Cultivating Ourselves Well Can Change Our Environment

(Minghui.org) During Falun Dafa cultivation practice, I have learned to look within when encountering conflicts. Below are some examples.

An Employee Quits

My wife and I own a small clinic. One day an employee told us she would like to leave. My wife and I felt very upset. We had put a lot of effort into helping this staff member get here from China and taught her a lot of acupuncture techniques. How could she leave us right after learning everything?

Between seeing patients, I read some articles on the Minghui website that impressed me. One article talked about how ancient Chinese people would respond to other's evil acts with good intentions; another article talked about a practitioner who helped his brother with everything, but his brother continued to ask for more. Following what Master said in Zhuan Falun that practitioner did not have any negative feelings and gave away property in his hometown to his brother without complaint.

After reading these articles, I talked with my wife about my understanding, “Compared to other practitioners or even to ancient Chinese, we have done very poorly,” I continued, “If that employee wants to leave, I think we should just let her go without imposing any conditions on her.”

To my surprise, my wife nodded and agreed with me. I know in the past, she might have thrown some sarcastic words my way and say I just wanted to behave like a practitioner and do not care about the family business. Apparently, when I have a pure heart and just want to help her, she will agree with me.

From this, I learned that only when we truly cultivate ourselves will the environment change. To some extent, how our family members, friends, and the people around us behave are largely based on our mindsets.

Being Humble

A 16-year-old boy in my region is very talented on the guqin, or Chinese zither. He recently held a workshop and I attended it hoping to tell people about Shen Yun or the Shen Yun Symphony Orchestra. Musicians, painting artists, as well as experts in the I Ching (Book of Changes), and Feng Shui attended the workshop. Seeing the boy had a broad knowledge in many areas, a Tai Chi master praised him, “It seems you are much more knowledgeable than me about Chinese culture.”

Instead of boasting about himself, the boy smiled lightly, “My main job now is being a student. Hopefully, in the future, I will be able to do my best promoting guqin in our region or our country.”

I was impressed by his words. When telling people about Shen Yun in the past, I often told them this is a “must-see” cultural show. In fact, if I force my opinions onto others it may not work well.

Being humble is important for everyday people as well as practitioners.

Sentimentality

I have a friend who is able to tell her past and future. I bought two Shen Yun tickets for her and her family. She then told me that, because of some personal issues, she could not make it to the performance.

Surprised by her message, I knew I must have some loopholes. So I began to look inward. When sending forth righteous thoughts, I realized that because she was well-known for her ability to know the past and the future, I somehow wanted to get together with her. This vanity is an attachment that I needed to get rid of it. So I calmed down to purify my thoughts.

She contacted me again to see whether the tickets could be changed to Sunday so she could make it. Another friend then called me to ask me to buy two Sunday tickets for her as well. I know Master was encouraging me.

After practicing Falun Dafa for so many years, I have now come to understand that we have to do well ourselves. If we discipline ourselves as practitioners, the situation around us will change.