Kiki’s Big Dream Experiment - Week 12 - Forgiveness
Week 12 of Kiki’s Big Dream Experiment
Hey Dreamer,
My final week of Kiki’s Big Dream Experiment!
It’s so hard to believe it’s here. It’s funny both how slow and how fast 90 days goes by!
This week’s theme of Forgiveness has been especially important to me because I’ve realised that our ability to forgive is how we know we can close out a story. When you think of all the success in your life, you recognize how easy it is to forgive yourself for the late nights of hard work that it took to get there. It was all worth it in the end. Yes, it is worth it in the end!
That’s an easy story to tell when you are successful in your endeavours. But what about when you are not successful? We fall into the traps of telling ourselves we should have done this, we should have done that. If only I tried harder! Most of the time, all of these musts and shoulds are outside of your control in some way. This is why forgiveness is especially important. Maybe you flew too close to the sun, or your dream was too big for you to hold right now. Those experiences are not failures - they are data. That data is part of your story, and the story should reach a conclusion that has you showing forgiveness for your past.
I found myself with tunnel vision this week. Tunnel vision to get to the end of Kiki’s Big Dream Experiment so that I could finally rest. It has been an action-packed experience with very little time to rest in a way that felt revitalising. It is only with hindsight that I can see that - and that is one of the things I want to forgive myself for - pushing too hard.
It is with a loving heart that I can look back on this experience and say that it was beyond my wildest dreams. I am still trying to find words to explain what this experiment has meant for me, but I’ll try.
I found who I was as I stumbled through the darkness with a vague map of the journey ahead. I felt so validated in my choices each week because every theme that showed up brought about a marked change in my attitude towards myself. I am saddened not to have explored 10 of the Major Arcana cards, only because I can now see how much depth came with each of the 12 I did explore. I look forward to exploring the rest in my next experiment.
For the last time, here are the links to my content pieces for Week 12. Please note that some of these were posted after Kiki’s Big Dream Experiment officially ended on Day 90 - the Christmas and New Year period heavily influenced my ability to post online. But that’s all part of the process, because none of this is meant to repurpose the flow of life - it is all meant to be in flow with life.
Mon · 22nd Dec:
Podcast Episode on Spotify - Episode 12 - Forgiveness - The final episode of this series of my podcast, where I talk about the theme of Forgiveness
Sat · 27th Dec:
Newsletter on LinkedIn - Your Power in Forgiveness · December 27th, 2025 - Sharing the power behind Forgiveness and how you can harness it for your own good
Sun · 28th Dec:
Post on Substack - Forgiveness is a Healing Act - This week’s piece discusses the healing power of Forgiveness
Blog on my Website - Kiki’s Big Dream Experiment - Week 12 - Forgiveness - My wrap-up post for the week
Tues · 30th Dec:
Live on TikTok - KBDE #12 - Forgiveness - A personal and interactive discussion of the topic of Forgiveness
Video on YouTube - Kiki's Big Dream Experiment - TikTok Live - Episode 12 - Forgiveness - A recording of my TikTok Live on the theme of Forgiveness
Wed · 31st Dec:
Stream on Twitch - KBDE 💥 Borderlands 4 - Part 12 - Week 12’s Borderlands 4 stream, which included some discussion of the weekly theme alongside gameplay
Video on YouTube - KBDE 💥 Borderlands 4 - Part 12 - A recording of my Twitch livestream of Borderlands 4
Board on Pinterest - KBDE - Week 12 - Forgiveness - A collection of pins linked to my content for Week 12
Fri · 2nd Jan:
Post on Instagram - A Forgiving Connection - This final poem encompasses the lessons of Kiki’s Big Dream Experiment
My 9th content piece is my Site on Notion, where I share the story of Kiki Dreams Big and Kiki’s Big Dream Experiment. This site is a place I am carrying forward with me into the New Year to continue working on my 3 Big Dreams: Dream Book, Dream Business, and Dream Self.
Reflection on Week 12
Internal
Your capacity for forgiveness is a sensitivity gauge for your capacity to interact with other people. Crucially, this also includes yourself! Being willing to work towards forgiveness tells you that you value the connections you have made. The boundaries you create for yourself are akin to your spiritual home. Welcoming people in means becoming vulnerable in some way, and so when someone takes advantage of that and hurts you, it can be destabilising. I have been exploring those old relationships that still stick with me, and it has been a struggle to even find safety when thinking about some of those people.
You have two choices - stand up for your boundaries and express that they have been trespassed upon, or walk away. You make this call - but you also must accept the consequences of that call. Not every person who trespasses is intentionally trying to hurt you, in which case this is an opportunity to mend a fractured connection. Your propensity to forgive this infraction guides you like a compass - it shows where North is, but you decide if you want to get to North.
When you walk away, you close those doors. Sometimes that is the right call, other times it is a reactionary call. You may not always be able to make the right decision, but this is why forgiving yourself for those moments of misjudgement is a powerful act of self-healing. Once you can forgive yourself for the mistakes you’ve made - even if they were right at one point in time - you can begin to mend the fractured connections with others.
External
In society right now, forgiveness is weaponised by those who wish to control. Forced forgiveness is not true forgiveness, yet the systems we operate in may treat it as such. Do not let others dictate when or how you offer forgiveness. It is your choice to offer it at all! Our free will is all we really have - don’t let others dictate that power for you.
When forgiveness is being weaponised in some way, that means that control is being sought. Often, we seek forgiveness so we can repair a damaged relationship, and we believe that forgiveness must be achieved in order to continue a relationship. That is not true. A relationship can be maintained in a new form without forgiveness for a specified action.
Our relationships with other people change all the time. That means they can grow, but it also means they can regress. There is no rulebook - and be damned any person who says there is!
At the end of the day - it is your choice when to forgive. Just keep in mind that in any case, you should always strive to forgive yourself so that grudges do not linger.
Creative
How can you learn how to forgive yourself? Unfortunately, it comes down to your own relationship with yourself. But here is my top tip for helping you find your way.
Open a dialogue with yourself - perhaps you speak to yourself in a mirror, write a letter, or just write your free-flowing thoughts. Find a way to make your inner voice come out into the world in some way. Find the parts of you that you are afraid of, ashamed of, scared of, or even worried about. Those shadows are the parts that require the healing power of forgiveness.
What is the story you are trying to mend? Now that you are beyond that story of the past, what do you need to hear or feel in order to return to safety and love with yourself? Walk towards empathy. Understanding your position in the story is your first step, so that you can mark out your growth and make promises to yourself on how to be a better version of yourself. There is nothing wrong with your past actions - but the fact that you feel out of alignment means that you feel there was something wrong with those actions.
You can very simply begin with, “I forgive you for behaving the way you did - I know you were acting out of fear for your safety” - see how that softens your body. Explore that feeling more, and over time, you can start to make minute adjustments to the closure of the story. You will find that you are learning how you behave automatically, and becoming aware of your patterns of behaviour that misalign with the person you want to be.
Forgiveness will teach you how to correct those patterns. Just remember - you are correcting them because you want to, because you choose to move forward with alignment to your best self.
Takeaways from Week 12
My takeaways for Week 12 are as follows:
Forgiveness is for you, not the person you are forgiving: It is how you find closure because you come to a place where you can let go of the anger and hurt in a way that nurtures your future. Forgiving others is how you know you’ve healed your trespassed boundaries. Forgiving yourself is how you know you’ve healed your past self.
Forgiving yourself is how to grow: Learning from your mistakes includes every mistake. Even the ones you don’t think were mistakes at the time. What was once the right decision may reveal itself as a poor decision. We can only do the best we can with the information that we have. When we learn more about the world, we can change our behaviour and acknowledge that growth as a good thing.
We learn lessons at the right time: The theme of forgiveness showed up for me when I needed it to. I am still learning from my past themes all the time, but the bulk of the learning came during the week my theme showed up. Take the signs from the universe as your learning opportunities. The universe operates in cycles, so the lessons will come back again and again until you learn them.
Perfection is an illusion: We can strive for perfection. We can share perfect stories. But we should never forget that life is imperfect. When you learn to go with the flow of life and embrace imperfection, life becomes so much easier. You are one person operating in a vast machine of cosmic magnitude you cannot even imagine - how do you expect to behave perfectly in a world with no rulebook?
Endings are important: I am saddened to see the end of Kiki’s Big Dream Experiment finally come. It feels like such a big part of my life is now ending. It has been a massive part of my life, but I can see that its ending gives way to new beginnings. Everything comes to an end eventually — endings are not to be feared.
Introducing Week… Nevermind
Oh, I guess I don’t have to write this section anymore.
What to put here instead? Um. I guess I shall see you next year with whatever new projects come my way!
I am writing a final post for Kiki’s Big Dream Experiment to bring it all full circle. I want to share some reflections on my weeks. I also want to find the biggest lessons from this experience and share those. I am excited to explore my tarot spreads now that I am at the end of the story.
Stay tuned for my final blog post in this series!
Keep dreaming,
Kiki <3
