While I was promoting Shen Yun, many ordinary people shared with me how they liked Shen Yun and it made me very happy. I was also thinking: Shen Yun can save people, because the blessing of Master and the performers' righteous thoughts, but if the performer did not have such a superb skill, can it achieve the same effect? And how hard may they have to work to achieve such superb skill? If they worked hard in their school studies, people would really be seeing the power and magnificent of Dafa on them.
Behind the attachment to time and the attachment to the end of Fa rectification, is my selfishness and a view of Fa-rectification using ordinary people’s thoughts. Being attached to time can result in going to extremes and being irrational.
I began to reflect on myself and realized that since the beginning, I have been in the "extreme". It may look like I had been very "diligent", but deep inside I still have fundamental attachments. It seemed like I had let go of the attachments to fame, sentimentality and material interests when in fact, I was persistent and dared not to touch them.
The first is my attachment to time and the attachment to the ending time of cultivation. I do not like my career and I have always wanted to change it. It generally takes a couple of years, but up until now to this point of Fa-rectification, I still have such an attachment. It is a waste of time, and it might never be finished before Fa-rectification is over. It is better to do more righteous things. So I did not work hard on this, and I did not cultivate diligently. Sometimes I found myself holding a computer all day, watching videos which not only wasted a lot of time, but also filled my mind with a lot of dirty things, even lust. This made my mind sluggish and I was often distracted by my thoughts when I read Fa or sent righteous thoughts. It was difficult to end this bad habit and it continued for almost a year. With the help of fellow practitioners, I participated in the morning Fa study, and felt a lot better. But from time to time I still made mistakes. Especially when I was tired, I watched the videos using relaxation as an excuse. In fact, I knew that was my attachment to time, and I slacked off.
Then there is the strong attachment to “results”. I was constantly worried that I would receive no reward for my efforts and that caused me to weigh things over and over before making any decision. Many times, things were deserted even before they started. For example, I spent three to four years considering which career, plan, and job would be better for me and how well it was paid. I always wanted to pick easy jobs and shirked hard ones, but I never started to learn. I should have completed all the necessary studying and training to start a new career during this period but I became very impatient, always doing only the surface work, always wanting to accommodate when I encountered problems, and not wanting to study the problem in-depth in order to find a better solution. I participated in the Shen Yun project, but only with my own small smart and not my whole heart. I was always satisfied as long as I participated in Shen Yun projects and completed the assigned tasks. This also made me inadvertently play a bad role in the promotion of Shen Yun. When I thought we had already worked very hard yet still did not reach our goal, I began to complain, grumble, and give up. I realized I was complaining that other fellow practitioners were not working hard enough, even when I was the one who lacked the motivation and did not put in any effort, and that created barriers between practitioners.
When I tried to put down this heart, I began to understand that Shen Yun is the opportunity that Master gave us to improve together. Participating in Shen Yun promotion is the process of our cultivation, and the result of Shen Yun promotion is like our cultivation which cannot be pursued like every day people. They involve the cultivation and coordination of local practitioners. It is the embodiment of the cultivation process. I realized it is very important to participate in Fa rectification to improve yourself instead of waiting and relying on others to do the right thing. In this way, my heart slowly calmed down, from which I realized the mystery of non-action, being free of notions, human factors, and the sense of myself.
In fact, I still have a fundamental attachment to escape reality/today’s society. I started to practice Dafa partially because I wanted to escape from the today’s society. I came from the countryside to the big city and I found that there were a lot of things I did not understand. I thought I could reach my life goal if I went to a good university, but I was wrong and found it very hard to adapt to this society. I needed more motivation, and I felt lost. At this time, I came into Dafa and I found “a hiding place" in Dafa: I wanted to "put down all the attachments", so I wouldn’t need to deal with reality (today’s society). "Let it be, whatever" was my favorite saying, but I knew myself in depth, it only covered my true attachment, escaping from reality. With this fundamental attachment at the very beginning, I did not do things following the Fa, and sometimes went to the “extreme”. During my last year of college, many of my classmates were busy preparing to study abroad. I knew that studying abroad is very hard and takes a lot of effort, so I gave up. I just wanted to graduate to find an easy job, but I later found that it is hard to find a good paying job with a bachelor’s degree. I went to graduate school. I realized that I was trying to arrange an easy life for myself. It actually brought me a lot of difficulties in my life. There was also the desire of getting things without effort.
I knew that a person's whole life in this world was determined far in advance. Later, I was successfully admitted to the graduate school. My English has always been not good, and I did not spend a lot of time practicing it. I was “lucky” to be accepted by a very good American university with scholarship. My life had been relatively smooth, which caused me to believe I could easily get whatever I wanted without any hard work. However, that proved to be wrong later. After my graduation, I went to work and was forced to face reality. I still could not adapt myself to that “society” or I just could not meet the requirements of that class, and the “society” could not see the greatness of Dafa from me, which made me miss a lot of opportunity to clarify the truth of Dafa. There were simply too many regrets as a consequence.
After recognizing these attachments in myself, my mind became clear. I became more diligent in studying the Fa, sending righteous thoughts and clarifying the truth to people. My ability to work and study efficiency have also greatly improved. I changed my career in an easy way and I now have more time to participate in the Fa-rectification projects. I understand that everything is here for Fa-rectification.
I have shared some of my recent cultivation experiences and understandings. Please point out anything inappropriate.
