NPR - Two Pills

I wrote an essay about long road to somewhere and choices we make along the way, with one Buddhist's idea of being-time and the concept of the past, present and future. I take a number of health supplements everyday, and have for decades - albeit it's debateable if some are still working. But I also take two pills which are defining my life.

I put these two pills in my hand separate from the health supplements to acknowledge their importance in my life and make the same decision every day between what I was before I started these pills and where I am going. I'm in the present that moment to decide to stop or continue. I have that choice and make it a choice so I know I'm a conscious, thinking human being and not someone who disguises choices as not choices because it's life or death.

I know I disagree with the many other people who are in the same boat as me and on their own road, their own journey. It's why I've always been a fringe person, standing at the edge looking out and back in to see the group so introspective on their own ideas and values. I'm a Taoist who always looks outward and thinks inward. I don't accept the dogma because it is just that, and often there to avoid reality of being human.

And everyday I put those two small pills in my hand and make a decision. It's sometimes amazing the small things are the most important in a life, and decides so much.