(Clearwisdom.net) I suddenly understood something when I studied the following passage of the Fa. Teacher said:
"The old forces don't dare to oppose our clarifying the truth or saving sentient beings. What's key is to not let them take advantage of the gaps in your state of mind when you do things." ("Teaching the Fa at the 2002 Fa Conference in Boston")
When a Falun Gong practitioner is arrested and tortured, it is never because he produced or distributed Falun Gong truth-clarification materials, had the Nine Commentaries on the Communist Party in his possession, clarified the facts about Falun Gong to someone or because he did any volunteer work for Falun Gong, it is because he developed attachments to showing-off, zealotry, getting things done, fear or other attachments. He falls prey to the persecution caused by evil beings from other dimensions because he is not aware of his attachments or he does not eliminate them in time.
Teacher said:
"What could human beings possibly do to gods? If there were no outside factors, would humans dare to do anything to gods?" ("In Fa-Rectification Your Thoughts Have to be Righteous, Not Human")
The persecution is not about human beings persecuting other human beings. Those people who are persecuting Falun Gong practitioners are manipulated by evil beings from different levels of the universe to commit these crimes. But beings at high levels don't dare to oppose our truth-clarification work. The only way they can do anything is if our thoughts are not righteous. Yet even this kind of interference Dafa practitioners strongly deny.
However, some practitioners have held on to the following misunderstanding for a long time: as long as we do truth-clarification work, we will be subjected to the persecution. As long as we store any material related to Falun Gong, it will be used as an excuse to escalate the persecution. They believe that they will be safe as long as they don't help with truth-clarification work. Or they believe that a practitioner will not be released unless his family bribes the officials in charge. Or they believe that elderly practitioners will be spared from the persecution. Why must we restrain ourselves within these everyday people's notions? For example, when a man has a tumor surgically removed, he might be diagnosed with cancer in another area of his body. Little does he know that the tumor and the cancer are caused by beings in a deep dimension. What is the being doing there? If he studies the cause, he will learn that the root cause is his karma.
In actuality, attachments are the biggest excuse for the old forces to persecute cultivators. It is the root cause of the persecution. Once we let go of our attachments to humanity, the old forces will not dare to touch us, as we would have manifested ourselves as magnificent divine beings. This is the reason why some cultivators, who were arrested after the police ransacked their homes and confiscated truth-clarification materials, were released in just a few days. Some practitioners, however, did little to help with truth-clarification work and hardly had any truth-clarification materials in their possession, but they have suffered from very severe persecution for a long time. Teacher said:
"Remove your human thoughts
and evil will naturally die out" ("Don't Be Sad" in Hong Yin II)
In my humble opinion, Teacher has always expected us to transcend the secular illusions and see the true nature of things.
Some of the most common attachments that I discovered are the mentality of showing-off, sentimentality towards family, anxiety, lack of sincerity, fear, jealousy, belligerence, defending ourselves, etc. As for the attachment to fear, it often accompanies some other attachments. Let's analyze the attachment to fear. When we are afraid that our family might not accept our truth-clarification work, we are actually afraid of losing our harmonious and comfortable life or the warm atmosphere when we spend quality time with our family. Put simply, we are afraid of losing happiness in the human world. When we are afraid that we might give in to the torture, we are actually treating ourselves as everyday people instead of divine beings who are saving sentient beings. We are actually afraid of tribulations and the possibility of death.
There is another common problem. Some practitioners may be persevering in validating the Fa, but they often wonder if they might be arrested or persecuted for doing Dafa work. This is a notion caused by fear. All practitioners came from the old universe; therefore, we might carry the degenerated notion that it is normal to be persecuted if we choose to save sentient beings. This notion is precisely what Teacher will change in the Fa-rectification. Falun Gong practitioners coexist with Teacher's Fa-rectification in order to create a new history and to rectify everything that is not righteous. To do that, we must eliminate all the degenerated laws of the old universe in our heads first.
If a practitioner steers away from clarifying the facts about Falun Gong in an attempt to protect his/her personal safety and to reduce the chance of being persecuted, he/she is already being severely persecuted. As he, a special life that a Falun Gong practitioner is, gradually steers away from the Fa that can save his life, the sentient beings in his corresponding universe are also disintegrating gradually. Fear, the attachment consisting of many other complicated attachments, is enough to destroy everything.
On the other hand, a practitioner should not dismiss common sense about personal safety and clarify the facts about Falun Gong to anyone at any time, just to prove that he has no fear. This is not a righteous thought; this is about redeeming himself. It is irresponsible behavior. A cultivator differentiates himself from non-cultivators when he thinks of others first. A divine being is selfless and altruistic and will not force others to accept his ideas. As long as you are righteous, you will naturally carry a righteous energy field, which will naturally rectify your neighboring environment.
If a practitioner does not have any attachment or fear when one clarifies the facts, does it mean he/she will be free of any persecution? If one thinks so, the evil lives from other dimensions might think he/she has an attachment to complacency or that he/she is eliminating their attachments for the sake of avoiding the persecution. Then they will find an excuse to persecute him/her. It is imperative for us to understand that we eliminate our attachments for the sake of returning to our true selves, reaching the standard of the new universe and saving sentient beings. We eliminate our attachments in order to meet the needs of Teacher's Fa-rectification and Teacher's requirements, not to comply with the evil old forces' expectations. The evil beings from other dimensions are filthy low lives that are bound to be eliminated. They are not entitled to exist in our heads or in our fields. It is our mission to eliminate them by sending forth righteous thoughts.
I have met fellow practitioners who felt, "It's beyond my power because I don't have enough righteous thoughts and my level is not high enough." In my humble opinion, such a "humble" attitude is a reflection of their lack of faith in Teacher and the Fa. Teacher said:
"If every Dafa disciple can think and act righteously as he goes about things and can look at things with righteous thoughts under any circumstance, none of you will become afraid when facing persecution. If that is how you are, who would dare to persecute you! If a person is completely in the Fa no one can touch him. Isn't that having the ability to protect yourself? As a matter of fact, with regard to the veteran students [that started] prior to the persecution, I raised all of you to your positions. As long as you can go about things with righteous thoughts and righteous actions you can protect yourselves perfectly well, and that applies as well for new students that joined later. It's just that some students simply don't have righteous thoughts. They have all the things in place, and yet when experiencing persecution they still look at things with a human mindset and still have a big pile of attachments. What is Master to do?" ("Teaching the Fa in San Francisco, 2005")
Teacher has already bestowed us with the greatest title in the universe --- Falun Gong practitioner --- and has given us the solemn and mighty divine powers of the Buddha Fa. In addition, Teacher has taught us that we are capable of saving sentient beings and eliminating the evil beings in other dimensions. How could we "humbly" say, "It's beyond my power." Isn't it a reflection of our lack of faith in Teacher and the Fa? Is it really "our true selves" that send forth such a "humble" thought? Does such a thought comply with the new universe's standard?
We must disintegrate all of those human notions and thoughts that lead to a lack of steadfast faith in Teacher and the Fa and eliminate those thoughts that the old forces forced upon us. We had the courage to descend from higher realms and follow Teacher to the human realm because we had a steadfast faith in Teacher and Teacher's Fa-rectification. Righteous faith drives righteous actions. We have chosen to come down to the human realm to save sentient beings. Now that we are in the illusionary secular world, we should have an even more steadfast faith in Teacher, because this is the only guarantee of our return to our respective universes and the only guarantee for the lives who placed all of their faith in us. Since Teacher says that we are capable of eliminating the evil beings with our righteous thoughts, then it must be true!
Each and every practitioner is protected by Fa-guardian divine beings. No matter where we go, we are surrounded by numerous heavenly soldiers, heavenly warriors, heavenly dragons, righteous divine beings and Teacher's fashen (law bodies)! An ordinary human being does not have such protection! Only divine beings enjoy such protection!
Teacher said:
"What is immortal? Human mentalities do not exist." ("Distinction Between Human and Enlightened Beings" in Hong Yin)
Is it difficult to attain the realm of an immortal? Not really. When we reduce and eliminate the secular attachments to fame, self-interest and sentimentality, we will naturally attain the realm of an immortal.