(Clearwisdom.net) Recently, my husband and I, who are both practitioners, started arguing a lot because I believed that he did not behave like a practitioner, and I was really worried about him. I knew clearly that I should look inward and let go of my attachments. However, I failed to do so, and instead continually pointed out his shortcomings and asked him to rectify them. He said, "You must cultivate yourself and should not just help me to cultivate." I replied, "You have shortcomings. Don't you want other people to point them out?"

Since my husband's release from detention, he became very cautious when contacting fellow practitioners on the telephone. He used to be a local coordinator, and thought that his phone may be tapped. However, other coordinators in the area believed that as long as they kept very strong righteous thoughts their phones would be safe to use. They even accused my husband of not having strong righteous thoughts and having a big attachment to fear. Eventually, my husband was not willing to keep in contact with these practitioners anymore. They said that as my husband had stopped doing any coordination work, what was the point of him spending a lot of time studying the Fa, when he was not willing to participate in Dafa work.

Fellow practitioners that I contacted all hoped that my husband would be a coordinator again and said that our local area had became like a bag of loose sand, with nobody coordinating well on Dafa work. They praised him for his coordination work and said that he played a great role as a coordinator. On hearing this, I too hoped my husband would do the coordination work again, and use his skills, shouldering the responsibilities of such an important task.

My husband told me, "Fellow practitioners have too strong an attachment of relying on me. If I step forward and help with coordination work again, when I am not sure of my own ability in decision making, problems would surely occur. I do not want to make the same mistakes again." When fellow practitioners knew they could not rely on my husband anymore they began to talk about him behind his back, saying that his behavior was not on the Fa. The problems between my husband and other practitioners were mainly over issues of safety on the telephone. As soon as he raised these concerns other practitioners would say he had a strong attachment to fear, and just did not want to listen. Eventually, my husband stopped contacting them anymore.

When I shared with him on how we could be more diligent, my husband said, "My mind is clear and I know I can play a positive role in Fa-rectification, but I just can't do it now!" Teacher said,

"What I just said was meant to tell you that no matter what problems might arise among Dafa disciples, they are, for sure, aimed at certain people or the human attachments of a certain group of people. That's definitely the case. The old forces don't dare to harm the Fa-rectification, for if this undertaking were to be damaged the cosmos would cease to exist. Dafa disciples are helping Master rectify the Fa, and their doing so plays a decisive role. And nobody would really dare to undermine that effort. It is just that the old forces want this affair to proceed according to their wishes. Then as you cultivate, how will your human attachments be removed? Master has his ways, while they have theirs. But whatever the case, don't let them exploit your gaps, and make sure to examine yourselves often as you cultivate. No matter what kind of problem arises, first reflect upon yourself and the group you are working with, and quite likely you will find the root of the problem. " ("Fa Teaching at the 2009 Washington DC International Fa Conference")

Regarding the conflicts between my husband and I, the state of our local area as one-body, and practitioners hoping my husband could do this or that, I thought about Teacher's words. Of course, fellow practitioners' concerns were on saving more sentient beings, but this reliance on my husband allowed the old forces to exploit practitioners gaps and take full advantage of the situation. As a result, my husband began to distance himself from other practitioners. Owing to his own attachments and Xinxinglevel, whenever my husband wanted to be diligent he would fail to keep it up, and would do something that he should not do. He said, "Teacher has imprinted the Fa in my mind but I still fail to do well." He felt extremely upset because of this.

Then I remembered something Teacher said,

"Of late, some students have often sent me notes, letters, or messages telling about how wrong such-and-such persons were (audience laughs), or what problems such-and-such persons have. I know what's going on--very well. Cultivate yourselves. I don't want the environment Dafa disciples have to become one in which people point fingers at each other. I want the environment to be one in which everyone can accept criticism and at the same time look inside themselves. If everyone cultivates himself, everyone looks within, and everyone cultivates himself well, won't the conflicts be few? This is a principle I have taught all along, going back to when I first began teaching the Fa. Isn't that so? Improvement for a cultivator definitely doesn't result from finger pointing, nor does it result from my criticism of you as your Master or from your pointing fingers at or criticizing each other. It comes from you cultivating yourself."("Teaching the Fa in the City of Los Angeles")

After all these years I had failed to really cultivate myself, as I kept trying to help my husband cultivate. I finally realized that I was in the wrong and must rectify myself. I cannot just ask my husband to do this or that.

After having understood the Fa principles I had no longer had any complaints towards my husband, but had more compassion and tolerance towards him. As a result, my Fa study and exercises improved. When reciting the Fa I found that in one hour I could remember two pages of the Fa, compared with only one paragraph before, in the same time. When I used to do the sitting meditation I could only sit for half an hour and my feet would become extremely painful and turn blue. This morning when I did the sitting meditation it was not as painful and my feet did not change color. I knew that it was because I became clearer on the Fa principles, my xinxing had improved and so Teacher helped me to clean up all the bad substances from within me.