Online Driving Tips

Defensive driving classes – Three Styles of Driving – and One of Them Can Kill You

January 31st, 2009

No matter where you live driving is becoming a regular part of our daily working lives. Even in China, in major cities like Shanghai, I understand traffic congestion and commuting are fast becoming daily facts of life.

There are three different ways of driving with three distinct effects on your health. At the end of the day you are free to choose the type of driving you are doing and free to suffer or enjoy the distinct health effects associated with them.

1) SHORT CUT TO THE GRAVE – In this type of aggressive and angry driving, people get upset at anything and everything.

They are upset that the “jerk” behind them is trying to pass them (she might have a patient in the back seat and just trying to make it to the emergency in time) and they are committed to never let her do that.

Or they are upset that the white haired frail guy in front of them is driving too slow. They try harassing him with honking and worse. The effect is immediate – blood pressure rises, breathing becomes labored and brain cells start to sizzle. Since high blood pressure is the number one “silent killer” all around the world, I call this driving method the “short cut to the grave.”

2) CHATTERING-MONKEYS DRIVING – This is when we are not visibly upset at anybody but we are nevertheless very busy in our brain, adding things and subtracting things like a calculating machine, constantly going over and over the problems we have and all the tasks that need to be completed, etc. There are a million monkeys chattering in our brains.

This is a guaranteed way to arrive really tired at our destination. Since we are not paying full attention to traffic, there is a higher chance that we might be missing a red light or miss that truck barrelling down on us from the left lane… Try this “chattering monkeys driving” method and you’ll be tired whole day.

3) PEACEFUL LET-GO DRIVING – And you have another alternative: you can let go of anger and mental chattering and just let things BE until you arrive where you want to go.

You cannot change the conditions of the drivers around you. You cannot help if someone is late to the hospital or if someone is 85 years old and cannot react quickly to the way light changes from red to green.

But you can always control your mind, and control what you think.

Think peace and let go. Tell your mind that nothing is more precious than your inner peace and think nothing negative for 10-seconds at a time. Try this as a 10-second game and, repeated frequently enough, you’ll see that you are driving more and more in a calm and collected manner to work or home.

You have a choice. Today think about what you are doing to yourself while driving and go for inner peace, lower blood pressure and a better world for us all.

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