Remember, Forget, Repeat. Why — The Great Oscillation

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit tigmonk.substack.comThe forgiveness you are looking for is already there — because the wrongness you think happened never actually occurred.This is a clip taken from a recent live video broadcast where we explored the “great oscillation” between remembering and forgetting, and why true forgiveness has nothing to do with pardoning a wrongdoing. Here in Substack, we will write it out and explore it in a bit more depth.The Great OscillationThere is the appearance of a great oscillation — the appearance of remembering and forgetting the truth of your spiritual nature. We could call this the great oscillation of the ocean’s low tide and high tide, or of daytime and nighttime. In everything, there is the appearance of this great oscillation.However, it is not really an oscillation between this and that. It is an oscillation within itself that is required.The oscillation between daytime and nighttime is not going back and forth between two separate things. It is one thing. The high tide and the low tide are not different versions of the ocean. It is one ocean.Likewise, the great remembering or the great forgetting — it is not really this or that. It is one breath in and out, and it is required.It is not the oscillation that is so much the problem. It is wanting what is not that presents the problem.Oh my goodness, how long the winter lasts when you so desperately want it to be summer. Only to find out yet again the summer returns. The sun rises once more, and here comes the high tide.Such a beautiful invitation to relax. Let it be what it is and trust the process. If I remember, I am supposed to remember. If I forgot, I am supposed to forget.The Invitation of ForgivenessI don’t know if you recognize this, but this is also a great invitation of forgiveness. It is not a forgiveness because you did it wrong. It is a forgiveness that recognizes there is actually nothing to forgive here. Nothing went wrong.It is so deep. It is so deep and it is so true.There is this infinite sea of forgiveness immediately available. Fully present in every day, there before the sun even rises. And it is not even a forgiveness in advance that says, “Hey look, I know you’re going to mess up.” It is a forgiveness that says there is no such thing.The Wrongness That Never HappenedIn a greater context, sure, you can attempt to do a math problem and get the wrong answer. So in that context, there is to get a wrong answer. There is to attempt to do something and experience what we might call failure. So in that context, there is to get it wrong.But in the raw nature of these contexts, that is not what brings about suffering.What I’m saying is that the wrongness that inspires suffering is not really a wrongness. That wrongness never actually happened.Because the wrongness that inspires suffering is always a wrongness that comes with an assumption of a guilt that withholds love. A wrongness that says you are less than. A wrongness that says you are unworthy.You can find this flavor of wrongness in the wrongness of an answer to trying to solve a math problem, or in the wrongness of failing at an adventure. But the wrongness that breeds suffering is a wrongness that isn’t really there.In the appearance of not getting the anticipated or desired outcome, it is simply a learning opportunity. It doesn’t say anything about your worth and value.Furthermore, the forgiveness is forgiving the impossible wrongness that leads to being less than or unlovable. Which is why that forgiveness is there before it even happens — because there is nothing that can happen that ultimately means you are unlovable. The one thing that makes you suffer.Forgiveness and the Innocent MisunderstandingIt is like seeing somebody who steals a bunch of money from me. And I say that you are already forgiven, because the thing that I would be trying to forgive is some sort of upside-down world where you have the power to make me feel unlovable.So you did something that made me suffer, which is to have an emotional disturbance to my perception that says this means I’m unloved, unworthy, not enough. And that didn’t really happen. So therefore you are forgiven.Do you see this? The opposite of forgiveness is to withhold a love that essentially says, “I do not love you because you’re making me feel unloved.” Which is an innocent misunderstanding.Isn’t that wild?In this, because it is an innocent misunderstanding, the whole world is forgiven. Instantly.Now does that mean people are not going about a way of living that might be out of alignment with the way of things? Ultimately bumping into life and hurting themselves? There is plenty of that going on. But it is automatically forgiven because the judgment and guilt that is perceived to go with it isn’t really there.Learning Without JudgmentIt is fascinating that when we remove the judgment and guilt — which is to be forgiven — how much more effective the learning experience becomes.Likewise, as we were talking about earlier, the great oscillation between remembering and forgetting: how much more do you learn in your forgetting when you are not judging yourself about forgetting?That is wild.IntegrationLet’s get practical about how to live this in the everyday chaos of your life.