(Minghui.org) Less than two months after my mother died, my father was living with a widow. She took all of my mother's savings. I felt it was so unfair, and I developed a deep resentment toward my father.
Everything changed, however, after I put aside my human notions and let go of my attachment to money.
I have happy memories of my time with my mother. She was a practitioner, and she died of sickness karma in August 2012. Her neighbors and co-workers thought she was a very nice person. She stayed with me in my home for a few years to help me cook and take care of my daughter.
Every night we studied the Fa and sent forth righteous thoughts together. We shared our cultivation experiences as Dafa disciples and cultivated diligently together. That was such a wonderful, happy time.
I was annoyed with my father's behavior after her death. He once practiced Falun Dafa, but, because of fear, he gave it up after the persecution started.
When the widow moved in with him, he insisted that I visit her and regard her as my stepmother. On top of that, he didn't want to live in the home where he and my mother had lived. Instead, he wanted to take my apartment, which I had bought with my savings, after he re-married. He also asked my husband to renovate the place at our expense.
However, the widow insisted on a new apartment with an elevator. Otherwise, she would only live with my father and not marry him. So my father wanted to sell the house where he and my mother had lived. With the money from the house, plus his and my mother's savings, he would purchase an apartment. He wanted my bother and me to pay for the renovations.
All this happened within six months of my mother's death. My brother and I were very angry, and we agreed we would take our share of the proceeds if our father sold the property. Yet we knew that, if we did, our father could not afford to buy a new apartment.
I hated the widow to the bone because I felt that she was the cause of my mother’s death. My father had earlier threatened my mother, saying that he would marry that widow one day. My mother couldn't let go of her sentiment, and little by little, my mother was dragged down.
At that time my heart was really bitter whenever I thought of my father's ruthlessness toward my mother. Then, just after my mother passed away, my father was planning to re-marry. Every week he came to me and asked for a new apartment, as if I were his mother. Every day I missed my mother so much, and I couldn't let my sentiment go. I was really depressed.
Master said:
“As a matter of fact, when you agonize over infringements upon your reputation, self-interest, and feelings among everyday people, it already indicates that you cannot let go of ordinary human attachments. You must remember this: Cultivation itself is not painful—the key lies in your inability to let go of ordinary human attachments. Only when you are about to let go of your reputation, interests, and feelings will you feel pain.” (“True Cultivation” in Essentials for Further Advancement)
During that difficult time, I knelt down every night and read “True Cultivation” over and over again. Tears ran down my face. It was really hard to let go of my sentiment. After reading “True Cultivation” many times, I gradually calmed down, and I realized that my love for my mother was sentimentality. So was my resentment toward my father. Finally, I was able to rise to the standard of the Fa and let go of part of my sentimentality.
Being limited by my xinxing level at that time, the only thing I could let go of was my right to my parent's savings. I could not give up the property they shared when my mother was alive. Although I offered my apartment, including the renovations, to my father and his wife to live in, I would take it back after my father passed away, considering that an apartment is worth hundreds of thousands yuan, which is a large sum in China for people like me.
From then on, I had to interact with the widow. I started to call her “Auntie.” I remembered my mission more clearly at that time: Everyone came for Dafa, and regardless of the bad things they have done, they should be saved.
Because I didn't completely let go of my own interests, however, I was very unhappy with her whenever she took valuable things from my house.
She borrowed my apartment to live in, so I assumed that she would take the property away from me. In my eyes, she was simply there to steal, so I was always cold toward her. I never wanted to approach her or talk to her.
After I watched Master's lectures and shared my cultivation experiences with other practitioners, my xinxing elevated. They reminded me that everything I encounter on my cultivation path is a good thing, and for the sake of my cultivation and improvement. Nothing is accidental, everything is to improve my xinxing. Many of the practitioners in our Fa-study group have also encountered issues around money and property. Most of them have given up their share or given their part to their siblings in need. In comparison with what they had let go of, I felt very ashamed of myself.
After I let go of these things, even including my mother 's house, I thought to myself that they could take anything they wanted. In fact, in “Lecture Nine” of Zhuan Falun, Master talked about what we should do when we encounter such situations and how to reach the Fa’s requirements; however, I simply did not get it until recently.
My father asked me to sign an agreement regarding the eventual division of their property. I thought that it would be disastrous for me, so I looked for excuses not to sign it. When I let go of all my human notions, however, I read the agreement and realized it was not at all what I had expected. What it said, in general, was: “The elderly will be taken care of mainly by his/her own children, and the property will belong to his/her own children.”
My father invited me to their apartment after they returned from touring France. He told me what they had seen in France, including paintings of Jesus, who suffered for all beings, with little angels in the glorious murals. I told them about the Gods, deities, and angels with wings that I saw through my third eye when I first started to practice. Then I began to talk about why Jiang Zemin started to persecute Falun Gong. When I paused, he urged me to continue, seeming eager to know why.
Auntie was also very interested in what I was saying. She said that, in France, she saw a few newspapers about Falun Gong that told how practitioners have improved their health by practicing and about how Zhou Yongkang, Bo Xilai, and others have persecuted Falun Gong. She really wanted to bring some of these papers back with her, but the tour guide told her that she couldn't. She thought it was too bad that she could not bring some of them back.
I clarified the truth about Falun Dafa and told her that Master asks us to look inside ourselves when facing conflicts with others.
“I can see that you really do behave like this,” she said. “I can see that practitioners have a higher moral standard and good ethics. I can see this in you. No matter how much of your father's money I’ve spent, you have not gotten mad at me. Falun Gong is such a good practice, I would like to learn it!”
I then helped her quit the CCP. “This is to be safe,” she said. “I have sisters, so please help them to quit, too!”
“I cannot help them quit, because they haven’t shown interest in quitting yet,” I said. “This thought has to come from their true selves.”
“I will talk to my sisters tomorrow,” she said.