(Clearwisdom.net) I see two reasons from my understanding why our family members have predestined relationships with practitioners. One is for them to obtain the Fa. The other is for the old forces to weed out those with very low moral standing during Fa-rectification. They use such people to commit crimes against Dafa and practitioners so that they can be eliminated. If we are in such a family, we have to be clear, reject, and eliminate the persecution of our family members in order to save them.
For many practitioners, family members and relatives had been treating us unfairly or even immorally even before we began our cultivation. After we learned the Fa, we all resolved the feelings of unfairness in our mind and were able to forgive them and not find fault with them. We understood that all these were due to retribution from the karma that we had accumulated in many past lives. (Note: In China, children usually live with their parents even after they get married.)
But since July 20, 1999 when the Chinese Communist regime began its persecution of Falun Gong, family members' interests became affected immediately. Usually members in such families were more selfish and often unreasonable in their dealings. During cultivation in normal times, they found that Dafa was good for the family so they did not complain. But once their interests were affected, their attitude changed immediately.
Take my case for example. My parents-in-law did not want to be implicated, so they went to the jail where I was being held to ask me for a divorce. They also forced my husband to get a divorce. Without my consent, they introduced some women prospects to my husband. My mother-in-law received retribution in the form of cortical atrophy, and had to spend close to ten thousand yuan for the diagnosis. The whole family was even more bewildered, and blamed all these on me.
Six months later when I got out of jail, my father-in-law had already sold my house and tried to use the money to buy a house for himself. He also tried to force his son to divorce me and drive me out. He tried every which way to harass me and force me out.
As a Fa-rectification period Dafa practitioner, I put up with all these. I used the compassion and righteous thoughts cultivated from Dafa to restrain myself, and did everything right to show the goodness and the wonder of Dafa.
In the beginning, I obstinately clarified the truth to the family members, which turned them off and they refused to listen. Then I tried to do it with wisdom. When they praised me for something, I took advantage of their good mood, and told them that I had done it because of Dafa and Teacher. I told them had it not for Dafa, my illnesses would not have been healed. I would not be able to work so hard. I would not have treated them the way I did either.
This way, gradually I clarified the truth to the family members. Now the twenty to thirty members in my family are all clear on the facts about Dafa. The whole family has quit the party and its associated organizations. Some declared that they had made mistakes and declared them null and vowed to support Dafa in the future. Some distributed flyers, pamphlets, and CDs in order to redeem themselves.
I want to share with fellow practitioners of my experience in this process, how I distinguished between the family members and the evil that manipulated them, and how I recognized and eliminated all the tribulations that the old forces had arranged so that I could save the sentient beings and walk my own path.
In past years, my family members' words and deeds had caused me to form a biased view of them. This, plus the rough treatment that they dished out to me after July 20, 1999, caused me to have further biased views about them.
First, we need to recognize these views and notions and know that each and every thought we have in our minds is the orderly arrangement of the old forces that was forced into our minds. I want to change my views and notions about my family members and disallow these thoughts and notions to exist in my mind. It does not matter how my family members behaved, I need to recognize that it is the evil using them to persecute me. I will not accept any of these. I need to be clear-minded and not let these notions prevent myself from separating myself from them, and let it exert its effect, causing myself to fight with or be bothered by my family members. As soon as I have any bad thoughts I would eliminate it right away and not be troubled by it. It took me a lot of pains and over two years to be able to restrain, reject and finally eliminate them.
In the meantime, we need to treat it with compassion, using compassion to dissolve all the evil factors. It does not matter whether my mother-in-law is indeed a person just as I view her or however bad a person, we should not pay attention to it. We should see if this thought is based on our own pre-conceived ideas and reject it if it is. Do not get hung up on whether the other party is right or wrong. It is her business. If a person does not want to cultivate, God would not be able to help her. But we have to be able to tell our preconceived notion from our true self.
I found that when I was busy or not careful about my every thought, I would not be able to filter out my ordinary-person's thoughts in time and let them slip through; I would not be able to catch and eliminate them in time. The evil would immediately use my mother-in-law (even when I was doing everything right) to create an illusion of finding fault with me to persecute, disturb and upset me.
Why does it happen? My understanding is that we are still cultivating among ordinary people, and we still are not clear about every principle of Dafa, which gives the evil a loophole to exploit. It occurred to me that when the police was persecuting us, we would send forth righteous thoughts to eliminate the evil factors behind them, so why don't we do the same when our family members persecute us? This way we can reject these evil forces fundamentally, and eliminate them. So normally when I send forth the righteous thoughts, I would add this thought.
At the same time, I have also found my fundamental attachment. I have always been very timid and never wanted to get involved ever since I was young. I am a very introverted person with a strong ego; I don't like to say much, and not knowing how to explain myself. My husband said I am a proverbial punching bag, and have always resigned to adversities. Family members on my husband's side were mostly bad-tempered, and not listening to reason. My mother-in-law is jealous, aggressive, likes to show off, and always finding faults with people. In the past few years since I got married, I''ve always grinned and bore, and never talked back no matter how they treated me, which only gave them the impression that I was stupid and an easy target to pick on. As a matter of fact, the principle of the Fa is very clear on this. By allowing family members to persecute us, we are actually harming them. I regret that I did not have better enlightenment quality. Not only did I suffer, I also caused harm to my family members.
We need to explain to people with good intentions and lead them to a right way of behavior. We need to keep our divine righteous thoughts when talking with people on these principles, and calmly explain to them.
This is my understanding at my current level. Please point out any deficiencies.
