(Clearwisdom.net)
1. How to better tolerate others
Since I began practicing Falun Dafa two years ago, after returning home from get-togethers with my colleagues, I always had to lie in bed for two hours to calm down. I would endlessly think back over how I clarified the truth and how my colleagues seemed to take it. They would use Communist Party propaganda to defame Falun Dafa, as they had clearly been brainwashed. Yet, they still thought themselves to be balanced and impartial, even as they showed unusual coldness and indifference towards the persecution of Dafa practitioners, thinking it has nothing to do with them and so on. These people came across as warm and rational in their daily lives, so some of the things they said really took me by surprise. I know that these manifestations aren't their true thoughts, so I kept saying to myself "Then why did you treat this person that way in the past?" (Zhuan Falun). However in my heart I felt an indescribable pain.
Afterwards I enlightened that what my flesh eyes see is nothing but illusion. Amidst everyday people these colleagues may seem warm and rational, but it doesn't necessarily mean that life after life our karmic ties are small, and it doesn't necessarily mean that their ability to accept the truth about Dafa will be strong. So in clarifying the truth our righteous thoughts must be sufficient, and at the same time, before we clarify the truth we mustn't box a person in with our human notions. Otherwise as soon as we face an unexpected situation it is easy for us to lose our temper. Writing this, I have come to a deeper understanding of the below words by Teacher.
"Sometimes when you folks think about an issue you form a type of habit--"I want to do such and such thing... here's how I'm going to do this thing, here's how I'm going to do that thing." You ponder over it a lot and, well, to the point that you feel you've covered everything in a satisfactory way. But when you get down to doing that thing, the real, actual situations can vary in a lot of ways and your plan won't actually work (laughs). And when it doesn't work, you start to ponder it again. That's not how you should do things. Have righteous thoughts! However you think something should be handled, just go ahead and do it, and when you run into problems you will naturally know how to solve them. If your righteous thoughts are strong, everything will work out smoothly and it's guaranteed you'll do well." ("Teaching and Explaining the Fa at the Metropolitan New York Fa Conference" 2003)
I always thought about how to be less nervous or rash when clarifying the truth, how to cultivate "grand forbearance". One day it occurred to me, why couldn't I accommodate non-awakened sentient beings into my universe? Teacher helps us to stimulate the Buddha nature in others. We should ask more questions. Ask questions, be tolerant and accommodating, be inspirational, and not try to match strengths by shouting the opponent down. That doesn't serve any purpose.
Now when I clarify the truth, I first have the thought: send out the Law Wheel to spin counter clockwise and save others, encompass the person with the Law Wheel, encompass the person in my universe. The worse the things the other person says, the more I persist with sending out the Law Wheel. Lately I have been adding parts of Lunyu that I have memorized. One day when I recited "It encompasses everything", I suddenly had a deeper level understanding about how to better tolerate sentient beings.
Reading a sharing on Clearwisdom.net entitled "Only By Studying the Fa Well Can We Validate the Fa" (http://www.clearwisdom.net/html/articles/2010/5/6/116707.html), I was deeply inspired by what it said about jealousy. When clarifying the truth I had a very serious problem of looking down on and despising everyday people. I would place myself above everyday people, which seriously affected by ability to accommodate the other.
These past two days I have also enlightened to another problem. After I started cultivating, although I no longer cared much for playing cards, I was still attached to the results of big competitions, and always wanted to know who won and who lost. Actually paying close attention to competitive sports, and who wins and loses, is a manifestation of a heart of competition that hasn't been given up. In fact it was a key factor affecting my ability to keep a calm mental state while clarifying the truth.
Teacher tells us again and again how important it is to study the Fa. When teaching the Fa, Master was once asked whether new students could catch up with the progress of Fa Rectification. He said "So there is only one way, and it is to study the Fa more." ("Fa Teaching at the 2009 Greater New York International Fa Conference") I am able to study one chapter of Zhuan Falun every day. Although in doing the three things well I still fall far short, I have truly experienced the power of studying the Fa in keeping me stable and calm while clarifying the truth.
2. Human instruments can't detect matter sent out by Gods
The Shanghai World Expo has just begun, and the Communist Party is behaving as if battling an enemy. All of the railway station exits have scanning machines, where people have to place their bags to have them checked. There are also so-called safety personnel all over the place, and you could run into them anywhere, anytime. When thinking about how to best use the time during the World Expo to clarify the facts about Falun Gong, I thought very seriously about letting go of life and death. I asked myself if I was truly willing to let go of death and go out to clarify the truth, and from a deep place in my heart an answer welled up: Yes! At that time a warm current washed through my body and I realized that I had made another breakthrough. I had an even more sacred experience when later studying Zhuan Falun. I read the following section:
"A qigong master possesses all of these substances, and there are some other substances emitted by qigong masters that are undetectable because no such apparatus exists. As long as there is such an apparatus, everything is detectable. The substances emitted by qigong masters are found to be extremely abundant."
I suddenly enlightened that the materials that we use to save people, whether it be DVDs, booklets or articles, all are tools that Gods use to save people. What good are the tools that the Communist Party uses to control everyday people? They are useless.
Now when I go through "safety checkpoints" I send strong righteous thoughts towards the scanning equipment: have them assimilate to Dafa, have them position themselves. At the same time I clean up the surrounding environment, and with the truth-clarifying materials in my bag, I safely pass through.
The Expo in Shanghai runs from May 1 to October 1. This is a grand opportunity for us to eliminate the evil forces that are coming together there. The cosmos has gone through great changes, and the Fa-Rectification has reached the final stage. Sentient beings are continually waking up.
Many classmates that I had not seen for 10 or even 20 years are coming one after another to Shanghai to see the Expo. On the surface it looked as if they are traveling to Shanghai for leisure, but in fact they are coming to be saved. Lately Teacher has often used loose shoelaces (slack and sluggish) to remind me that I have no excuse to relax myself and disappoint the sentient beings who are waiting for me to save them. Let us cultivate ourselves well, save more sentient beings, and leave fewer regrets for ourselves in the future.
