(Minghui.org) My fellow practitioners and I used to go to the countryside to distribute Falun Dafa truth-clarification materials, but we have not done so for quite some time due to interference and the lack of looking inward. When we realized that we should not be passive, we worked late to make truth-clarification desk calendars for our trip to the countryside.
After everyone left, a fellow practitioner showed up and told me that a practitioner from out of town urgently needed some truth-clarification desk calendars. I said that I had some, but they were for our trip to the countryside. However he insisted and so I gave them to him.
I got up very early to make more desk calendars since I did not want to be told that I ruined our plan. When fellow practitioners found out about it, one of them still told me off and said that I was not righteous.
I had given the calendars away because they would be distributed in an area where the persecution was rampant. I did not think it was wrong to do this, especially since I had made enough calendars for our trip. But, the fellow practitioner continued to chastise me.
Then I recalled a poem from Master's Fa,
“Don’t argue when people argue with youCultivation is looking within for the cause”(“Don't Argue” from Hong Yin III)
I suddenly realized that behind my seemingly calm explanation I still wanted to argue, although it was difficult to detect. As soon as I realized this, I no longer looked at who was right or wrong, but started to examine the process of how my thoughts were developed throughout the matter, and discovered many attachments.
When I gave the calendars to the fellow practitioner last night, a flashback about a similar matter in the past came to my mind. I had refused to listen to the practitioner and thought I would only follow the Fa. Actually deep down, I had a competitive mentality.
I then found another strong attachment. I always thought that I was on the Fa, and tended to be self-righteous. I often looked at the shortcomings of others, and believed that I was the only one on the Fa. No matter how much experience sharing has been done and how many quotes of Master I have used, my only purpose was to prove that I was right.
It wasn't until I identified my acquired self that I started to gain some new understandings about what “on the Fa” truly refers to. In my understanding, not only should our perspectives conform to Master's Fa, our thought development and process are also a part of it. In other words, every thought of ours must be on the Fa.
Another paragraph of the Fa occurred to me,
“In the past, some phony qigong masters said, 'One may kill lives on the first or the fifteenth of each lunar month." Some of them even claimed that it was fine to kill two-legged animals as though they were not lives. Is killing on the first or the fifteenth not considered taking a life? So that’s just digging the earth, is it?'(Lecture Seven, Zhuan Falun)
This helped me to discover some deeply hidden warped things in myself.
I attempted to set standards using human notions instead of following Master's Fa completely. For instance, when I debated with fellow practitioners, I just explained myself instead of listening to others’ arguments. I could not strictly conduct myself according to the Fa and look inside, but covered my shortcomings with some warped standards that I had acquired with my human thoughts and notions. I deviated from the Fa's standards unknowingly.
I suddenly understood why the old cosmos is at its end – it's because the beings gradually took their own understandings and elements as the standard, deviated from the actual Fa standards unknowingly, and eventually went against the Fa.
This mentality and behavior manifests especially strongly in the old forces who have changed a large percentage of Master's prehistorical arrangements, forced their arrangements and standards upon Master's Fa-rectification, and measured it and Dafa disciples using their warped standards.
Therefore, my thoughts were in line with the old forces warped ways of thinking. Where would I end up with this kind of understanding?
Perhaps many practitioners share this problem. We must pay attention to it and ensure the purity of cultivation, eventually conforming to the standards of the Fa and completely assimilating to the Fa.