July 19, 2002
(Clearwisdom.net) After the police illegally kidnapped me, the most difficult thing was having no access to Dafa books. I regretted memorizing too little Fa and not studying the Fa diligently, as well as wasting a lot of time. In that kind of environment I believe I could have quickly memorized a Dafa book if I could have obtained one. I thought, "If I can get out, I swear I will cherish the Fa and study hard!" However, when I finally walked out of the demon's den and returned to my warm home, my thirst to study the Fa was washed away in the comfortable environment.
While being detained, I often said to Master in my heart, "If I can get out, I will devote all of myself to Fa-rectification. Now as I'm trapped like this, I can do nothing. Although I have no regrets or complaints and can endure everything, isn't this long-term endurance useless for 'assisting Teacher to rectify the Fa?' " However, when I really broke out of the demon's den, for some reason I forgot about my vows. Not only did I fail to fulfill them, I also developed the pursuit of comfort. I thought that compared to other practitioners, I had endured a great deal. I already walked past the critical step of giving up life and death and was walking toward Consummation. From now on, let me just cultivate myself at home.
Although I did not stop assisting Master to rectify the Fa, I somehow feel that I was far behind the Fa's requirements. Every time I do Fa-rectification work, in my heart I wanted to take a break and live several peaceful days, as if I had an excuse to rest. Occasionally, I even did not want to do the work, or I acted very passively. Although I did not want to do it from my heart, since the material was here, I still did it as if completing an assignment. Although this state did not last long and each time I was able to correct it, I had the feeling of hardship and bitterness. When I lay comfortably in bed, in my more leisurely days, I often thought, "At this time, what are some fellow practitioners doing in jail? Maybe they are enduring one brutal beating after another for persisting in doing the exercises. Maybe they are suffering even more serious persecution because they spread the Fa to the prisoners and resisted the evil."
During my sharing with fellow practitioners, I felt that a few other practitioners were relatively lazy, that some practitioners were not diligent enough to make progress. According to my personal cultivation experience, I tried to analyze the reasons and shared with fellow practitioners.
These practitioners have all gone through life-and-death tests and passed them. What was causing them to not be diligent? At first, I thought it was laziness and the pursuit of comfort, but after a while I changed my mind. What caused us to develop the pursuit of comfort? Not wanting to endure or sacrifice is one reason, however, I do not think that is the root cause. Are we afraid to endure hardship after walking through life-and-death trials? I don't think so. Then, why is it that we can't continue to be diligent?
Personally, I think the most fundamental reason is that we do not have sufficient understanding of our own attachments and our missions in Fa-rectification. Invisible and imperceptible attachments to our achievements in past cultivation make us feel that we have built up some kind of credit and we are guaranteed to reach Consummation; that we don't have to care about more sentient beings. Just because we have these "achievements," we dared to forget about the greater picture of Fa-rectification and our Fa-rectification mission. We let up and became numb.
Isn't this what prevents us from being diligent? Isn't this the source of our laziness? Doesn't this show a lack of righteous thoughts? In fact, those so-called achievements were just things we were supposed to do, or that we had promised to do a long time ago. However, they are not all that we need to do. The quality of our work may also not have measured up to the requirements of Fa-rectification. The reason we could do what we had done was because Master sacrificed greatly and endured silently for us. Therefore, how can we think that we are great and can reach Consummation? Furthermore, we think it's not important if we can't do some "small things" well in our Fa-rectification cultivation, as long as we persist to the end, and we don't take it seriously even when our demon natures are being indulged. A few practitioners thought it was just a minor problem even when they were firmly controlled by laziness for a long time. All of these are worthy of our paying attention to from the perspective of Fa.
Our incorrect understanding of the environment also leads us to be idle. If the people around you are diligent, then you will see many of your own shortcomings and the environment will help you to change. Therefore, if one person cultivates well, he will bring up other people around him and help a group of Fa particles to improve as a whole.
Similarly, if we think others do not understand the Fa as well as we do, and their cultivation is not as solid, we have an incorrect understanding. Treating Fa-rectification cultivation with ordinary people's mentality will be taken advantage of by the evil, and we don't realize it even when we are affected. Dafa practitioners come from different, remote cosmic bodies, so our levels are also different. If others say you cultivate well, it does not necessarily mean you are diligent. It only means that you have a better understanding of a certain Fa principle. If others say you are in a state of diligence, it does not necessarily mean you are living up to what Fa requires of you. Don't indulge in praise or become moved by the environment. We should require ourselves to be in accordance with Fa at all times and live up to Fa's requirements after we understand the Fa principles. Making solid improvements is true, diligent cultivation.
Above are some of my understandings. Please benevolently point out anything inappropriate.
