PureInsight | January 23, 2006
[PureInsight.org] The issue that has been coming up for me many times lately is whether I am coming from human thoughts or righteous thoughts. I believed I understood this concept earlier in my practice, but I find that I have much more to learn in this area. Therefore, I am getting another opportunity to upgrade my xinxing to still higher levels. While I have felt stuck for the last several months my husband is presenting great opportunities for xinxing improvement, which suggests to me that I am changing, or maturing if you will. Yet, since I still have huge room for improvement I commenced a closer look at how I might become more in line with Dafa.
The incident that set the whole thing off was at the end of a football game one Sunday. My husband was in a football pool where each person put in so much money and the one who picked the most winning teams took the entire pot. The team he had picked that week was losing and the game was almost over. He was throwing a fit and stomping around the house. I made the mistake of asking him at that point in time if he would run to the store to pick up an ingredient I was out of, for something I was cooking. He turned and started yelling at me and said, "You want this from the store when I just lost $X?! I couldn't care less about that!" He continued stomping around and yelling.
I immediately went into an old behavior pattern that I hadn't used for a long time. I turned and walked out of the room and picked up a book to read. He went outside and stomped around for a minute more and when he came back in, his team had scored another touchdown during the last minute of the game. This obviously changed his mood immediately. After he calmed down, he came back and asked me what it was I wanted. I said, "Nothing", as I was seriously judging his behavior! He got mad again and said, "No, we aren't going to play that game."
That stopped me and in a matter of seconds I thought, "He's right, this is totally inappropriate behavior for a Dafa practitioner, no matter what he is doing or how inappropriate I think his behavior is, so I immediately let it drop. And I really did let it all drop in that instant. I didn't have to think about it for five minutes first, it was just gone.
It seems like such an insignificant thing when I talk about it, but because of it, I saw that I really am improving. But also, I need to pay even more attention to when I am having incorrect thoughts in contention with righteous thoughts. He wasn't about to admit that his behavior might have been inappropriate, nor did he apologize. So of course, I had to turn around and look at all the places where my behavior is still totally inappropriate and out of line for a Dafa disciple.
Upgrading xinxing is a constant process within Dafa. I find that all my human thoughts are based in emotion and every emotion is some sort of attachment. I really fight with myself over some of my attachments. Thus, for many days it felt like an unending whirlpool that I might never climb out of, but with vigilant introspection to discern from what attachment certain thoughts arise, I will successfully step out of human thoughts and operate more and more in my daily life from Truth, Compassion and Forbearance.
Master says, "We should all speak according to a practitioner's xinxing rather than create conflicts or say something improper. As practitioners, we must measure ourselves with the standard of the Fa to determine whether we should say certain things. What should be said will not present a problem if one complies with the xinxing standard for practitioners according to the Fa" (From Zhuan Falun).
Master also says in Zhuan Falun, "The cultivation of speech that we teach refers to: that which involves one's reputation and personal gain that cannot be given up among everyday people, that which has nothing to do with the actual work of practitioners in society, the senseless gossiping among practitioners in the same school of practice, attachments that cause one to show off, hearsay or circulating rumors, or those discussions on some social issues that one is excited about. I hold that these are all attachments of everyday people. I think that in these areas we should watch what we say---that is the cultivation of speech we refer to."
It is my understanding that if I could hold myself to this standard of cultivation of speech in my every moment, then it follows that I wouldn't have such a struggle within myself with human versus righteous thoughts of which I lately encountered difficulty. As much as I feel that I have worked on this, I have to say that I am still guilty of doing all of these things at different times, so I am working to do even better in my cultivation of speech.
Master says in Zhuan Falun, "When it's difficult to endure, you can endure it. When it's impossible to do, you can do it." In fact, that is how it is."
