband changed his thoughts on our child's illness. A few days ago, our son coughed a few times. My husband did not act in such a fuss as before. Furthermore, my child's sickness went away quickly, whereas before, he coughed for a long time. Only Dafa is able to truly change the human heart!

Chinese version available at http://www.minghui.org/mh/articles/2006/7/27/134133.html

 Yearly Archive   Printer Version