(Minghui.org)
When it comes to the attachment to lust, most practitioners have no problem realizing its damaging effects and they often work hard to remove this attachment. However, quite a few people tend to think only by engaging in sexual activities are we committing the sin of lust.
I'd like to bring attention to another form of the attachment to lust. When we have a crush on someone, such attraction is as damaging as outright sexual activity. If we allow our emotions to run wild, such attraction could easily lead to improper sexual activity. I urge everyone to be on guard against such physical attraction and nip it in the bud when we spot the earliest sign.
A local practitioner's recent death prompted me to the above understanding. I recognize only Master can tell the exact cause of this practitioner's passing and I am in no way trying to give a definitive diagnosis of why he left this human world. I am just sharing what I learned from this unfortunate event and please kindly point out anything inappropriate.
A Well-known Practitioner's Passing Gets Me Thinking
When I learned of the passing of a local practitioner in his 70s, I was shell shocked. He was well-known and greatly admired by fellow practitioners, including me. Though I had never met him personally, I heard from others that he was very diligent and had persuaded a total of more than 100,000 people to quit the Chinese Communist Party and its affiliated organizations in the eight years before he passed away.
I felt great sadness because such a good Dafa disciple died before he was able to finish the journey Master arranged for him. While he was still alive, he managed to encourage so many people to quit the Party almost every day. However, two months before his death, he began suffer illness symptoms and could no longer go out to clarify the facts. He felt tired on his last morning while doing the exercises and went to bed to rest, only to die just a short while later.
We were all wondering what caused such a diligent disciple to leave the human world so early. Some practitioners said maybe he had reached his predetermined age and it was time for him to go.
I didn't believe this was the reason. A little disciple with her third eye open told me that she saw this deceased practitioner already had compound eye and was, in fact, at the level of a Buddha. So my understanding was that he had long transcended the three realms and there was no such issue as to being confined by a predetermined life expectation.
It could be that the old forces targeted him and exploited his omissions since we all looked up to him.
What attachments did he still have? Some people felt his quick temper might have played a role. I wondered if it could have been his attraction to beautiful women that was the cause.
The same child who saw that he had reached the level of a Buddha also said Master told her through her tianmu that his attachment to lust led to his untimely death. She actually saw him going away with a “Bodhisattva” transformed by a lust demon.
Master told us in “Teaching the Fa in the City of Los Angeles:”
“What do the old forces and the old cosmos see as the gravest thing? Lust, [in the form of] sexual activity outside of marriage. That's what they see as the most serious of things. In the past, once someone violated the precept on that, he would be thrown out of the temple, and his cultivation would be utterly finished. So how do gods look at this now? Do you know what they have said in the prophecies that they left behind? They prophesied that all of the Dafa disciples who would be left in the end would be those who had maintained their purity along these lines. In other words, these things are extremely serious to them. So the old forces and all of the gods in that cosmos will not defend anyone who violates the prohibition on this, anyone who doesn't do well in this regard; in fact they will push you downwards.”
Having a Crush on Someone Is a Form of Lust
Having a crush on someone without engaging in any sexual activity doesn't seem like outright lust, but if we allowed our emotions to run wild, what would happen next? I wouldn't be surprised if sexual activities followed. As a matter of fact, extramarital affairs often start with an attraction to someone other than one's spouse.
I once read an article on the Zhengjian website that talked about an elderly woman practitioner's experience. For half a year, she always felt sleepy and couldn't concentrate on Fa-study or sending forth righteous thoughts. A practitioner with his third eye open saw that her attachment to lust was raising its ugly head. When he talked to her, she admitted she had been thinking about her very first love recently and had trouble facing her husband. After that attachment was identified, her situation quickly improved. She once again had a good relationship with her husband and was able to focus on doing the three things well. Had she not been able to spot her omission, one could only imagine what the old forces would do next.
It is apparent that physical attraction can affect practitioners of all ages.
Getting Rid of My Attraction to Beautiful Women
I had a dream the same night I enlightened to the above understanding. I went back to my high school class and saw my dream girl sitting there. I had a crush on her and tried everything to attract her attention. I felt the whole class became meaningful because of her.
After I woke up, I realized I had had similar dreams numerous times before. Since I never touched any attractive women in my dreams, I thought I did pretty well dealing with the issue of lust.
Now looking back, I knew it was laughable that I even thought that way. I was glad the most recent dream made me see my attraction to beautiful women was also a form of lust and I had to remove it.
Once I elevated my understanding of the issue of lust, my attraction to beautiful women disappeared by itself.
We Must Be Alert to Our Attraction to Other People
I searched the Minghui website and found many articles talking about the authors' attraction to other people. Fortunately they were able to nip it in the bud and subsequently wrote articles to alert fellow practitioners.
Unfortunately, many people still think it's no big deal if we just feel attracted to someone without engaging in any sexual activity. As I see it, the old forces are using our “no-big-deal” excuse to persecute us. We must take this seriously and remove this attachment.
The Fa-rectification is coming to an end, and it is really time for us to rid ourselves of any hidden attachments we still have. Please make good use of the time to cultivate and walk the last leg of the journey well. We do not want to leave any loopholes for the evil to exploit. I hope each and every one of us can finish our journeys and witness the grand moment when all disciples reach consummation.
Category: Improving Oneself
