PureInsight | October 24, 2019
[PureInsight.org] I read the notification, “Resolve Cultivation Issues Through Cultivation, Company Issues Through the Company”, from Minghui website recently. I have some thoughts to share with everyone.
One paragraph in the notification is written as “These tangible projects and companies involve money and property, as well as job positions and division of responsibilities; they have thus become a touchstone for many people. We have people who contribute selflessly, but also those who seek fame and gain. Some dedicate themselves to saving sentient beings, while others look on from the sidelines and make comments and judgments. While some persevere in overcoming obstacles and moving forward, we also have those who ride on others' coattails and only seek self-satisfaction”.
I have been working in sales and marketing for many years in our media. I started this job because this job allows me to participate in a Dafa project full time without worrying about time management.
After working for a while, I realized sales job is harder than other jobs, because salespersons’ performances will be evaluated by total sales while other media jobs normally don’t have such evaluations. Moreover, if you can’t generate enough sales, you will be asked to leave the position. Many practitioners came to work for a while and then left. Not many people could stay in this position for a long time.
But I managed to stay in sales and marketing and performed quite well. Therefore, I became complacent. It seemed that I did the most difficult truth clarification project, which is caused by my attachment to validate myself. I felt my job in sales can bring me a sense of achievements. I am not the only salesperson who felt in this way. My colleagues told me they had similar feelings too.
When my performance became better and better, I started to look down upon salespeople who didn’t do quite as well as me. I started to judge practitioners by their sales performances. I was so attached to fame and profits, because better performances mean more profits, and could win me praises. Back then, I liked to hang out with practitioners who shared similar viewpoints as me and didn’t want to talk to practitioners who disagreed with me, which is an attachment to Qing.
Because I did well in my job, I always felt lucky. I felt I found the best truth clarification project to do. Because I had been working in this field for a long time, I got some fixed clients. I didn’t have to make too much efforts to do my job. I was satisfied. I stayed in my comfort zone and developed certain viewpoints, preferences and attachments. More specifically, I only did whatever I wanted to do. I only associated with the people I liked. I also judged people.
However, my city faces a depression in many areas globally recently. I couldn’t perform as well as in the past. Even though it seemed like I had a lot of excuses, such as less markets for newspapers, different client-media relationships, and an increasing number of independent medias. I was as if facing an entirely new market. Clients I used to work with became like completely different people. I faced greater difficulties. In the past, I had difficulties too. However, all difficulties I had in the past were about clients. As long as I found the right method, I could overcome almost any difficulty. Nonetheless, this time I was facing a depressing market. All the methods I employed in the past became invalid. I felt greater and greater difficulties day by day. I felt less confident in myself. I had no motivation to try harder and restart everything all over again.
I felt embarrassed when reading “While some persevere in overcoming obstacles and moving forward, we also have those who ride on others' coattails and only seek self-satisfaction” from the Minghui notification. It’s indeed so. My previous stable client sources brought me attachments to fame and interests. I became self-satisfied. When the environment changed and I faced more obstacles, I didn’t want to persevere.
I have been working in sales and marketing for many years. I overcame a lot of obstacles. However, after I found my stable client sources, I stayed in my comfort zone and didn’t want to try anything new, neither did I want to overcome new obstacles. I became negative first when facing the depressing market. I complained and made excuses for myself. I blamed the depressed market, the Internet, and the management. I thought the management did a poor job, such as they were not creative enough and they overstated our products. However, this was all caused by my attachment to ease. I didn’t want to have any tribulations.
Master told us in The Closer to the End, the More Diligent You Should Be from The Essential Of Diligent Process Vol. III)., “Because human society is a place in which suffering goes hand-in-hand with enjoyment, life does abound with suffering, however wealthy you may be or however high your status. Because pain is hard on people, they try to, consciously or unconsciously, ward off suffering in hopes of leading a more pleasant life. And so it is that in the pursuit of happiness people form ideas about how to avoid harm, how to live well, how to get ahead in society and achieve fame and success, how to acquire more for themselves, how to come out on top, and so on. To this end, as they gain experience people come to form notions about life; and those experiences, in turn, come to fortify these notions as people live out their lives.”
Besides looking within, I also want to share some phenomena I observed in the media. Many phenomena were caused by the attachments that Master told us in different lectures: Some practitioners think like an ordinary people: they become complacent when they make some achievements. However, if they don’t do well, they feel jealous. Some are validating themselves instead of validating the Fa. Practitioners even compete among ourselves for resources. Some cooperate badly. Some complain about the management and don’t want to listen to the management. The management on the other hand doesn’t feel responsible for its employees and likes to assign works to new employees because they are easier to give instructions. Some communism cultures exist in media too. For instance, some people want fast results. Some care about their fame a lot. Some people overstate facts. Some people give up very quickly. Some people don’t trust each other and complain about each other. Some people are attached to truth clarification projects. Some people are attached to fame, self-interests and power. Some people form different groups. And some people have abnormal relationship with their opposite sex friends. I personally think the reason why so many problems exist is because some practitioners work in the media to enjoy themselves rather than help out.
Working in media can expose many attachments. Only by truly cultivating could we do well in media.
Let me end with Master’s teachings in A Heavy Blow, Essentials for further advancement, “There is no fame, self-interest, or official titles in Dafa, but only cultivation practice”.
If I said anything wrong above, please kindly correct me.
Chinese version: http://www.zhengjian.org/node/253455
