(Clearwisdom.net) I know a fellow practitioner who is young and single. A few years ago, she was illegally sentenced to forced labor. Because she consistently resisted the persecution, the guards were afraid to keep her in the labor camp. Before long, she was released and regained her personal freedom. After she was released, she always did the three things that Teacher told us to do. She doesn't have a stable job, but takes temporary work occasionally. Most of the time she does not work.
At times, fellow practitioners have introduced well-paying and easy jobs to her, jobs that anyone would be able to do. For those several years, because she did not have permanent job, her financial situation was really tight. Most daily necessities were offered to her from fellow practitioners. Since she lived with her parents, her family's financial and housing situation was tight as well. Her family always expected some money from her to help with the living expenses, but she only used what the family had without pitching in. Her family members always wished she would quickly get married. Because of the financial difficulty, there were more and more conflicts between her and her family members. She always cried and sometimes even thought about suicide. [Editor's note: The teachings of Falun Gong forbid killing, including committing suicide and self-injury.] Eventually, all the problems became more severe.
I would like to share with fellow practitioners, based on the problems above, but without referring to any particular practitioner or the practitioner I was just talking about above.
Practitioners cannot be attached to money, and everything we do should be based on saving sentient beings and cultivation. Every practitioner has his or her own special circumstances. However, some practitioners refuse to work for various reasons, such as not wanting to suffer conflicts and tribulations with employers and colleagues, the attachment of being slack, or being confused about the relationship between work and cultivation. Some young people use ordinary thoughts to go after optimal jobs. Other practitioners don't have much contact with society and are not willing to learn, and they have tried to escape or hide from society.
However, for practitioners, nothing occurs by chance. If we cannot get a job and more and more conflicts come up at the same time, it may mean it's time to raise our xinxing level. We should regard ourselves as practitioners, find our attachments, and eliminate them. If we cannot cultivate our xinxing while in the midst of conflict, and instead find excuses for ourselves, then we are not behaving in the manner of a cultivator.
Teacher often mentioned that we must not go to extremes. This is a principle of the Fa. If we truly are cultivating disciples, we should gain more understanding of the Fa and do our best. If we forget to look within or forget we are practitioners during conflicts, doesn't that mean our enlightenment quality is not good enough or we lack righteous thoughts?
Some fellow practitioners do not have financial problems, thus they don't pay much attention to this point. They may think that not working and having a tight financial situation would not bring severe consequences to the three things practitioners need to do. It would at most make our personal life a bit tighter. Actually, the Fa principle of not going to extremes is not for us to solve our work or financial problems, but to rectify our thoughts on every different level and help us enlighten to and validate the Fa better. It is not limited to a specific problem. For example, Teacher has corrected some specific problems in our cultivation, and has often mentioned that practitioners should not go to extremes and should be balanced and cooperate well. If we cannot understand the importance of the problems we encounter, and always think they are not related to our cultivation, then the next problem appears. The fundamental factor causing problems is the same and we still easily go to extremes. This causes more conflict. It is not because Teacher did not teach us the Fa, on the contrary, it is because we did not listen to Teacher or enlighten to the Fa well or even focus on it. Therefore, the result would be that we could not pass this test because Teacher did not mention it specifically.
If we are cultivating this way, it may be because we have not cultivated sufficiently, and so the same conflicts and mistakes occur repeatedly. This impedes saving sentient beings and validating the Fa. Therefore, for all the Fa that Teacher has taught, we need to enlighten to it with calm minds, and understand and accept it, and then we may improve quickly. When a problem comes up, we will then have a practitioner's wisdom and the ability to solve the problem freely.
Not everyone needs to work. Some practitioners are responsible for running truth-clarification materials sites daily, carry a heavy workload, and have no time to work in ordinary jobs. Some practitioners have consistent income, and some practitioners' spouses have well-paying jobs or savings. They are able to work full-time on the three things. This is very good. If practitioners don't have these circumstances, they should not go to extremes. If we work while validating the Fa, we can walk steadily on the path of Fa-rectification. In fact, many situations have occurred where practitioners could not give up attachments or were afraid of facing difficulty. This may bring more tribulations to our cultivation path. Sometimes, when we really give up the attachment and face the conflict, we will find that it is not hard to overcome the problem, because we are practitioners and Teacher always takes care of us.
This is just my understanding at my present level. Please point out anything improper.
