A Children’s Parable
By Neale Donald Walsch
(Two souls are eternal friends in the premortal realm – Friendly Soul and Little Soul. Little Soul expresses his desire to be One Who Forgives, but there is nothing in Heaven to forgive.)
“But just then Friendly Soul stepped forward and said, “Not to worry, Little Soul. I will help you.”
“You will?” the Little Soul brightened. “But what can you do?”
“Why, I can give you someone to forgive!”
“You can?”
“Certainly!” chirped the Friendly Soul. “I can come into your life on earth and do something for you to forgive.”
“But why? Why would you do that?” the Little Soul asked. “You, who are a Being of such utter perfection! You, who vibrate with such a speed that it creates a Light so bright that I can hardly gaze upon you! What could cause you to want to slow down your vibration to such a speed that your bright Light would become dark and dense? What could cause you-who are so light that you dance upon the stars and move throughout the Kingdom with the speed of your thought-to come into my life and make yourself so heavy that you could do this bad thing?”
“Simple,” the Friendly Soul said. “I would do it because I love you…I will come into your life on earth and be the ‘bad one’. I will do something really terrible, and then you can experience yourself as the One Who Forgives.”
“But what will you do?” the Little Soul asked, just a little nervously, “that will be so terrible?”
“Oh,” replied the Friendly Soul with a twinkle, “we’ll think of something.”
Then the Friendly Soul seemed to turn serious, and said in a quiet voice, “You are right about one thing, you know.”
“What is that?” the Little Soul wanted to know.
“I will have to slow down my vibration and become very heavy to do this not-so-nice thing. I will have to pretend to be something very unlike myself. And so, I have but one favor to ask of you in return.”
“Oh , anything , anything!” cried the Little Soul, and began to dance and sing, “I get to be forgiving, I get to be forgiving!” Then the Little Soul saw that the Friendly Soul was remaining very quiet.
“What is it?” the Little Soul asked. “What can I do for you? You are such an angel to be willing to do this for me!”
“In the moment that I strike you and smite you,” the Friendly Soul replied, “in the moment that I do the worst to you that you could possibly imagine-in that very moment…”
“Yes?” the Little Soul interrupted, “yes…?”
“REMEMBER WHO I REALLY AM.”
“Oh , I will!” cried the Little Soul , “I promise! I will always remember you as I see you right here, right now!”
“Good,” said the Friendly Soul, “because, you see, I will have been pretending so hard, I will have forgotten myself. And if you do not remember for a very long time, and if I forget Who I Am, you may even forget Who You Are, and we will both be lost.”
“No, we won’t!” the Little Soul promised again. “I will remember you! And I will thank you for bringing me this gift-the chance to experience myself as Who I Am.”
