Why Can’t We Be Tolerant of Fellow Practitioners?

(Minghui.org) I couldn’t get rid of an attachment for a long time. I was annoyed when I noticed some practitioners did not behave according to the standards of the Fa, and I was bothered by the stubborn attachments I saw in some diligent practitioners.

When dealing with everyday people (including members of my family who are not practitioners), when I see their shortcomings I usually look within to see if these issues apply to me. I never complain about them, so why can’t I tolerate other practitioners?

Someone who practiced Falun Dafa for 20 years recently started complaining, saying that this thing and that thing was someone else’s fault. I thought the Fa teaching on this was very clear—and I wondered why didn’t this person didn’t examine themselves.

I turned on the Minghui radio one day and listened to, “Eliminating the Chinese Communist Party Culture.” I suddenly enlightened: Party culture was interfering with me and fellow practitioners.

Why can’t I be tolerant of other practitioners? We know from the Fa that our well-cultivated side has been separated, so what we see are the human attachments that need to be eliminated and corrected.

In the Party culture, we are always right—whatever happens is always someone else’s fault. The Party is always great, glorious, and correct. According to traditional culture, those who lack humility deviate from the requirements of the Fa. Instead of looking outward and blaming others one should look inward and cultivate oneself.

According to Party culture, everyone should think and understand things the same way. This goes to extremes and ignores the diversity and inclusivity found in traditional culture. It’s not in line with the Fa (teachings), which say that there are different understanding at different levels. Practitioners are also at different levels.

Party culture is coercive—it insists on certain standards that it imposes on everyone. We shouldn’t use the Fa to judge other practitioners because their attachments are different and their levels of enlightenment are different.

The veteran practitioner who often said things were someone else’s fault learned to search within and not hate others. I often got annoyed by her behavior and judged her first before I examined myself. I now realize that I didn’t look inward unconditionally. Master made that arrangement to help me see my own attachment.

Master said,

“If you can manage to handle things calmly no matter how wronged you may feel, if you can remain unmoved and not try to come up with some kind of excuse for yourself, then with many things you won’t even need to argue. That’s because on your path of cultivation there is nothing that is by chance. So, when you get into a heated exchange and it stirs things up in you, or you get into a conflict over something that concerns your vital interests, perhaps the factors behind it were put there by Master. Maybe you only get upset when it’s a case of someone saying something that really provokes you or hits a sore spot. And maybe the person really did treat you wrongfully. But, those words weren’t necessarily said by that person. Perhaps they were said by me. (Everyone laughs) I want to see how you handle things at the time. When you butt heads with that person, it actually equates to butting heads with me.” (“Fa Teaching Given in Manhattan,” Collected Teachings Given Around the World Volume X)

Conclusion

We should recognize that fellow practitioners are different. Everyone (including ourselves) has different attachments, different degrees of attachment, different understandings of the principles of the Fa, and different innate factors and acquired things. Allowing for those differences can help us be tolerant of fellow practitioners. It can help let go of ourselves and face everyone and everything we encounter with equanimity.

Master arranges everything to help us eliminate karma, purify ourselves, and improve our levels. When we make good use of the magical tool of looking inward, we will see that the people and things we encounter are there for a reason. The other person’s unreasonableness is reflecting our own attachments. Master made the best arrangement to save every disciple.

This is my personal understanding that I wanted to share.