PureInsight | October 8, 2001
A practitioner talked about his long-term cultivation experience, saying that his mind wanders away when reading the books and doing the exercises. However, he still reads without a single mistake, and he can still do his exercises. He gave up his attachment very easily and lightly on the matter of whether to keep practicing Dafa or give up Dafa and keep his job, and he also has a good understanding of going to Beijing to appeal. Nevertheless, he failed to pass his tests on some trivial things; he said himself that it seems as if he had never cultivated.
I think this is the result of his loosening control over his main primordial spirit and letting his assistant spirit play the major role in cultivation. Because his mind wanders when studying Fa and doing exercises, if it’s not interference from demons or karma, it must be the intervention from the assistant spirit. He doesn’t study for his main primordial spirit; he loosens control on his main primordial spirit on important issues and the assistant spirit takes effect. When the cultivator is tested on trivial matters that assistant spirit does not care about, the main primordial spirit’s shortcomings are exposed, and therefore, he feels as if he had never cultivated, that he can’t pass the tests and keep up his xinxing (heart-mind nature).
I realized after reading Fa that for human beings, the assistant spirit does not necessarily have to exist. Teacher said in Zhuan Falun, “Normally, when people think about something or do something, it is up to the Main Spirit that makes the decision. The Assistant Spirit mainly tries its best to prevent one’s Main Spirit from committing wrongdoing. When the Main Spirit is very stubborn, however, the Assistant Spirit is unable to give help. The Assistant Spirit is not fooled by ordinary human society while the Main Spirit is easily deceived.”
If it’s very hard for the assistant spirit to prevent men from committing bad deeds, then its power over controlling the speed of mankind’s moral corruption and the extent to which morality has slipped down is also extremely limited.
The participation of the assistant spirit is also something produced after beings in the universe deviated from the Fa. Teacher said in Zhuan Falun, “Lu Dongbin once made a statement: ‘I’d rather save an animal than a human being.’” Then, should one really save animals? There is a law in the universe that prohibits animals from cultivating. There is also a proverb among people, saying, “The dog bites Lu Dongbin [a god in ancient China] and doesn’t recognize his good heart.” Only human beings possess compassionate nature, and only human beings have the opportunity to cultivate and become great, enlightened beings. What is to be done if gods still want to save people? Then the assistant spirit is given to people, and they save the assistant spirit when saving people. People’s main primordial spirit painfully struggles among the mysteries in the mundane world. After much difficulty, he finally gets rid of attachments to fame and fortune and is willing to cultivate. However, he is used by others. This is helpless and pathetic for the main primordial spirit. Teacher said, “Assistant Primordial Spirit doesn't enter the Three Realms, but controls the person's body at a microscopic level beyond the Three Realms. It's simply impossible for a person to return--never before in history has this happened” (Lecture at the Western U.S. Cultivation Experience Sharing Conference of Falun Dafa October 21, 2001). So we can see that compared to the primordial spirit, the assistant spirit is on a relatively high level. He doesn’t dare to cultivate in the human’s world of the maze and “cultivates” in a cheating way in the degenerated universe. Actually, it is not easy to be an assistant spirit. Why can someone become an assistant spirit? Don’t people exchange benefits when bribing and accepting bribes in the human world? In the past, assistant spirits that cultivated to consummation decidedly couldn’t reach the level of 24k gold because of the way they cultivated.
After reading Zhuan Falun, I realized that the main primordial and assistant spirits don’t have obvious differences regarding their cultivation methods. The cultivation of primordial spirit:
For instance, upon arriving at the workplace, a person will become furious when he overhears two people denigrating him very badly. We have said, however, that as a practitioner one should not fight back when being punched or insulted, but should conduct oneself with a high standard. Thus, he thinks that Teacher has said that as practitioners we should not be the same as others and must conduct ourselves better. He will not quarrel with those two persons. But normally when a problem arises, if it does not irritate a person psychologically, it does not count or is useless and cannot make him or her improve. Accordingly, his mind cannot get over it and is still bothered by it. It could be that his mind is hooked on it. He always wants to turn around to look at the faces of those two people. Upon looking back, he sees the two wicked-looking faces in a heated conversation. He can no longer take it and becomes very upset. He may even pick a fight with them right away.
Assistant spirit’s cultivation:
When his Assistant Spirit was still around, he was controlled by his Assistant Spirit. For instance, one day his workplace gave out an apartment unit. The supervisor said: 'All those in need of the apartment come here to describe your conditions and explain why each of you needs the apartment.' Everyone provided their own reasons while this person did not say a word. In the end, the supervisor found that this person had a greater need for it than others, and that the apartment should be given to him. Other people claimed: 'No, the apartment shouldn’t be given to him. It should be given to me because I need the apartment badly.' This person said: 'Then you can go ahead and take it.'
When controlled by the assistant spirit, one can discard attachments to one’s own self-interest with the light wave of a hand. However, the main primordial spirit has heartache and feels terrible, and slowly cultivates and learns to be able to lose with calmness.
In our cultivation in the Fa-rectification period, the assistant spirit often wants to interpose and attempts to take the dominant position. It is said in Zhuan Falun, “A mental patients’ Main Primordial Spirit … is always in a daze and cannot become conscious. At this point, the person’s Assistant Consciousness or foreign messages will interfere with him.”
When our main primordial spirit is not strong, our assistant spirit immediately comes in and studies the Fa and does the exercises. Teacher admonished us, “Primordial spirit must be strong,” and this is very likely one of the reasons. Thought karma can successfully interfere with the main primordial spirit. The assistant spirit is responsible for willingly allowing the existence of thought karma. In the long deviation of the universe, the continual role of assistant spirit in cultivation has probably made him accustomed to the state of participating in studying Fa and doing exercises, and also the state of mind that has twisted notions. This must be changed. The assistant spirit should be a good Fa protector, and he also must be pure. If the main primordial spirit is not strong, of course there is the element of main primordial spirit’s cultivation, but the assistant spirit should do his best to help and remind the primordial spirit. All beings are continuously positioning themselves in Fa rectification.
Teacher has great benevolence. Teacher said, “In our cultivation way, in the future, the assistant spirit will work as your Fa protector” (Lecture in Sydney) [Unofficial translation]. How much he safeguards Fa is not the key issue but is determined by predestined relationship. This is Teacher’s benevolent solution regarding this matter. From now on, cultivators will cultivate their main primordial spirits. After Fa-rectification, the world will forever be the most clean and most beautiful. In our cultivation in the future, when we are sending out righteous thoughts to eliminate bad elements in ourselves and outside of ourselves, our assistant spirit should actively cooperate with our main primordial spirit in eliminating the evil. If assistant spirit is playing the role of safeguarding Fa, now it should fully take effect.
Teacher said in Lecture at the Great Lakes Conference in North America, “A god comes down to save people, yet humans nail him to a cross--what a huge crime people have committed! They're still paying for it today. But that wasn't done by humans alone. It was caused by the degeneration of beings at higher levels. They don't dare to admit anything wrong on their part in all of these matters. This is because everything is becoming distorted--so distorted that they've deviated from the Fa and gradually become how they are. No beings at any level have ever dared to touch them. Everything is determined by interwoven elements that have become extremely complicated.” In the past, the corrupted beings’ degenerate behaviors threatened the universe and other beings and even gods found out that they themselves were not safe. We are practitioners cultivated in Fa-rectification. The new universe will have the Falun to look over it and correct all that is not righteous. However, we ourselves can also correct all that’s unrighteous. Thus, the universe and the world will remain forever pure and harmonious.
Translated from:
http://www.zhengjian.org/zj/articles/2001/9/25/11798.html
