A Lesson Learned from Being Attached to Sentimentality to My Family

My father passed away when I was little, and my mother struggled to support our family. Because of his poor financial situation, my brother hasn't got married yet and I have always worried about this.

After I started to practice Dafa, Master re-arranged my life, so my economic condition kept getting better and better. I wanted to help my brother get out of poverty and get married quickly, fulfilling my wish.

I began to send money home without letting my husband know about it. My sister, also a Dafa practitioner, pointed out to me that I wasn't conforming to the Fa and that the money I sent home would cause misfortunes to our family. I didn't take her words seriously and even accused her of being selfish. How could she stop me from sending money home while she didn't care about our family! I sent home about fifty thousand yuan periodically throughout the last four years.

Not very long ago, I finally persuaded my husband that we could afford to provide my brother with thirty thousand yuan so he could buy a house. I went home with the money, full of joy. However, when I asked my brother to buy a house with the money I had sent earlier, together with the money I had brought this time, he told me that the money was gone. After I questioned him repeatedly, he finally told me that he had been fooling around these past four years and had squandered all the money. This was like a thunderbolt to me. How many sentient beings could have been saved with the truth clarification materials that could have been created with that fifty thousand yuan! Not to mention that the money corrupted an originally good person! Master, I have done something terribly wrong, I am to blame!

I recalled Master's words:
"Someone may say, 'I'll earn some more money to settle my family down well so I won't have to worry about anything. Afterwards, I'll practice cultivation.' I would say that this is your wishful thinking. You are unable to interfere with the lives of others, and neither can you control others' fates, including those of your wife, sons, daughters, parents, or brothers. Can you decide those things? Furthermore, how will you practice cultivation if you do not have any worries or troubles? How can you do the exercises comfortably and restfully? How can there be such a thing? That is what you think, from the perspective of everyday people." (Lecture Four, Zhuan Falun, 2000 translation version)

"Actually, everyone has his own fate, and no one can decide others' fates. Some people say, 'I just want to have my offspring live well.' If your offspring don't have blessings, no matter how much good fortune you may leave them, they will squander it all, or it will go up in flames, be lost, or stolen." ("Teaching the Fa at the Conference in Houston," 1996)
"Everyone has his own fate and no one can change the fate of others, even if those people are your children. You think you want him to have such-and-such future. I'm telling you that if you left him billions of dollars worth of inheritance, but that good fortune was not his to have, it would somehow be incinerated, or he would quickly and extravagantly spend it all. He has to have the good fortune to inherit the money." ("Teaching the Fa at the Conference in Canada," 1999)

"...and everything in the entire human society comes from this sentimentality. If this sentimentality is not relinquished, you will be unable to practice cultivation. If you are free from this sentimentality, nobody can affect you. An everyday person's mind will be unable to sway you. What takes over in its place is benevolence, which is something more noble." (Lecture Four, Zhuan Falun)

I regret being attached to sentimentality; I blindly disregarded Master's teachings. I didn't awaken until I finally ran into bumps and bruises. I initially did not intend to write an experience sharing article, however, the night before last, I had a dream that Master was teaching me how to write articles. Then I enlightened that I should write this out to remind fellow practitioners in similar situations: "Let go of sentimentality and remove the attachment." During this last, short period of the Fa-rectification, our resources, except our living expenses, should be used to do things for Dafa, to save sentient beings and to fulfil our divine mission successfully.