Is It Possible?

"I came to the dharma in the midst of a lot of personal suffering. It seemed that everything in my life and in the world around me was falling apart. It was the early nineties. The country was in a financial crisis. There were wars and rumors of wars all over the world, and I had just found out that I had failed the bar exam for the second time. I was a single mother of two children, unemployed, and near bankrupt.

I remember sitting in a bookstore, a place where I would go to just get away, not really to buy anything but just to sit there and read through the books. I could sit in that bookstore and read for hours. And on this particular day I remember sitting reading through books in the religious section, and I started reading some books on Buddhism. The words seemed to jump off the page at me. It seemed that everything that was being said pointed to someone just like me, pointed to someone whose life and circumstances were just like mine.

So a question came to me that day, and I’ve been practicing with that question my entire life: is it possible to be truly happy, to have a sense of safety and deep joy in the midst of difficulty, problems, pain, and suffering?

I offer this for your reflection:

There are many ways that I have hurt and harmed myself.
I have betrayed myself, knowingly and unknowingly, in thoughts, words, and deeds. For the many ways my fear, pain, anger and confusion has caused me harm,
I now extend a full and heartfelt forgiveness.   
I forgive myself. 

Just as I have caused harm to myself, there are many ways that I have hurt and harmed others. I may have, knowingly and unknowingly caused them harm by my thoughts, words, and deeds. If out of my fear, pain, anger and confusion, I have caused you any harm, To the extent that you’re ready,
I ask for your forgiveness.   
Please forgive me.

There are also many ways that I have been hurt and harmed by others.
I may have been harmed, knowingly and unknowingly, by another’s thought, words, and deeds. I remember the ways others, out of their fear, pain, anger and confusion, have harmed me.  I believe I have carried this pain in my heart long enough.  To the extent that I am ready,
I offer my heartfelt forgiveness to all those who have caused me harm.
I forgive you.

I bow."

~ Tuere Sala is a retired prosecuting attorney who has practiced Vipassana meditation for over 25 years.  In 2009, she was appointed to be a Local Dharma Leader and has often supported Seattle Insight Meditation Society in unconventional ways such as answering the many letters SIMS receives from practitioners in prison; offering beginning classes at Angeline Women’s shelter and Jubilee House, a women’s transitional house; and facilitating workshops using nonviolent communication (NVC) to support a mindfulness practice.

Tuere believes that urban meditation is the foundation for today’s practitioner’s path to liberation.  She is inspired by bringing the Dharma to nontraditional places and is a strong advocate for practitioners living with high stress, past trauma and difficulties sitting still.