(Minghui.org) After fellow practitioners and I shared our cultivation experiences, we realized that only by completely removing human notions can we improve ourselves.
Practicing Falun Dafa is very serious. Below are some examples of what happened when practitioners failed to cast off human notions compared to when practitioners improved their xinxing.
Hopefully we can all benefit from hearing their stories to improve ourselves.
1. Negative Lessons
Practitioner A did Falun Dafa projects very well. He could complete things other practitioners could not do well or would not even dare to take on. However, A did not know that he should cultivate himself when he had conflicts with his brother’s wife or his daughter-in-law.
Their home was rife with hatred, anger, and other negative emotions. He thought he did so much for them, but they did not treat him well in return.
Practitioner A never did change, and one day he passed away from sickness. He had measured everything based on everyday people’s principles instead of the Dafa principles, and the old forces saw that as an excuse to persecute him to death.
Another practitioner (B) worked very hard to clarify the truth and to validate the Fa year after year. She studied two lectures of the Fa and practiced the five exercises twice every day. Further, she was very clear about the Fa principles when she discussed cultivation experiences.
However, whenever she met with conflicts, she behaved like an everyday person. She thought that she was right and everyone else was wrong. She generated hatred, particularly at home, and argued with her family members.
Practitioner B used everyday people’s principles to measure her family members and always argued with them. She wanted to change others but not herself. B kept an ordinary person’s state of mind, and one day she had a stroke.
2. Positive Examples
Several years ago, another practitioner (C) did not know how to cultivate herself and became easily angered over trivial things. Her husband did not practice Falun Dafa and always gave her a hard time. Recently, C began to change her conventional notions and started to measure everything based on the Fa principles instead.
Every morning she went out to tell people about Falun Dafa and the persecution; in the afternoon she studied the Fa at home, and then did all the chores around her home. She was not picky when she did the grocery shopping and simply chose whatever was closest to her to make sure she had no intentions. For example, she picked eggs even if they were dirty or small, and she grabbed the nearest string beans even if they did not look good.
She apologized to those she used to harm and said “thank you” from the bottom of her heart to anyone who harmed or treated her badly. Although C is quite elderly, she began to grow dark hair again, and her skin became light and delicate. Her husband also began to practice Falun Dafa and stopped interfering with her.
Yet another practitioner (D) cultivates himself quietly and diligently. When his wife passed away, his sister-in-law grabbed their land for farm use without letting him know. When his mother took away his house, he became homeless and had no land to work. But all of that did not bother him a bit.
He found a place to live, got a job, and kept doing the three things. Later, his house and his land were returned to him.
When I told him that I could not completely get rid of my lust, he said it was just like the attachment to smoking. One needs to get rid of the addiction completely until they are just like a three-year-old child who does not have such a concept. He quoted Master:
“Now think about it, in our practice the qi of blood and essence is used to cultivate longevity—you can’t just discharge like that all the time.” (The Sixth Talk in Zhuan Falun)
By communicating with fellow practitioners, I have learned to use high-level principles to measure everything. I have given up arguing with others when I am wronged, and I have realized those are just opportunities arranged by Master for me to lift myself up. I now try to behave like a true practitioner.
As Falun Dafa practitioners, we have to remove all of our human shell. Only then we can follow Master to return home. Human notions and their shell warp our true thinking.
Master said:
“If you do not change the human logic that you, as an ordinary human, have formed deep in your bones over thousands of years, you will be unable to break away from this superficial human shell and reach Consummation.” (“Cautionary Advice” in Essentials For Further Advancement)
Category: Improving Oneself
