Last week I was driving to work and I was late and I was not completely concentrating on driving (again that overactive imagination) and I was driving through a construction zone. I came around a turn and saw traffic getting heavy in front of me and started to slow down. In slow motion I realized that there were no brake lights. These cars weren't slowing down - they were stopped - yep all four lanes. So the appropriate reaction would have been to slam on the breaks at the first moment I saw them instead of the 10 seconds after. That short time would probably have bought me the foot I needed to NOT rear end the car in front of me. Here is my thought process for the next 5 minutes. Everything in quotes was said in my head not out loud.
As my foot in pressed to the floor on the break: "please, please, please - STOP"
(There was no thought at this point to pump the breaks or use the emergency break. Perhaps that would have helped. Maybe sometime I should take one of those how to drive like a crazy person combat driving courses and find out.)
As my car made contact with the car in front of me: "grrrrr...this is not good and probably expensive.... then I am going to be smashed flat by oncoming traffic"
As I realized that there was no one behind me and all the cars in front of me couldn't move anyhow: "I better see if the other driver is okay and she is obviously not getting out of her car"
As I looked at both cars: "Thank you divine intervention - not a scratch to be seen...and my car is really dirty!"
As I approached the other driver found out she was fine and told her there was no visible damage to which she replied - not that you can see but in my experience it often surfaces later so I called 911: "Really we have to involve the police. You are totally annoying. No harm. No foul. We can both just get back on the road. You are making me even later for work. Why are you so vindictive."
Five seconds later: "Really! Seriously you just had that thought! If someone had rear ended you wouldn't you think about calling the police? And she is making you late for work? Who caused this accident - oh yeah it was YOU. True she was stopped in the middle of the interstate....because none of the cars in front of her were moving! You caused this whole situation by not paying close attention to the task at hand. This is a much better way to be reminded about the dangers of not paying attention while driving than if you had caused damage to cars or even worse injured or killed another person."
Yeah - my mind is kind of a scary place. While I hope to someday get to a place where I wouldn't have the very unChristlike first thought at least I was able to redirect myself fairly quickly and in my head not to the unfortunate other driver. So this whole long rambling can be summed up with this...perspective is important. I have long believed most if not all the world's problems could be solved with better communication. But I am being reminded (almost constantly it seems) lately that in order to improve communication you need to be much more aware of what perspective you are bringing to the table and what perspectives others are bringing to the table. The best way to do this is to keep as close to the Spirit as possible. It sounds so easy! :)
