(Minghui.org) Jealousy manifests in many ways, and one way is not being able to take it when others seem to be doing better. Someone with this attachment constantly compares themselves to others, including other practitioners.
Jealousy can also lead to being competitive by showing off or an attachment to one's reputation. If practitioners don't eliminate jealousy, they will not only be unable to meet the standard for cultivation but may also fail to succeed in cultivation. At the same time, it may cause many complications and problems in coordination, which can affect the practitioner's ability to validate Dafa.
How is jealousy formed? My personal understanding is that we all came from different origins. In the process of birth, death, and reincarnation as they descended here, people became further entangled in the maze. Caught up in seeking power, fame, and comfort, human beings have done many wrong things and thus accumulated a lot of karma.
Throughout our various lifetimes, we've also developed many deeply rooted attachments, such as selfishness, competitiveness and other human notions. The layers of karma, emotion and notions are not our true selves, and they have buried our innate divinity. In this lifetime, we regard many concepts and attachments formed over eons as our own thoughts.
At the same time, the old forces have their own agenda: to destroy humans. In order to block people from learning about or practicing Falun Dafa, they arranged for communism, which hates humanity, to control the entire world. In the West, the concept of atheism was introduced.
In China, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) publicly denies the existence of gods or the divine and advocates atheism. The CCP has actively destroyed China's traditional culture and promotes absolute egalitarianism, which pits people against each other and causes them to become jealous. This is one reason why Chinese people have such strong jealousy.
As practitioners, we cannot remain lost in the maze or go along with the old forces' arrangements. We must remember why we are here and fulfill our prehistoric vows.
From Master's teachings, we know that jealousy is not part of our true selves; rather, it is generated by notions and karma. If we regard these negative notions as our nature, then we may be buried by them. These attachments and notions are exactly what we need to get rid of through cultivation.
How can we completely eliminate jealousy?
We must steadfastly believe in and respect Master and Dafa. We cannot partially accept what Master asks of us, such as letting go of our notions and attachments. If we refuse to proactively do as he asks, it's an issue of fundamentally believing in Master and Dafa.
My personal understanding is that our cultivation strengthens our righteous belief in Master. If our thoughts are pure and sincere, we'll be able to study the Fa solidly, and then we'll be able to truly examine ourselves when challenges surface.
If a practitioner doesn't truly accept Master and Dafa, he may not pass tests arranged to eliminate attachments, including jealousy. Master has boundless compassion, and if we truly believe, we can enlighten to principles at different levels.
We all came to this human world with a common goal. We come to obtain the Fa, cultivate and assist Master during the Fa-rectification, and save people. We cannot fail during this last step, getting entangled and misled by jealousy or other attachments.
Human notions are not part of our innate nature, so we should recognize and reject them. As long as we have a strong wish to eliminate them, Master will help us.