Watching my parent die slowly over a year when I was a teenager. They'd always been messy, lived a chaotic life with a lot of drug use. They completely changed the last year as their body became ravaged by sickness, all strength day by day seeping until they were skin and bones, barely able to walk, and they knew that death was so near. It culminated in their dying in a hospital bed with tears running down their cheeks. I was young when I understood what a life full of regrets looked like but I truly believe in the last moment they saw Jesus or God or something, it gave them a deep comfort and they cried. I want to believe that they were forgiven for all the horrible things they'd done and found peace.

I don't at all to this day like this parent but I chose to forgive and love them. It completely changed me as a person in that I realized how much choice we have, that life is over really quickly, that every single moment we are choosing the life we leave behind -- our legacy. 1) I decided to never do drugs 2) I decided to live a life of service 3) I decided to accept the limitations of the humans around me and not let the darkness in them change my own life trajectory and commitment to living a noble life 4) I decided every moment of my life to dedicate to whatever it was this parent saw in the last moments, that seemed to be beautiful, forgiving and good.

I decided my parents darkness had been trying to murder the good in me my whole life and that whatever is good in this world had been stronger than all that darkness in the end. That no matter how dark the world ever got the light had won in the last moment, I had seen the proof of it -- it truly looked as if they saw something good and loving in that last moment and been comforted by it.