(Minghui.org) Although I live in a town, I often visit our house in the countryside. Across the street from that house was a neighbor who gave us a lot of trouble. Between our houses there was a five-meter-wide road with busy traffic.
One of the neighbors in the countryside called me in August 2016, and asked me to go there immediately, but he did not explain clearly what had happened.
When my husband and I arrived at our house the next day, we were not able to drive into our yard. The neighbor across the street had extended their yard an additional meter into the road, and a pile of dirt outside their yard wall extended another half a meter onto the road. The road was therefore much narrower, and the traffic almost scraped the wall of my front yard to pass by. A deep ditch formed as a result, with the water accumulating there when it rained. Pedestrians had to walk through the water to get past.
Seeing this, all the previous things the neighbor had done came to mind:
When we started to build the house, we had two truckloads of stone delivered to the front yard. That neighbor took some of the stones while we were not there, and built their own yard wall with them. They didn't ask us if they could use them, nor did they offer to pay us for them. I am a Falun Dafa practitioner, and restrained myself from fighting with them. I didn't say a word about it, and just bought more stones when the work started.
That wasn’t the only time they took some of our property. The road in front of our house used to be uneven and bumpy. Drivers of dump trucks were not willing to travel on it. We had to ask many truck drivers before one of them finally agreed to deliver us some dirt.
We then hired some people to re-build the road. A week later, when we returned home from the town, we were surprised to see that the neighbor had moved all of the dirt, and used it to build their own yard. I was furious. I wanted to smash down their door and have a fight with them. But a Dafa practitioner should not behave like that, so I held back my anger.
Another time, there was a large plum tree in my yard. When I went home one night in autumn, I saw a long ladder on the wall of our house. When I opened the gate, I saw my neighbor with a large basket picking the plums. I was very surprised, but he nonetheless stayed calm. He jumped out of the tree and simply went home with his full basket of plums. There wasn't a ripe plum left on the tree. He took them all.
I wanted to get the plums back from him, but a Dafa practitioner shouldn't argue, so I simply bought some plums from the grocery store.
This neighbor was always bullying us and was very selfish. And what they did this time was just not acceptable. All the other neighbors came and spoke badly about the neighbor across the road. They said that we were too easy on him and that the roadway in front of our house was now too narrow. They encouraged my husband to sort out the neighbor.
My husband couldn't put up with the neighbor any longer. He wanted to go over to talk to them openly about what they have done to us again and again. I was also angry with them. They were too unreasonable. I really wanted to pull down their yard wall.
The neighbor, however, didn't open their door, no matter who went to talk to them. Some neighbors became so angry that they took their picks, waiting for our order to pull down their wall.
Everybody was very angry, but I knew that I should calm myself down.
Master said in Zhuan Falun:
“Our school of practice directly targets one’s mind. The key issue is whether you can take lightly and care less about the issues of individual gain and interpersonal conflicts.”
I persuaded all the neighbors to go home, and I pushed my husband back into our house. He was about to explode. I asked him to sit, and tried to calm him down. I guided him with Master's Fa about loss and gain. Gradually, he was able to let it go.
He brought three trucks of dirt the next day, and with the other neighbors' help, we took down our front wall and re-built it one meter inside our yard. Though we spent a lot of time, effort, and money in building the road and the wall, we listened to Master and did not mess around with the dishonest neighbor.
We had no hatred towards them, as they helped us to improve in our cultivation. I thanked them from the bottom of my heart.
One day the neighbor came to see us. Though they did not apologize for what they had done, they said that they would like to give us the money for 200 pounds of corn they took from us. In order not to embarrass them, I told them that we were giving it to them for free. They were very happy and stayed at our home for a while to chat.
I thank Master and Dafa in my heart for changing me into a person with a much bigger heart.
Category: Improving Oneself
