Cultivation Is Very Serious

(Minghui.org) I decided to write down my lessons to warn myself and remind fellow practitioners that cultivation is truly a serious matter.

One night when I was halfway through the one hour sitting meditation, my phone rang several times. I thought there might be something going on with my family, so I picked it up. It turned out to be my granddaughter’s birthday and her family was celebrating, cutting the cake, sending videos, and giving her money as a gift. I joined in and started interacting with everyone.

I continued to meditate after I finished that up. Then, I felt that my lower abdominal area was cold and empty, and there was a sense of lightness, as if I had lost something. How could this happen? I was a little anxious. I knew that Master gave me a hint that cultivation is not a joke. I regretted giving in to sentimentality. Why couldn’t I connect with my family after finishing the meditation?

A few days ago, a practitioner told me that she couldn’t lift her right hand because while she was meditating she read WeChat and replied to a message. It hurt for several days. I didn’t take it to heart or enlighten that Master was using her to remind me to pay attention to my cultivation.

I pressed my hands together and said to Master, “Master, I was wrong. I didn’t take cultivation seriously and didn’t respect Master and the Fa. Instead, I placed greater value on the emotions of ordinary people than cultivation. I must work hard to eliminate those seemingly small attachments that have not been tended to, as well as human thoughts, concepts, and attachments that should not exist.”

Since then, I have strengthened my determination and will to truly cultivate. I must achieve the goal of cultivation so I can go home with Master.

When writing this article, I thought of two former practitioners who went through many ups and downs with me. I decided to share my lessons with them so that they can get out of their tribulations as soon as possible, eliminate their distracting thoughts, and make progress together.

The first one is a female practitioner who obtained the Fa early and was a member of the local assistance center. After the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) began persecuting Falun Dafa in July 1999, she refused to give up cultivation. Her legs were severely injured by the police. Over the past two years, she has encountered severe sickness and karmic tribulations, which impacted her validating Dafa in her locale.

I decided to go see her, only to find that the tall, energetic and spirited woman of the past was now unrecognizable to me. Her facial features had changed, she became shorter, and she walked with a limp due to leg pain. Her daughter has a young child, which led to hardships in cultivation. She said, “In the past two years, I have become a babysitter, not a cultivator. Now I really regret it. These troubles are caused by my own attachments. Fortunately, my granddaughter can go to kindergarten now. In the future, I will focus all my time and energy on cultivation and saving people.”

The second one is involved pyramid schemes. We have visited her home many times over the years, hoping to bring her back into the fold of cultivation, but she finds excuses to avoid us every time. I made an appointment to visit her over the phone once, but I didn’t meet her as she went to a seminar. I wondered, “How could she have time to cultivate?” Her pyramid scheme not only left her in ruin, but also harmed several practitioners who came into contact with her. One practitioner lost nearly 100,000 yuan (US $13,823), while the others lost 10,000 or 20,000 yuan, respectively. They were rural people, and every yuan was hard-earned!

Fellow practitioners, calm down and think about it: Is emotion so important? Is money so important? If you can’t let go of emotion and money, you will accumulate karma. There will be many tribulations which will prevent you from achieving success in cultivation. After Master published the article “The Ordeals Our Spiritual Discipline Faces,” he immediately published “A Wake-Up Call.” But how many of us have awakened, how many of us have taken the scriptures seriously, and how many of us can feel that Master is anxiously waiting for those who are still sleeping to catch up quickly? If you are not diligent, you won’t even have the chance to be reborn with your karma.

What we need to do now is to study the Fa seriously, look inward, and keep up with the progress of Master’s Fa-rectification.