Letting Go of Saving Face and Clarifying the Truth to People

By a practitioner in Henan Province, China

(Clearwisdom.net) Many fellow practitioners have done well in explaining the facts about Falun Gong face-to-face. However, for fellow practitioners who have not yet started walking up to strangers and clarifying the truth face-to-face, this can be a daunting prospect. To be able to clarify the truth to people face-to-face, one first needs to let go of his fear and mentality of "saving face." Having gone through nine years of tribulations, fellow practitioners have eliminated most of their fear, and some now have almost no fear at all. However, when it comes to clarifying the truth face-to-face, many fellow practitioners still hesitate. Why? In my understanding, it is not that the fellow practitioners don't want to do it or that they don't know how to do it. To a great extent it is probably because they are worried about embarrassment or "losing face."

Everyone wishes to avoid embarrassment, especially those fellow practitioners who usually worry about saving face. Not worrying about losing face and just walking up to a total stranger can indeed be very difficult. It's like there is an invisible mountain trying to stop us, and one needs to gather up great courage to go over it. Take myself as an example. I had always thought that everything would be fine if the other party actually listened. However, if they refused to listen, it would cause me to feel humiliated, and I would really lose face. This mentality stopped me for a long time. Sometimes I thought that if I couldn't clarify the truth face-to-face, it would be fine as long as I worked on something else. That was a manifestation of not being strict with myself and not wanting to actively improve myself when encountering difficulties.

This summer, I finally made the decision to discard my attachment of worrying about losing face. I knew that I didn't have any more time to waste and I "forced" myself to walk up to strangers and talk to them. It was very difficult at the beginning. That evening I sat on the curb and watched people walking by, but I simply could not work up the courage to open my mouth. I looked at my watch, and it was after 10:00 p.m. I decided that I would not give up. I walked up to an older couple, and started telling them the facts about Falun Gong and tried to persuade them to withdraw from the CCP's Youth League. However, even though I spent a lot of time talking to them, they didn't want to withdraw, and I felt very disappointed. After I went home, I asked myself whether I still wanted to go out the next evening. I made a firm decision that I would indeed go out again. In my mind I told myself, time after time, that I must be persistent. I didn't achieve the desired result the first time, but I would not be discouraged. The reason might be that I didn't have experience in doing this and perhaps my approach was not right. However, I must not give up! I thought, "I have made the decision to go out and I've finally started talking to strangers. This is my new starting point." On the second evening, I went out again. This time it was not as difficult, and I was able to persuade three people to withdraw from the CCP and its affiliated organizations. Several days later, I felt that limiting myself to only going out in the evening was not enough, so I started going out in the morning as well. In the afternoon, I read the Fa and sent righteous thoughts at home. I kept doing that, and within one week I was able to persuade several dozen people to withdraw from the CCP and its affiliated organizations. During this period I also gradually discarded my competitive mentality, the attachment of showing off and the attachment of feeling embarrassed or worrying about losing face.

One time I was yelled at and verbally abused. I managed to remain calm and left the scene with a smile on my face. But at that moment, I felt bitterness in my mind, and my pretend smile looked worse than if I had cried. I stood by the roadside, calmed down my "hurt" mind and tried my best to forget that girl's caustic voice. After I calmed down, I thought that it was probably not her time yet, but I should not give up my efforts because of her reaction. I adjusted my mind and started to recite, "Truthfulness-Benevolence-Forbearance is Good, Falun Dafa is Good." I soon recovered my righteous thoughts and tried my best not to think about the "blow" that I had just experienced. I stabilized my mind and kept walking forward. As a matter of fact, later, when I thought about that experience, I realized that it was not a blow after all. Actually it was an opportunity for me to discard my mentality of worrying about losing face and an opportunity for me to improve. It was a good thing for me and a good opportunity that was difficult to find! After a period of time, I was able to face this kind of situation again calmly.

During the last several days I have been memorizing the Fa. While I was memorizing the section: "Whoever Practices Cultivation Will Attain Gong" in Lecture Eight, I suddenly came to understand Master's words:

"The future professional practitioners in temples will need to, in their cultivation practice, wander around among everyday people." (Zhuan Falun)

Isn't the situation in which we are clarifying the truth to people face-to-face similar to the situation in which we will be wandering around among everyday people? Why didn't I see this when I was memorizing this section before?

I had always thought that Master was specifically talking about those professional cultivators in temples. Now when I think about it again, I believe that Dafa is spreading among everyday people and most of us are cultivating among everyday people. How many of our fellow practitioners are in temples? None that I know of. Moreover, the majority of our fellow practitioners among ordinary people have already become true cultivators and every day, besides fulfilling their duties, they focus on doing the three things. Aren't their homes like small "temples" in ordinary society? Having already gone through such a long period of cultivation, it is difficult to have a big conflict in our xinxing at home, especially if it is full of fellow practitioners. At the same time, I also came to understand why Master talked about "wandering around" in Lecture Eight, "heart of great forbearance" in Lecture Nine and talked about how Han Xin suffered the "humiliation of crawling between someone's legs." I came to understand Master's great efforts to save us by teaching us patiently. If we did not have these opportunities to improve while we are out clarifying the truth, then how can we show our "heart of great forbearance"? Master said,

"Han Xin was an everyday person after all. As practitioners, we should be much better than he." (Zhuan Falun)

Master wants our xinxing to reach this level in today's special cultivation environment. But when I looked at myself, on this simple issue I have been holding on to my mentality of protecting my dignity from being hurt. I have selfishly put protecting myself from embarrassment or "saving face" ahead of saving the lives of sentient beings. Isn't this a huge attachment? Could I go to Heaven with such an attachment?

I feel ashamed because I have only just started to walk around and clarify the truth recently, and I cannot compare myself to those fellow practitioners who have done so well. Here I have written about my recent experiences to share with fellow practitioners. If there are any mistakes, please do not hesitate to point them out.

Chinese version available at http://www.minghui.org/mh/articles/2008/10/1/186898.html

 Yearly Archive   Printer Version