Nothing Gets Buried

Before I fell asleep, I prayed to the Buddha to speak to me through a dream. I pray this often, and so the teachings also come to me often.

In my dream, I met a child who wreaked havoc in my life. She entered my house and began vandalizing my belongings. She played with my shoes, losing one and leaving the other unusable. She opened a toy I had set aside as a gift; the box was broken to pieces and the doll inside sat on the floor looking distressed. Then she destroyed an advanced calculator and an electronic dictionary by yanking the cover off each one. All I saw was mess.

I did not avoid the anger rising in me. I was instructed to notice it fully. And then I was told to do something I did not expect: ask for what was mine.

Write down what she owes you, the Buddha said. Give the list to her parents. Ask to be paid for the damages.

I asked why. Aren’t I supposed to forgive, especially when the one who caused harm is a child? I thought I should forgive seventy times seven, as it is written.

To my surprise, the Buddha said:

Anger must be felt. It has to be allowed by oneself. This is why you are human. You are not only spirit; you are flesh and sensation, and sensation is sacred. To be alive in a body is to feel what passes through it, including what is difficult and sharp.

Anger is a tool to know oneself, and by effect, to know others. Do not bury it. Clear your body, which is your temple, as you would sweep the floor. What is not cleared leaves a mark, and that mark is carried forward. Unresolved wrongdoings do not disappear. They become contracts deferred to another life, where they must still be learned, still be felt, still be resolved. If you can right the wrong now, you spare yourself that return.

This is not about punishment. It is not retaliation. It is the correction of what is wrong. Ask for what is yours so that nothing remains unclaimed in your body or in your mind. When you acknowledge the harm clearly, when you name what is owed and ask for it without shame, you allow the emotion to move through you completely. This is clear seeing. The sensation arises, is witnessed without judgment, and is released. Nothing gets buried.

This teaching is an advanced path for those who can hold the distinction between feeling fully and acting from reaction, between correction and cruelty. The goal is not to punish but to become free.

After doing what the Buddha suggested, I noticed I felt free. There was no trace of anger. I even forgot what I had been angry about.

When I awoke, the anger was fully dissolved. There was no residue in my consciousness. My soul felt completely light, as if nothing had ever happened.

My conditioning, through my parents and later the church, was to absorb suffering and always forgive, forgetting my own needs. I understand now that by denying my own truth, resentment is buried deep inside and carried forward into the rest of life. The teaching was not against forgiveness. It was against suppression disguised as forgiveness. True forgiveness can only follow true feeling. First the floor must be swept.

“Be light as a feather. Become enLIGHTened.”

– Buddha