(Minghui.org) When I visited a practitioner who has been cultivating Falun Dafa for over 20 years, he told me that he had been taking medicine for several years. After some reflection on his situation, I will share my experiences and understanding on how to help practitioners who suffer with sickness karma. 

Dafa disciples are one body; so I should do my best to help other practitioners in distress. I was wondering what was the best way to help. 

After studying the Fa and thinking about it for a couple of weeks, I figured out a simple solution: Master's Dafa is the key to the problems. Dafa can help practitioners in distress find their gaps and fix them, establish righteous thoughts and firm faith in Master and the Fa, and get them back to their original pure state of cultivation.

Trapped in the Illusion of ‘Illness’

Five years ago, the toenails on both my feet turned gray. I rubbed medicines on the nails for two months, but nothing changed. Then, I tried a folk prescription, and the nails were cured within a week. However, there was a relapse a year later; so, I used the folk prescription again and in three days the toenails were better. A year after that, there was another relapse. At this time, I realized that the nail issue was not an “illness,” but was caused by karma or interference.

I said to my body: “Every cell, molecule, atom, and microscopic particle in my body are part of my life, and they have to follow my orders and instructions. Now, I want to eradicate all the evil factors and karmic falsehoods that interfere with my body, encompassing all the evil, and leaving out none.” I recited the phrase “The Fa rectifies the Cosmos, the Evil is completely eliminated.” After that, I sent righteous thoughts several times and the gray toenails recovered. This ailmentthat had plagued me for over two years has not recurred since then.

Help Practitioners Let Go of Attachments

Some practitioners suffered from illness karma for three years or even longer. After having the tribulation for a long time, they mostly don’t have sufficient righteous thoughts, and are prone to negative thoughts. Therefore, when other practitioners help them by sending righteous thoughts together, the effect was isn't ideal. The suffering practitioners need to let go of their attachments, which they may or may not be able to identify, so they can melt into the Fa.

We need to remember to be kind and patient with practitioners who are in the midst of a tribulation, and at a minimum, should not criticize, blame, demean, or ridicule them when we try to help. We should encourage them and praise their strengths in cultivation, so as to increase their courage and confidence in overcoming their difficulties. 

We need to sincerely and kindly let the practitioner recall when and how the “illness” began, and how they treated it. Ask them, if they said or did anything that didn’t conform to the principles of Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance before the tribulation began. If they identified the problem, ask them how they made up for their mistakes and resolved the issue. 

We must listen carefully, give timely encouragement for what they did well, and discuss what he needs to improve. 

Don't try to help in a pushy way. Remember to always be patient and compassionate. In reality, some people who tried to help the practitioners during tribulations criticized and accused them, which just increased their mental burden and even made them lose confidence in being able to break through the sickness karma, or even give up cultivation altogether. In this case, we didn’t live up to the expectation of the practitioners experiencing a tribulation, we were not true to ourselves, and even worse, we let Master Li down. At the same time, we created karma for ourselves. 

How can we improve our xinxing and upgrade our level if we accumulate new karma while trying to eliminate old karma?

Helping Practitioners Is Helping Ourselves

Helping practitioners is actually helping ourselves. I have to study the Fa and understand the Fa before I can choose one of Master's teachings that can trigger a practitioners' strong righteous thoughts and faith in the Fa.

We have two options when we are in a tribulation. The first one is to firmly believe in Master and the Fa, correct our thoughts and behavior based on Master's Fa, eliminate interference, let go of the human notion of life and death, move through the impasse using righteous thoughts, and eliminate the karma, to become a great divine being. 

The second option is to take medicine, get an injection, or have surgery, which presses the karma back into our microscopic body. When the karma recurs, it will be more painful, more serious, and may even take one’s life.

Master said, 

“Whatever you experience during your cultivation—whether good or bad—is good, for it comes about only because you are cultivating. A cultivator cannot achieve Consummation when laden with human thoughts, laden with karmic debts, or laden with attachments. ” (“To the Chicago Fa Conference” in The Essentials of Diligent Progress Vol. III)

We should treat bad things as good things; and regard sickness karma, all tribulations, interference and persecution by the old forces, and other bad things as opportunities to eliminate karma, become enlightened, and improve our xinxing. If karma is not exposed, we cannot see or eliminate it. Tribulations are a great opportunity for us to eliminate karma.

Search Inward and Look at Problems Based on Fa-Rectification

Look inward to see if you are still attached to sentimentality, desires, lust, and human notions. One accumulates karma whenever one has attachments, such as, fighting with others, losing one’s temper, jealousy, lust, resentment, not accepting criticism, selfishness, and being self-centered. Thus, one creates new karma before the old karma is eliminated. We should pay special attention to lust, which can cause anyone’s improvement to stall. 

Master said, 

“I'm going to tell you that no matter what kind of conflicts arise, or what kind of situations emerge, it's bound to be that we have gaps in ourselves. That's for sure. If there weren't a gap nobody could exploit it.” (“Teaching and Explaining the Fat at the Metropolitan New York Fa Conference”)

We should always first look for our own shortcomings and gaps whenever we encounter tribulations, illness karma, tests, or conflicts with others. We cannot find fault with or blame others for our problems.

Some practitioners may say, “I don’t know how to look inward.” My personal understanding is one looks to see if you have said or done something that violated the principles of the universe, Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance. To be more specific, you are looking for attachments to fame, profit, and affection or sentimentality. Only by letting go of all attachments can we improve.

Some practitioners, instead of trying to pass an obstacle, complain that Master didn't care about them. With this thought, they can be caught and dragged into Hell by the old forces because disrespecting Master and Dafa is the biggest excuse the old forces uses to drag the cultivator into Hell.

Master said, 

“Except for newer students, from July 20 of 1999 on, Master hasn't created any personal cultivation tests for you, and that's because overall your personal cultivation has changed in every respect so that it's in the direction of saving sentient beings and validating Dafa.” (“Explaining the Fa During the 2003 Lantern Festival at the U.S. West Fa Conference”)

We should look at problems based on Fa-rectification, and not blindly endure and eliminate karma on the basis of personal cultivation.

We have no choice, but to firmly do the three things well. We do what Master requires of us: We cultivate ourselves diligently, send righteous thoughts, and save sentient beings. We must seize the time to cultivate ourselves well and save more sentient beings.

Once we have cultivated well, the countless sentient beings, in macroscopic and microscopic celestial bodies, corresponding to our human bodies, will be saved. Isn't this saving sentient beings? It is extremely important to cultivate oneself well.

If we don't follow Master's requirements, not only will the sentient beings have nowhere to go, but we will be eliminated. Then, the countless sentient beings, who placed their hope in us, will also be eliminated. The consequences are terrifying.

Lastly, I sincerely hope that the practitioners who are going through illness karma will study the Fa well, send righteous thoughts more often, get through the tribulation as soon as possible, save more people, and follow Master to reach consummation.