(Clearwisdom.net) For a long time I wasn't comfortable being around my husband, because he wasn't the type of person I liked. Through cultivation, I came to understand that I should be good to people, and in dealing with him I was able to follow the principle of "don't hit back when struck, don't talk back when cursed." But there were still knots in my heart, and I still looked down on him. Back when we married, I rejected others who were fond of me, and chose the man who is now my husband, so whenever we had arguments, or whenever his faults stood out, I felt a deep sense of regret, "If in those years I had chosen that other man, things would be better. He wouldn't be like that." Living in my own imaginary world, I was unable to give up the things I had lost.
In my circle of acquaintances, there is a female practitioner whose husband is a good man. His income is relatively low, which means she has to shoulder a little more responsibility making money for the family. She often complains, "Back then I was so muddle-headed. He's so poor. Why on earth did I marry him!" What she means is that there were wealthier people she could have chosen but missed the chance. To this day she is still unbalanced about it. There is another practitioner, an auntie in her fifties. When she was young, haughty and in her prime, fate had it that she would marry a rough-and-tumble tradesman. Owing to this she felt unbalanced right up until she took up cultivation, and under the persecution was forced to divorce. Even now when she remembers that time, she can't calmly accept it, and believes that she found the wrong man, lost the opportunity for a beautiful marriage, and if she had married a different man everything would be wonderful. She feels a deep sense of loss for the everyday people's things that she has lost. Actually all of these things are attachments.
In talking to other practitioners, I discovered that many are guarding human concepts, which are ideas about how their lives should have gone. Younger practitioners feel they still have a lot of living to do and want to pursue certain things, while older practitioners sigh with emotion at the things in the past that they missed out on. It doesn't just apply to marriage, there are also feelings about workplaces, houses, and other matters of financial well-being that manifest in this way. One practitioner was just about to graduate and had already secured a good job, but owing to the persecution, the university wouldn't give her a graduation certificate, which caused her to lose the chance of stable employment. Today she works outdoors and regularly changes jobs, and has a deep sense of loss about the job she didn't quite get. She feels that if she had done things this way or that way, things would be different.
These things are all predetermined aspects of a practitioner's circumstance. Even though there is no hope of things changing in the future, these practitioners are still unable to eliminate their hearts of pursuit. They vent about their situations from time to time, when in fact these are all fundamental attachments. The younger practitioners also have matters they are concerned about. They still haven't started families, they wish they could find a project that fits perfectly with their circumstances, and at the same time be diligent practitioners. They are painstakingly pursuing a good life in the human world. They don't want to give up human things, but at the same time they want divine things. Of course that's not possible, because gods didn't create this place for people to live a good life, it was to let people return to their true selves by way of hardship. So no matter how we pursue a good life, there will always be this or that aspect that isn't perfect. Only by giving up the pursuit of a good life, only by giving up our human goals and objectives can we obtain true good fortune.
This is only my personal understanding, please correct anything that isn't fitting.
Written on December 10, 2009