PureInsight | December 23, 2002
This is what I saw and came to understand during the course of the weekend events at the Falun Dafa Eastern Canada English Speaking Experience Sharing Conference.
The Fa Conference
The conference was held in Toronto, Ontario, and arranged by Western practitioners. Western and Chinese practitioners from Montreal, Ottawa, St. Catherines, Barrie, Saint John, NB and Quebec attended the conference. Visitors also drove over 10 hours from Boston and Chicago to be part of this Fa Conference. Although the speeches did talk a lot about self-cultivation, many practitioners discussed the difficulties and the importance of having a harmonious and cooperative Western cultivation environment. This significance of cooperation referred to the relationships among Westerners and between Westerners and Chinese practitioners.
I came to believe that the social climate among Western people and Chinese people was actually an arrangement by the old forces. With so many people in China, people have grown up working in teams. They have been forced into such conditions and it did not matter if they worked well or not as a team. One or a few leaders led the team and the others followed. There was the leader mentality and the follower mentality. Over the years, I observed those Chinese practitioners in the follower or leader roles when doing Dafa activities.
In the Western culture, people have more autonomy. Westerners are used to doing things on their own, leaving a very good environment for personal preference to be developed. In other words, Westerners are more used to working alone or in small groups in the manner in which they prefer. I also felt these traits in myself and saw them in other Western practitioners. Recently, I have seen many Chinese practitioners who used to be followers begin to take more initiative and playing more active roles and do things without leaders, and the past leaders stepping back and treating their past "followers" with more respect. This is a manifestation of the pure land that Dafa has provided and evidence that practitioners are breaking the old forces' arrangements. With more Chinese practitioners taking an active role, more Chinese people can be saved and the future universe can be that much more wonderful. With the past leaders taking a bit of a step back, it also provides a more harmonious cultivation environment for cultivators to make essential progress in their cultivation during the Fa-rectification.
In fact, these are only a few surface benefits. I feel that this recent Fahui is a strong step for the Westerners to break the old forces' arrangements for the Westerners' mentalities and environment during the Fa rectification. Cooperation between Chinese and Western practitioners is also improving and this has helped to make the conference a success.
Other issues addressed in speeches were rescuing practitioners from China, working on TV projects, how to clarify the truth to Chinese people, miraculous recoveries from life threatening illness, and living a healthier life because of practicing Falun Dafa.
During the Fahui, a Chinese practitioner and I were responsible for arranging meals for everyone. In one incident, we were in the car driving and I made some sort of comment to joke with this practitioner who is a middle-aged woman. She replied, "In the past, I found your manner just too difficult to deal with, but not any more. Now it's fine." I could see that she was not making a comment about my manner. Rather, she was making a comment on her own progress. I replied, "Wow, that's wonderful. I mean that's not good for me but its good for you." I was genuinely happy for her. But what touched me most was that she never came to me to tell me about her problem because I never knew. She just looked inside herself, changed herself and now we were both serving Dafa together happily and laughing in harmony. It also showed me her heart to want to work well with Western practitioners.
Western and Chinese practitioners have a great deal of difficulty working together for countless reasons many of which I have had the fortune to experience. But this small interaction really demonstrated the power of how cultivating the self well is one of the greatest things you can do for your environment.
The next day the Western practitioners went to Chinatown to deliver handmade lotus flowers and a poem from the Western practitioners to the local Toronto Chinese people. When I arrived at the busiest intersection, I came to the location where our Chinese practitioners usually station themselves with a 60-inch large TV screen playing truth clarification videos. Numerous Westerners were also there, so I decided to walk around and distribute our lotus flowers and poems. Then I heard a loud voice shout my name and someone grabbed my shoulder. It was a large male Chinese practitioner. He then forcibly pulled me for about 20 feet down a crowded sidewalk and then placed me in front of the TV and shouted, "You stay here, good!" There were videos playing with Westerners in them and he wanted to create a certain effect for the passers by.
Although I was a little surprised to be dragged through the street, I did not react in any way to defend myself. I just said OK to him and began to hand out the flowers and poems. The effect was indeed very powerful. We gave out hundreds of flowers and poems. Many Chinese people stopped to watch videos about Westerners and Falun Gong. It really shocked them. It was plainly obvious to them that we weren't being paid and some of them sat there very confused for a long time just watching the videos. Others just passed by and some stopped for little while to smile and say thank you.
On the surface, it looked like the combination of Westerners and the video about the Westerners had a good effect, but later I looked back to see that I could have made that situation much different by taking the forceful actions against me personally. I could have been offended or angry by that incident, but I was not. I could have quickly transformed a very benevolent field into a cold one but I chose not to act selfishly. I knew his heart was for Dafa and I decided to ignore his manner.
The united effort of the Chinese and Western practitioners that day created a benevolent field for Chinese people to enter. The Chinese practitioners supplied the TV screen but it was the Westerners in the TV screen. The Western practitioners wrote the poem and the flowers were folded by the Chinese practitioners. It was a really good team effort and none of it was planned that way.
Now when I look back on those two incidents, one thing stands out. The differences between Western and Chinese manners can cause interference with practitioners in forming and harmonizing one body. But recently, I understand that this was actually an arrangement by the old forces.
A practitioner recently rescued a very righteous practitioner from China. When I heard this story, I was very touched about how great they were. I had the opportunity to sit down and have a small conversation with them. We sat down and discussed some issues and shared our understanding of Fa. It was very peaceful and harmonious. I left asking myself, "Why they did not seem as great as I had created them to be in my mind after I heard their stories. They were just like all other practitioners. Why did I think they were so great?" Well it was because I was giving them credit for what they had accomplished when in fact it came from their steadfast belief in Master and Dafa. Then isn't this the power of Dafa? In fact, this point has been made clear to me many times in my own cultivation but now I could see that I treated many practitioners with sentimentality - thinking that they were great for this reason and that reason.
But what I really learned was that there must also be a corresponding relationship for the bad or unsacred things that we do. Master has said that the old forces have separated our cultivated side and our human side and this allows them to thoroughly make use of our human attachment to do things against Dafa. Yet in the past, I would get frustrated and angry at practitioners when they did not do things properly. Now I see that it was actually arranged by the old forces, and treating a good practitioner as someone special in my heart is negating the power of Dafa. Also, if I treat the bad actions of another practitioner with anger and frustration, then I am deceived by the old forces and can only interfere with the process of harmonizing our one body. This only gives the old forces more opportunity to create more interference.
Specifically, our Western and Chinese cultures were also arranged by the old forces and if we hold onto their manner and customs, then we will give many great and small opportunities for the old forces to interfere with our Dafa body. Generally, the old forces also arranged our human culture and sentimentality between Westerners and between Chinese the responsibility is not smaller.
I don't think that such an understanding should stop us from pointing out each other's shortcomings. It has helped me to see the more fundamental issues regarding harmonizing our Dafa body.
