FORGETTING - REMEMBERING

There is a time when North forgets about South and then remembers all the horizon.

And it seems like South does the same, forgets direction just to reunite again.

Does the East gaze toward the West to feel complete, or out of fear that it might forget?

And so the legend says that when West turns its back inward, the journey of all four centers of reference chooses surrender in REMEMBERING.

NORTH - Remembering

The compass of our fabric. The call to our calling. The answer to our question, but being in the question.

The poison and the medicine. THE GRIEF.

Every broken heart that remains open...

EAST - Birth into Forgetting

The place where the Sun rises and every life begins. Birth doesn't enter life alone. It is sustained by death. Every time we forget, it feels like death. Because something else has to be reborn again to remember. Forgetting is the greatest gift of impermanence, of imperfection.

SOUTH - Living the human narrative - the Personal.

Relationship - the core of the Universe.

Love.

Loss.

Fear.

Resistance.

We are IMPERFECT (foolish) human beings who are HERE to HEAL.

HEALING is the only 'destiny' we have.

WEST - Surrender to WHAT IS.

The setting sun.

Death as a doorway to where remembrance pervades.

HOMECOMING.

REUNION.

INTEGRATION.

And then the compass turns again. Infinitely...

In a shorter version,

NORTH - Silence

It reminds.

EAST - Innocence

It forgets.

SOUTH - Experience

It gathers stories.

WEST - No making

'What is, is all that is.'

The four directions are happening separately and also all at the same time, in every NOW. They don't direct us to a destination; they simply orient us in order to explore indefinitely.

Forgetting is not failure; it is not a mistake in our human condition. Maybe it is the generosity of Being, allowing existence to unfold endlessly.

It is the great partner of remembering that whispers to us, "It's not your fault. You are an imperfect human being!" Remembering is not finding a better map. It is trusting the direction, no matter which one is next. Maybe all at the same time; and that is what we call a "wave of life." We learn to swim in the middle of storms and winds; we forget first, and we remember...

Within every element of Creation - from the greatest piece to the miraculous tiniest atom - there are two forces that come together in the greatest dance toward COMPLETION. Wholeness, Existence, and Being are possible because of the CO-ARISING of these TWO forces that the imperfect mind can misinterpret or limit in their significance as opposites, strictly in opposition, with no opportunity to cooperate and support this Journey.

Following this idea is neither wrong nor something to be judged. It is simply somewhat incomplete. It forces the individual to live in a constant struggle of choosing between one pole and the other, becoming far more concerned with making the 'right' choice to avoid being guilty of its consequences than with fully experiencing life itself. And so, the human being becomes "pre-occupied", entertained by fear of, 'What if I am not choosing correctly?', focused on results and (self)judgment within every action or experience. And, in this battle, life is never enough. It gets better when it is more; when it is always more. Then come the ladder, the hierarchy, the 'better me', the 'better me than the others', the 'me' versus 'anything else that's not me and that's not doing things my way', and so on. The Journey becomes a marathon. LIFE RESUMES AS RUNNING, instead of LIVING.

We begin unlearning all this repetitive, methodical, habitual life—funny enough, but without much real life in it—when we stop walking from forgetting toward remembering in order to reach a rewarding destination.

I am not suggesting that seeing these opposites as allies in our Journey will diminish the human experience of forgetting—the suffering, the confusion, the searching—but making remembering the final achievement also doesn't elevate your living.

When both are met as they are, which is MOVEMENT within the same Wholeness, experience is chosen from a place that trusts life. That chooses navigating into the ocean even when the shore cannot be seen.

In our forgetfulness, we often adhere to the idea that healing is 'remembering who we are', rarely honoring the role of forgetting as well. We realize, in a process of healing, that without forgetting there would be no curiosity, no openness to learning, no humility, and no compassion born from that narrative.

Healing is not reaching a state where we never forget again. We all forget, always. It's very easy to enter into this confusion nowadays. The culture of self-development, as in becoming someone or something else, as in forgetting your past self/story, brings this insatiable desire to the table, where the individual wants to forget in order to be reborn again. At this specific moment, the person who chooses healing perceives forgetting as a cause of remembering. We all do it, at least once in this life. Actually, the psychological motivation to understand my story and "solve" or "remove" what I don't like about myself is actually the first stage of choosing remembering. And, as 'newborns' on the healing path, we need this ephemeral motivation. But we come to understand that this is just the margin of the ocean. The water is deep and unlimited.

And so, our first delusion is met when we realize that healing is not a straight line of cause and effect, but more like a respiratory waveform:

_____ forgetting. remembering. forgetting. remembering. forgetting. remembering.....

_____ inhale. exhale. inhale. exhale. inhale. exhale....

They are the inhale and exhale of consciousness meeting itself through a human life.

Healing happens where these two truths are allowed to coexist because awareness pervades both forgetting and remembering.

In our trustworthy path of healing, the helpers we meet on our way become our reminders. No teacher heals us. No book heals us. They are reminders. They point us back toward something we already carry. Eventually, the reminders no longer come from outside only. Eventually, life itself becomes the reminder.

In my activity of sharing this path, I often receive questions such as: "Which practices help remembering arise naturally?" Before I answer, I stay with the question, and then I dare to say, "Can you stay with this question and see which part of yourself is the urgent one who wants to get it done?"

This silence... this 'being with this exact question' is exactly MEETING FORGETTING and the CO-ARISING of its loyal partner - REMEMBERING.

Inhaling. Exhaling. Breaking the silence.

A process of healing is supported at every moment you breathe by PRACTICE.

The choice to PRACTICE IS YOURS. Jason Shulman said it beautifully in his masterpiece,

'The Instruction Manual for Receiving God': "Practice is you. You are practice!"

But the place you are choosing the practice from is under your authority. Because in choosing meditation, nature, music, beauty, art, soulful sharing, gratitude, breathwork, rest, service, and so on, from a place of freedom and without naming, each of them becomes less a technique or a bypass and more AN INVITATION, where words cannot describe TOTALITY.

Dear you,

Please remember,

Healing is not the disappearance of forgetting. Healing is the INTIMACY with both FORGETTING and REMEMBERING. Because nothing is outside Wholeness....