The Truthfulness of a Cultivator

By a practitioner in China

(Clearwisdom.net) For a long time I had a misunderstanding regarding Teacher's requirement of Truthfulness-Compassion-Tolerance. I thought that being truthful was to tell people everything I knew without holding anything back. And that was exactly what I did when dealing with everyday people. Luckily there has been no bad people who took advantage of me on this, but people who know me thought that I was "naive, simple and not composed." My close friends said to me, "You should think about it. Why don't others take you seriously?" Though people around me thought I was a good person, none of them really paid much attention to me, including to what I said. When I clarified the truth to them, what I said did not sound powerful and it was very hard to convince them.

I was very troubled. I am 30 years old, so why did people not take me seriously and always treat me like a young kid? Looking inward, I found myself lacking self-confidence, as well as being unable to hold things inside. When others asked me something, I would pour out whatever I knew. I believed that my actions were in line with the requirements of truthfulness. Other people could easily know everything about me, such as my family, every family member's situation, income, friends etc. People felt I was dumb and had insufficient social experience. I thought that I was being truthful. However, I forgot that truthfulness also includes Compassion and Tolerance.

Teacher taught us not to tell lies, but that doesn't mean that I should tell others everything I know. In Zhuan Falun, Teacher said, "I am a person who will not say what he does not want to say, but what I say must be true." I had gone to an extreme on this aspect. On the other hand, being a practitioner I should also cultivate my speech. What should or should not be said has to be measured with the Fa.

After understanding this, it has become much easier to cultivate my speech, and handle things more rationally.

Posting date: 2/17/2010
Category: Practitioners' Insights
Chinese version available at http://minghui.ca/mh/articles/2010/2/10/217897.html

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