Be Proactive!

“Be proactive, not reactive!” my mom exclaimed as I let another drop of batter hit the table, “prevent the mess before it can happen!” While the chant “be proactive” haunts me every time I step foot in the kitchen, I’ve realized that this motto has stuck with me throughout every aspect of my life: cooking pancakes with a washcloth on standby, tidying my room as soon as something is misplaced, painting with napkins splayed all over my desk, and the most important one of all: driving with a defensive mindset.

When I first started driving, anxiety racked my body with the thought of crashing or suddenly being cut off by an aggressive driver. I had seen my friends drive with such ease: swerving, racing each other on the high way, or texting while driving. I looked to them with admiration and thought that they were such skilled and confident drivers for being able to multitask. It was only when I took a driving class that I realized that their type of confidence was not something that I should aspire to have. Of course, driving with confidence and assertion is a skill built over time but driving recklessly is also a learned mindset. When someone drives recklessly, they are overly confident in their driving skills but also place an overly confident in the driving skills of everyone else on the road. Reckless drivers have complete confidence that the other drivers will break for them just as they beat the red light; that everyone else will avoid them as they swerve; that everyone else will adapt to their reckless driving. However, every time we are on the road there is not a 100% certainty that everyone will drive perfectly. Even if we are all confident in our own driving skills, there are still other factors such as the weather, road conditions, and even timing that can cause a major or minor accident.

A driving education is crucial as it prepares drivers to make better informed decisions when they’re behind the wheel. They learn to be a defensive driver. Defensive driving is what my mom would call “being proactive” on the road. It means when you are driving, you think ahead to avoid potential collisions and respond quickly when there is an unexpected hazard. Just like how I would have never thought to prevent the mess instead of cleaning it, I would not have learned defensive driving techniques without the expertise of my driving instructor.

After completing my driving education, butterflies no longer filled my stomach when I sat behind the wheel. However, I was not at complete ease like my friends either. Instead, I was attentive to my surroundings and I felt a sense of responsibility to set a good example for other drivers and to arrive to my destination safely each time. Other than defensive driving techniques, I also learned a recipe of habits that have helped me be proactive in my driving:

Be in the mood for pancakes! Pancakes only taste sweet and delicious when they were made with love and effort and taste bitter if they’re made of spite and anger. So, when you’re on the road make sure that you are in the right headspace to be driving. Our emotions can take control of our actions and if you are upset while driving, you’re not probably not making the correct decisions on the road. If you know your emotions will take over when you start to drive, do not drive. This also applies to when you are feeling tired and fatigued. The 5 minutes you might save from driving right away rather than taking a 5-minute nap is not worth it if you end up in a collision and hurting yourself and others around you. Take some time to calm down and rest before you get behind the wheel.

Don’t burn your pancakes. You wouldn’t leave pancakes cooking while you run other errands, would you? This goes the same for driving: don’t multi task while driving. Distracted driving is one of the major reasons for collisions and its one that can be easily avoided. Driving requires your senses to be sharp and distractions such as your phone or loud music will take away from the task at hand. Make sure to silence and keep your phone out of sight so that you don’t have the urge to text while driving. Many of our phones now alert others when we are driving and your loved ones will understand if you can’t reply to them right away.

Follow pancake laws. Egg, flour, milk, and sugar make up a pancake and it’s these three ingredients for a reason! When you are on the road make sure to abide by the laws such as wearing your seat belt, following the speed limits, and driving sober. Following these simple rules can greatly reduce the number of deaths related to driving. You wouldn’t want to ruin your pancakes by switching the sugar for salt so don’t ruin the roads and risk the lives of people by not following laws that are in place to keep us all safe.

Share the recipe! Don’t forget to speak up when you witness unsafe driving habits. We must all become advocates for safe driving to ensure everyone is educated on the consequences of reckless driving.

As Warren Buffett says, “Chains of habit are too light to be felt until they are too heavy to be broken”. Don’t develop bad driving habits and if you think that you already have now is the time to break them. Obtaining a driving education and learning good driving habits and techniques will reduce the probability of encountering an accident on the road. It is a privilege to be able to drive, not a right. Reckless drivers may be overly confident that everyone will adapt to their reckless driving but defensive drivers are alert and hold a sense of responsibility to keep themselves and everyone else safe. Every time you are on the road remember that it is not only people in the car who are relying on your driving skills but everyone else on the road too. An accident on the road can have huge implications on the people involved so its imperative we educate ourselves and avoid any collisions. As my mom would say, “Be Proactive!” while on the road.