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Rational Understanding about “Celestial Vision”

March 18, 2021 |   By a Falun Gong practitioner in Boston, USA

(Minghui.org) Recently there have been a lot of discussions about a young Falun Dafa disciple’s prophecies about the future development of the Fa-rectification. I would like to share my thoughts on this topic.

For many cultivators, they are often interested in things about celestial vision. It is understandable that before one can reach a certain level of enlightenment, one wants to have some “empirical evidence” of the extraordinary. But if one takes it too seriously, I feel it might cause harm to one's cultivation. If one does things based on celestial vision, I feel it is wrong. One cultivates according to Fa principles, not visions.

I practiced other qigong and often meditated before I began practicing Dafa. I was able to reach tranquility and see things with my celestial vision. I thought it was just a visual hallucination and did not pay much attention to it. I felt comfortable and relaxed, but I did not reveal it to anyone.

After I began practicing Dafa, however, it became much harder for me to enter tranquility. Occasionally I was still able to see with my celestial vision, and the scenes were colorful and more vivid. They usually appeared suddenly and I sensed that Master arranged them for me to see, so as to enlighten to something. I was not able to see things at will or whenever I wanted to. I felt it was Master who decided when I could see things.

When I did the Dafa meditation exercise for the first time, I saw something above my conjoined hands, and I felt it might be my original shape in the heavenly abode. It greatly broadened my heart and mind and expanded my understanding of the images of Buddha, Tao, and gods. Another time while listening to Dafa music, I suddenly entered tranquility and saw Master in a gigantic dimension, just like “A grand Buddha stands between Heaven and Earth” ("The Awakened One," Hong Yin). I saw Master was talking to a few beings about something and I suddenly realized that my fancying myself being a particular type of Dafa cultivator was so meaningless. Just like that, my celestial vision helped me eliminate certain notions and rectify my wrong thoughts on certain topics.

I only shared my celestial visions with my wife and child since they both practice Dafa. I had no urge to share it with other family members who do not practice Dafa.

I remembered reading one sharing article regarding memorizing the Fa. The author mentioned that during their tranquility, they saw each character of the Fa they had memorized appeared like ancient key-shaped characters in other dimensions, which enlightened me to one layer of the meanings of studying the Fa.

Regarding the aforementioned young practitioner’s prediction about who would be the U.S. president, I believe many things can be understood through the Fa teachings, not based on the vision we saw. The existence and development of all things follow the law of the cosmos.

We are cultivators and we have learned many hard lessons in the past. When we pin our hopes on ordinary people instead of taking the leading role as Dafa cultivators, the situation usually turns from bad to worse. We have done that with various Chinese Communist Party (CCP) leaders, whom we had hoped to do the right things and end the persecution of Dafa, only to see them continue or intensify the persecution. Counting on Trump to disintegrate the CCP also did not go well.

What we do as Fa-rectification Dafa disciples will set examples for future mankind. We can’t rely on an ordinary person to end the CCP or the persecution. Ending the persecution has to be achieved by Dafa practitioners.

Sentient beings are counting on us to reach Consummation and provide salvation to them. How could we turn around and rely on humans to change the situation? Of course, we also have cultivators hoping that “If humankind does not do something about it, heaven will.” (Lecture Nine, Zhuan Falun). Again we forgot the roles we should play.

My understanding is that we, Dafa cultivators, should do what we are required to do, cultivate ourselves well and do the three things well. Our main task is to save sentient beings, not to topple the CCP. The CCP is like the coal used in steel-making. Once the steel (us practitioners) is forged, the coal is useless. Isn't that the relationship between us and the CCP?

Some claim that they could use the wisdom eye of the celestial vision to see things, which sounds even more off. At our cultivation level, I don't believe one can choose which level of celestial vision to use. How could we know which level of celestial vision is used even if we're able to see things in other dimensions?

When some discussed the article “Letter from a Practitioner's Kingdom in Another Dimension,” they even cried. I felt it was full of sentimentality. When one reaches the level beyond the three realms, what one has will be compassion, not sentimentality.

There was also a series of articles about the interference from assistant souls. I didn’t finish reading them, as I felt that when we became concerned about such interference, we didn’t fully have faith in Master.

I feel Master is watching over our cultivation at all times. What we need to do is to pay close attention to our cultivation and meet the requirements as Dafa disciples. We shouldn’t get carried away by the supernatural powers developed during the cultivation, or be misled by the celestial vision one sees, as it only reflects one's current level and it usually is very limited.

We should measure ourselves against the Fa teachings. Whenever one firmly holds on to their own limited understanding, they should pay attention to Master's teaching like this one:

“If you put Dafa in a secondary place and put your supernatural powers in the primary place, or as an enlightened person you believe that what you understand one way or another is correct, or if you even regard yourself as being great and beyond Dafa, I would say that you have already started to stumble.” (Lecture six, Zhuan Falun)

Even the enlightened beings can't think that their understanding is absolutely right, let alone people who are still cultivating.

[Editor's note: Views expressed in this article represent the author's own opinions, for which the author is solely responsible. Readers should evaluate the article's merits on their own.]