(Minghui.org)
Greetings, Master! Greetings, fellow practitioners!
Here I would like to report to Master and share with fellow practitioners my experience of eliminating barriers through searching within. Please point out anything inappropriate.
Searching Within to Eliminate Barriers Between Practitioners
I am in charge of maintenance and repair of computers and printers in my in my local are. Therefore, I have many opportunities to meet with fellow practitioners. I have paid special attention to my cultivation of speech. When I go to fellow practitioners' homes to repair computers or to share cultivation experiences, I never asked for personal information about others. Nor do I want fellow practitioners to ask about my personal information. This is being responsible to the Fa and fellow practitioners.
Several days ago during the Chinese College Entrance Exam period, one of my fellow practitioners' child was taking the exam. This practitioner accompanied her child to the exam facility and had the chance to make acquaintances with other high school students taking the exam. She distributed the software that can break through the Chinese government's Internet blockade by the Chinese government to the students, and most of them were willing to accept it. The exam period was just three days. On the first day she used up all the software DVDs she had on hand. That evening, she asked me for more. As I did not have the DVD on hand at that time, I asked another fellow practitioner to find some DVDs elsewhere and deliver them to her home that night.
After some days, the practitioner who requested more DVDs met with me regarding some coordination issues. After resolving the issues, she asked me, “Do you know the practitioner who delivered the DVDs to me the other day?” I replied, “I have met her a few times but am not very familiar with her.” She then told me, “That practitioner asked me where I worked, what I did, and what projects I am involved in to clarify the facts. I thought you knew her well, so I told her everything.”
Hearing this, I was infuriated and exploded, “How could you tell her all that?! I have told you so many times not to reveal any personal information to fellow practitioners. Yet you did not listen. Do not ever contact me in the future.” She was very sorry and said, “OK, I won't contact you anymore.” Thus, we separated on bad terms.
On my way home, I remembered a paragraph of Master's Fa,
“Nothing happens in cultivation without a reason. When incorrect states and bad human conduct surface among us, those things have come to target human attachments. We don't acknowledge the old forces' arrangements, but, when we fail to do well they will exploit our gaps. So, perhaps it was that a particular place needed to be targeted in that manner, and that was why an incident happened.” (“Fa Teaching at the 2009 Washington DC International Fa Conference”)
On the surface, the conflict happened due to the fact that this fellow practitioner did not follow the teachings of the Fa and did something she should not have done. Fundamentally, however, it was because of my human attachment, and this fellow practitioner was showing it to me by what she did. I searched within and discovered that I had attachments to complaining, hatred, looking down on others, arrogance, showing off, feeling superior to others, and fear. I sent forth righteous thoughts immediately to eliminate these bad human attachments. I said to myself, “How could I treat a fellow practitioner like that?! I vented my anger on her. Was that the proper state of a practitioner?” After realizing my xinxing issues, I called her the next day to apologize. She said, “I was going to call you. Let's sit down and talk.” So we agreed on a place to meet. She said, “I was so out of line yesterday and so bad in my cultivation of speech. I will for sure be more cautious in the future.” I told her, “It was my fault. My human attachments caused the problem. I should thank you for helping me to eliminate these attachments. I certainly should not have gotten angry with you. In the future, we will collaborate well with each other and kindly point out each other's gap. As long as we act righteously, nobody will dare to persecute us. We will do the three things well, which Master has asked us to do.”
After the Shen Yun DVDs became available, practitioners in my region did not waste any time copying them. Because the Shen Yun show is a project to save sentient beings under Master's direct guidance, it has the connotation of the Fa. Thus, we should not neglect any details, including purchasing the blank discs, burning the DVDs, printing labels and covers, and packaging them in DVD cases. These steps cannot all be done by one practitioner—several practitioners need to work together. One practitioner burned the CDs. Another practitioner and I were in charge of printing the covers and packaging.
A few days ago, the practitioner who was burning the DVDs called me to her home. She seemed upset and said, “How come you have not brought me the discs? This has delayed such an important project.” I replied, “It takes quite a few steps and cannot be done immediately upon your order.” She said, “As long as fellow practitioners can distribute them, we should not delay making them.” I replied, “You are right.” I felt wronged although I agreed with her on the surface. I said to myself, “You think burning DVDs is the only step? We are doing many other steps.” I felt indignant and left.
On my way home, I became increasingly upset. Looking inward, I noticed a severe attachment to saving face, unwillingness to accept criticism, a need to defend myself, and feeling superior to this fellow practitioner.
Master said in “Don't Argue” in Hong Yin III),
“Don't argue when people argue with you
Cultivation is looking within for the cause
Wanting to explain just feeds the attachment
Breadth of mind, unattached, brings true insight”
I said to myself, “Isn't it true that this practitioner wants to save more people by distributing more DVDs? Why am I looking for excuses?” I realized that I had not behaved like a practitioner. After discovering my attachments, I sent forth righteous thoughts to eliminate them. In the future, whenever it does not interfere with my studying the Fa, I will arrange my time well to complete my share of the work in order to not delay fellow practitioners from saving sentient beings. I will accept it calmly when fellow practitioners point out my issues and fulfill my part in various projects to not let Master down.
Keeping Righteous Thoughts at Every Moment in Cultivation
My local fellow practitioners mostly use Internet cards, which are refilled annually, to access the Internet and download files from the Minghui website. I am in charge of purchasing and refilling these cards for them. Early this year, most of their cards had expired and they asked me to refill them. Thus, I hurried and did it for all of them.
One day as I was about to access the Minghui website, I suddenly thought, “Fellow practitioners have exhausted their quotas on their Internet cards. How come I have used mine for several years without having to refill it?” Due to this improper thought, I had difficulty running the program and accessing the Minghui website. No matter how many times I tried to double click on the program icon, it did not work and kept reporting an error. I had used my Internet card for years and it had always been fast and successful. Through the years, my card had acted as if it were a living being and it had worked so well for me no matter how badly the evil attempted to block the Internet. During the past years, I had no distracting thoughts and had a firm belief that my Internet would work fast.
In 2008, I was still using a secondhand computer, which had been used by a fellow practitioner for many years and was very slow. Because I needed a fast Internet connection and a fast computer to do my project work, another practitioner suggested that I exchange my computer with another practitioner because that practitioner did simple work, which did not require a fast computer or fast Internet. That practitioner agreed and exchanged computers with me. Thus, my computer and Internet card had been very fast since then. I said to myself, “Due to one improper thought of mine, this Internet card may be destroyed and will no longer be of any use. What a pity that is! Cultivation is a serious matter. I must uphold righteous thoughts at any moment.”
In retrospect, my loopholes were being taken advantage of, namely my attachments to being successful, zealotry and a tendency to showing off.
In order to repair a machine, I must first repair my xinxing
A few days ago, the printer of a fellow practitioner was not working and she asked me to get help from another practitioner, who was an expert in this area. In other words, she did not think I could solve her problem. The other practitioner was very busy with his regular work as well as clarifying the facts. When I noticed this several years ago, I decided to learn different technologies to help out. I had closely watched and learned from him as he fixed computers and printers over the years. I can now solve a lot of problems myself. Therefore, I decided to give it a try this time.
I went to the practitioner's home, and when she saw me she asked, “Why are you here? I thought the other practitioner was coming.” I told her, “He is too busy. Let's not bother him if we can solve it ourselves.” I was upset but did not display any unpleasant feelings. She then told me about the printer problem, “The other day as I was printing something, it suddenly lost power. When I powered it up again, it did not boot up. It might be the power supply that is dead.” I said, “The power supply is not likely to go bad. It could be the motherboard.” Because I did not have a motherboard on hand, I told her that I needed to wait until I get another one before I could fix it. After returning home, I talked to the other practitioner and he agreed with my diagnosis and also suggested that the motherboard be changed.
A few days later, I got the motherboard, and went to her home again. After replacing it, the power came back on. However, the printer's upper and lower lights were flashing interchangeably ten times. I realized that the printer had a more severe problem than I had thought, and the ink jet needle had to be replaced, plus another motherboard. As I explained the situation to the practitioner, I could tell she was sad and upset because the motherboard cost 280 yuan and the ink jet needle, 380 yuan. Also, I felt that she did not have confidence in me. I quickly went home to fetch another motherboard and ink jet needle. After putting them in her printer, the flashing lights didn't go off. I had never encountered such a difficult problem and said to myself, “Normally, changing the ink jet needle would do it. What is happening? Is it caused by my own problem?”
Master told us,
“For a cultivator, looking within is a magical tool.” (“Fa Teaching at the 2009 Washington DC International Fa Conference”)
I said to myself, “I myself often told fellow practitioners that we should first improve our xinxing and then repair a machine. How come I don't apply that to myself?” After returning home, I carefully read the recent Fa teaching and earnestly searched within. I realized, “A fellow practitioner did not trust my skills. Is it because I am unwilling to hear negative things about myself? Is it because I have the attachment to saving face? A fellow practitioner looked down on me. Is it because I also looked down on her? Fellow practitioners are a mirror and can reflect my own attachments.” Then I sent forth righteous thoughts to eliminate my human attachments and all evil factors interfering with the printer. I also prohibited the evil from taking advantage of my loopholes and interfering with this truth clarification tool.
Later, I asked the expert practitioner and he also thought it was strange. He agreed that replacing both parts should have fixed the problem. I told him that it might not be that strange, because my attachments had interfered with the printer. When I went to that practitioner's home once again to examine the printer, I found the problem: one of the three threads that were driving the ink cartridge was broken. After replacing it, the printer worked properly again.
There is little time remaining in the Fa rectification period. In my future cultivation, I should learn my lessons well, make up for my shortcomings, study the Fa well, utilize my strengths, form a whole body with fellow practitioners, eliminate barriers between us, and do the three things well together.