(Clearwisdom.net) I am a policeman. My job is to supervise residence registrations. Recently I gained some understandings in Fa-rectification cultivation that I would like to share with you. Please kindly point out anything inappropriate.
1. When Expressing Opinions with a Compassionate Heart, It Will Have a Good Effect
There is a phenomenon among practitioners. Sometimes when we see a practitioner behaving in a way that does not accord with the Fa, we usually figure that it would be useless to point it out to that practitioner. Instead, we might talk about that practitioner's problem behind their back and choose not speak to them directly. Conversely, I think that some practitioners make it very difficult to point things out because they behave as though they are unable to listen to any criticism. Despite the fact that this difficulty might be present, is it really true that it is useless to point out these practitioners' problems face to face? From my personal experience, I think that as long as we speak with compassionate hearts, our words will make a difference for those practitioners sooner or later.
My cultivation state varies between good and not so good. In the six years of my cultivation, sometimes fellow practitioners have pointed out my shortcomings. Even though at that moment I might have appeared to disagree with the other practitioners' opinions, or even though it was other practitioners that had the problem, over these several years, the words of others are still vivid in my memory, and I still refer to them and look inward.
It is this way because we are all cultivators and we know that we should look inward. It would be impossible to completely ignore other practitioners' words without some degree of self-assessment. Although a practitioner may not recognize the problem that the other practitioners point out at that moment, as time passes the practitioner may gradually see the point. Here is one example.
Once I raised some criticism and made a suggestion to practitioners that own and operate a particular media company. One practitioner who heard my comments responded impolitely by saying, "The practitioners in the media are already very busy, do not add more burden on them. Do not make the suggestion if it is impossible to implement, otherwise, you better be able to act on it yourself." Upon hearing this, the immediate thought arising in my mind was: "What kind of logic is that!" The purpose of sharing is to share ideas so that the whole body might improve. If offering suggestions were discouraged, would it still be called sharing? What's more, wasn't it wrong to say that if you cannot carry out your own suggestion, you should not say it? Wouldn't this take away opportunities for others to benefit from the idea? My attachment of competitiveness surfaced on this issue, as I believed that I was correct.
That practitioner's criticism sounded very inappropriate and unreasonable on the surface, but it really helped me to realize that the practitioners working on media had a very difficult task. They were usually unable to spare time to do extra things and needed our tangible support and involvement, instead of more talking and comments. It motivated me to start writing stories targeting everyday readers. After discussing with other practitioners, we added another column to the newspaper.
If that practitioner had not said something to me, I would not have realized that help was really needed. I might have even drawn the incorrect conclusion that the media practitioners were simply irresponsible. So we should speak our minds when the need arises in a way that other practitioners can accept and understand. I believe that if we can do this well, then our field as one body can be more and more righteous, and our work to validate the Fa will achieve better results.
2. Making Phone Calls
In the past, I made calls to China to clarify the truth about Falun Gong. But later I thought that it was too slow to talk one-to-one, since there are over 1 billion Chinese people. Besides, the phone calls often failed to go through, or the recipient on the other end hung up. I decided that this effort was a waste of precious time. Compared with clarifying the truth through other means such as the Internet, making phone calls was too ineffective. Because of this notion, when other practitioners talked many times about the importance of making phone calls to China, I still could not act on it.
Not until recently, when I picked up the phone again, did I feel the importance of making phone calls to China. Most of the phone calls we make are focused on contacting the perpetrators of violence against Falun Gong practitioners, such as policemen and guards in forced labor camps. If one phone call stops one policeman from further involvement in the persecution, then many practitioners could be free from torture and persecution. Think about how many sentient beings one practitioner can save when free to do so! Besides, some practitioners who are persecuted are active and diligent in their cultivation. If one such practitioner is freed from detention, then they can also help other practitioners to gain release. On the other hand, if a policeman refused to join the persecution, it could cause a chain reaction whereby more policemen around him might refuse to get involved with the persecution. This kind of trend would change the situation for the better to a very great extent! How could we so easily give up making phone calls just because of temporary frustration?
The evil is afraid of being exposed, so when I make phone calls to China, I usually tell the person on the other end that their wrongdoings are published on the Internet. I inform them that their misdeeds (including on which dates such acts were committed) are all clearly listed on the web. I tell them that once the Fa comes to rectify the human world; there will be no chance for them to rectify their wrongdoings. Thus, if they wish to have a hope for the future it is urgent for them to stop persecuting practitioners. I have found that this line of conversation usually gets good results.
For example, when I called a team head of a certain National Security Team, I told him that what his subordinates had done was published on the web, and his name was the first one listed. Hearing this, he asked, "Which website? What did it say?" I told him the content and asked him to restrain his subordinates. Otherwise, he would have to take personal responsibility for their crimes. His voice obviously showed that he was carefully considering the situation. A Chinese Communist Party (CCP) secretary in a workplace said that he knew the situation of the practitioner under persecution and would find a way to help; a committee head of a certain village promised to help rescue persecuted practitioners; a deputy chief said that he would pass on what I told him to other police.
When I first joined the phone call project, I often felt extremely nervous when making a phone call. Looking back at that time, I laugh at myself. The person on the other side of the line cannot persecute us nor find out our phone numbers. So what was I afraid of? It is the perpetrators who should feel afraid, not us. We should be open and noble. In fact, the evil is very afraid, as their yelling and shouting reflects their insecurity. However, if our hearts are nervous and unsettled when talking with them, rather than restraining the evil, we might enable the evil to act even more rampantly.
Some practitioners expressed their feelings that the effect of making phone calls was not good. My personal understanding is, whether the effect is good or not is discernible from the surface. Think about it, under the CCP dictatorship in China, a person's attitude towards Falun Gong affects his livelihood in society. When they receive our phone calls they know that we have their names, professions etc. Even if they agree with what we are telling them, would they directly and openly state their opinions? So I feel that if the person talks with us calmly and/or listens to us quietly, we might have already achieved our goal. On the other hand, if the person became irrational and curses at us, he might still think over what we said later after calming down. The perpetrators might feel guilt for what they have done to practitioners.
3. Cultivating Speech
On one occasion, I went to supervise a particular district's residence registration. When I arrived, I asked a policeman to join another policeman already on duty, but the policeman responded in a disgruntled and disrespectful manner. Though I was annoyed by his attitude, I told him that I would check his work on another day. In other words, I would find time to check his work and make his life difficult.
Later, I realized that as a practitioner, I should not be influenced by ordinary people's attitudes. Interestingly enough, in a chance occurrence, I was asked to supervise that policeman's work. The usual procedure is to inform the policeman before visiting the police station, so as to give the policeman some time to correct any errors in the records. But when I contacted him, he said that he would begin a long vacation the next day. To not affect his vacation plan, I went to the police station immediately, so there was little time for him to review his own work. Besides, his past performance reviews indicated his inattentiveness to detail. So, not surprisingly, I found many errors when checking his work. The errors he made were justification for a stern warning, though insufficient to warrant his termination. Nonetheless, it would leave a poor impression on his boss.
I tried to give him another chance, but was unable to get in touch with him since he was still on vacation. When I asked the police station to help contact him, the staff was too busy attending other matters. Finally, hoping to gain a break for the policeman, I submitted the review to a person in the department above me who was known for his leniency. However, this time his attitude was different and he suggested I teach this policeman a lesson. In addition, the police chief, who usually paid little attention to residence registrations, requested that all police begin strictly enforcing registration policy.
In other words, from the time when I said that I would make his life easy, many coincidental things happened one after another to hold him accountable. That policeman really had big trouble awaiting him on his return from vacation.
From the perspective of the Fa, we all know that the words from a cultivator carry energy. But in the big dye vat of ordinary people's society, some words easily flow from our lips, but if we are not careful it can bring unnecessary interference to our cultivation.
5. Little Effort to Finish a Big Task
Recently, deporting people coming to Taiwan from China for arbitrary reasons became a priority for Taiwan police. Some colleagues expressed different views about security units putting so much energy on people from Mainland China. In a group meeting, I introduced the Nine Commentaries on the Communist Party to them and shared my understanding. After several such group meetings, more than three hundred policemen were made aware of the Nine Commentaries and gained a new understanding of the Communist Party's evil nature. I have distributed around one hundred copies of the Nine Commentaries among them.
There is a very famous saying in the Kung Fu community, which states, "A few ounces can deflect a thousand pounds." This statement is on the mark in that we sometimes feel certain things are very difficult to accomplish. Yet, if the task is assigned to the right person, it will be light and easy to accomplish. A practitioner without the right conditions might find it difficult to introduce the Nine Commentaries to more than 300 policemen. Yet for me, I did it easily because I had the conditions arising from my work.
A practitioner's work, family environment and special skills are not coincidental. My personal understanding is that Teacher will give practitioners with special skills and conditions chances to validate the Fa. Hopefully we won't miss the opportunities or stop ourselves due to our attachment of fear, which might cause other practitioners to have to do those things using enormous efforts due to not having the convenient conditions.
Fellow practitioners, let's fulfill our predestined roles!