(Clearwisdom.net)
Recently I read some experience sharing articles from the latest New York Fa Conference and the Canada Fa Conference. I'd like to share some of my thoughts with fellow practitioners, especially those in China.
When reading those articles, I was moved to tears several times. Teacher said in "Fa Teaching at the 2007 New York Fa Conference:"
"Many of our Dafa disciples have responsibilities in multiple projects, and things are indeed quite difficult. Master knows about your challenges. In the future, I will tell the Dafa disciples in mainland China about these challenges you have dealt with, and let them know about how you, under such trying circumstances, have validated the Fa and restrained the evil's persecution of them."
The environment outside of China is comparably more relaxed, but the old forces and the evil elements are closely watching us and trying to take advantage of our loopholes. Starting with explaining the facts about Falun Dafa and exposing the staged "self-immolation," practitioners abroad have been promoting the Nine Commentaries, helping people to quit the wicked party and its affiliates, and successfully hosting the global Chinese New Year Spectacular several times. Their contributions and the difficulties that they encountered are more than what we knew. From 1999 till today, it's been 8 years. I can imagine that every day and every hour, Falun Dafa practitioners continuously work on Dafa projects. They have had little time to rest and have taken on a lot of work. With many pressures, they have been keeping up with the Fa validation progress. They have been supporting practitioners in China and clarifying the truth and exposing the persecution of Falun Dafa.
Of course, the environment in China is special. Practitioners have to directly face the evil and live in the "red terror." Still, many of them have been doing very well. Their righteous thoughts and righteous actions are very touching and admirable. However, Teacher told us in "Solid Cultivation" in Hong Yin, "Focus on how you study and cultivate..." Therefore, we practitioners in China should learn from practitioners outside of China. Here, I'd like to share my understanding from two aspects. Let's strive forward diligently and move forward together.
Each individual Falun Dafa practitioner is very active. I found practitioners abroad can directly face tribulations and difficulties both as one body and as individuals. They don't avoid issues and they seldom wait for other practitioners to help. They maximized their own ability and they have persevered. For example, I read an article from the Canada Fa Conference. It talked about how a group of practitioners used their wisdom at airports to clarify the truth and help people quit the wicked party and its affiliates. Initially, both the group and each practitioner in the group faced many difficulties, but no one backed off. They all thought about how to break through. With their determined righteous thoughts and constant compassion, they did a great job.
Looking at myself and our local practitioners, I see a gap in that we are all not that active. When we encountered similar difficulties, not every one of us tried our best. It's like the modular model where one ball is connected to many other balls. Each ball needs to get to the right place and do what it's supposed to do in order for the whole to function to its maximum power. However, in our area, some of us, actually many of us, depend on the coordinator or other practitioners with the excuse of "I don't know how to do it" or "I'm not capable enough to do it." For example, when Teacher published the article "Thoroughly Dissolve the Evil," many fellow practitioners came to realize that we should go send forth righteous thoughts close to the evil dens. When they shared their understandings with other practitioners, some practitioners then asked, "Why didn't someone lead this effort?" When there was indeed a "leader," some practitioners then followed the lead to do this. Although we have improved, the improvement has not been sufficient.
From what I can see, practitioners living abroad are not like us. Today, we should be mature. Practitioners abroad generally would think independently and then share their ideas or understandings. Then the group would discuss based on the Fa and come up with the final plan. During discussions and implementations, they improved as one body. Maybe this is related to the cultural difference between the east and the west. Westerners are used to independent thinking and they have been encouraged to think independently since they were children. Meanwhile, because of the wicked Party culture and the brainwashing-oriented education and punishments for independent thinking from the CCP, Chinese people nowadays tend to wait for and follow others' lead.
However, we are Falun Dafa practitioners. We need to break through these notions, since these notions themselves are elements from the old forces. Each of us is a Fa particle and therefore we need to cultivate our way with everything. I think that being active in our cultivation shows our true nature since we are supposed to try our best to validate the Fa, save sentient beings, and harmonize what Teacher wants.
I feel that even though there are separations among practitioners abroad, it is not as bad as what's happening in China. It's like a disease that's hard to get rid of, since it's mainly caused by the poisonous Party culture. This makes it more difficult when it comes to coordination. The coordination among us in China is limited and therefore it wasn't able to bring the whole body forward fast enough to function as one body.
The above are my personal understandings. I hope that practitioners in China, including me, who are not as diligent as those abroad, can look at the strengths of fellow practitioners abroad. We cannot always just try to catch up with others. We are at the final stage. We need to step forward together with other fellow practitioners.