Calling All Cars...

Patience is not a common descriptive word for the observations you make during your morning commute. 

However, you can learn a lot about why people are impatient by understanding road rage. 

There is anger present when we observe acts of road rage.

It exists at such an intense level, yet strangely, that degree of anger is something we observe most frequently from the vantage point of our vehicle while looking at the other cars around us.

Crowds and crowded spaces have never brought on universal feelings of relaxation for humans as a species, but a crowd of cars with people in them just seems to amplify feelings of aggression.

But why?

Some Answers:

An interesting cognitive process happens to people when they become angry in a car. 

The car that we are driving becomes an extension of ourselves literally because we physically control how it moves similarly to how we are able to control how we move outside a vehicle.  The difference in our control over how our bodies move and how we are able to move a car.

The difference is in our ability for our thoughts to become actions immediately in our cars. 

We can tell our brain to move our legs 75 miles per hour but physically our legs will not oblige.  We know that with out a machine we are not capable of running 75 miles per hour.

We also know that no one else can move like that either.

Since we all know moving significantly faster on foot than others is unlikely, we accept “slowness” as a standard for our physical condition.

Patience while we walk amongst others is therefore not so much a virtue as a universal acceptance of a “natural pace”.

It can then be said that problems with patience and aggression arise when you have different ideas about what acceptable means.

At work if we feel we are more diligent than our peers at our daily tasks we may begin to cultivate impatience.

However, since we see others “getting away” with laxity, less than diligent behavior is regarded as acceptable in the same way that walking less than 5 miles per hour is universally acceptable.

This is how impatience begins to fester with in us. 

Our surroundings cause impatience.

Each experience where we observe what we deem unacceptable behavior begins to pile.

We begin to start judging the behavior of others and simultaneously disassociate the person from the behavior.

The unacceptable behavior then becomes what we lose patience for and we lose our sensitivity to take into consideration the reasons for the behavior and ultimately, the individual behind the behavior.

Often, we do not know or acknowledge the reason a person is acting the way they are acting.

Because we are so used to recognizing, and instantaneously reacting to behaviors that frustrate us.

We are conditioned to…

Here is the problem…

You need patience.

Patience is one of the character traits found in the most successful people.

You want to be as successful as you can and you will not get to your highest aspirations with out a higher level of tolerance than the average Joe (or Jane).

Here is how road rage can help us with patience:

Our frustrations in our day-to-day lives get bottled up.

Not all the time , but often.

It is not politically correct or socially acceptable to yell about the things that you find frustrating.

Sometimes that pent up frustration results in a person expressing emotions less…

Sometimes the pent up frustration results in passive aggression…

And sometimes frustration get physically released, finding what it considers a “safe” outlet…like driving aggressively in a car…

In cars our whole outlook on reality has the ability to change. 

A cars interior is sound proof in that other people, enclosed in other cars, cannot hear us.

The enclosure of a car for some becomes a shield both in reality and subconsciously.

A car presents an opportunity to say things we may not say so freely if everyone around us could hear us.

For those that have road rage sometimes when they become angry with another person on the road they are thinking of the person in the other car as a car and not an individual.

In a car you are on behavior alert and when you observe a behavior that frustrates you similarly to in other situations you feel the same.

The difference is while inside the vehicle you can react with out the same hesitation due to the fact you are enclosed by your car.

In other words, you are able to hide from taking personal accountability and judgment because of the barrier the car represents.

As a passenger or a driver, you have either heard/thought something like: “MOVE! The light is green! Wake up Honda!” 

This freedom of speech in a car begins to associate the other cars around you as just cars, objects in your way. 

Judgment starts getting passed on the people in the cars around you and you don’t know anything about the individuals driving the other cars.

Our impression of our environment and the situations we have been in are constantly a part of how we view life. 

Our experiences for the most part are all we know of how to feel or relate to something. 

We could have had a horrible experience with an individual that drove a black Honda. 

Our experience with them may not have anything to do with the car they drove but we know we don’t like that person based on something they did.  Now we have a person in our memory we do not like and they drove a black Honda, therefore anyone who drives a black Honda is most likely some one we will also not like.

This is a conclusion that we all are vulnerable to. 

Our experiences are so powerful and we are so perceptive that we are constantly storing bits of details that arrange them selves in our minds as reality and as facts when they are really just strong impressions. 

We pick the color, the model, and the brand of our cars most times based on our experiences with cars, advertising, impressions and perceptions of other people who own cars like ours.

Did you know you are 5 times less likely to have feelings of road rage against a person with a car identical to yours? 

10 times less likely to have road rage against a car you experienced a wonderful memory in.

All of this is because we store our interactions and perceptions very deep in our consciousness.   

Weather our intention is to pass judgment on others or not, the reality is that because of how we internalize our experiences our brain takes us in that direction sometimes. 

We hopefully know better than to do this because we have the capacity to reason objectively but we have to acknowledge the power that our experiences have on our emotions.

Patience for most of us requires effort, and in certain situations like our careers it can be the challenge that makes you the best at what you do, or what holds you back from being the best you can be.

Having patience means controlling our most natural urges to assume and jump to conclusions.  There is a saying: “love is patient and love is kind” and if we agree that yes love is at the least both of those things then we should know how to be kind enough to grant everyone some patience so we can at least give them and ourselves the opportunity not to pass judgment so quickly.

Take a moment to recognize an individual client or colleague may remind you of something or someone but they are not that exact something or someone.

Patience is making the effort to think about what is going on.

Most of the time if you take a moment to think about what is going on you will realize you do not yet know what is going on because you assumed a conclusion based on non-factual information.  The black Honda for you that represents someone who gave your child a bad grade represents for another person their grandmother’s car and all the memories about her. 

The reality is you are both wrong about the person driving the black Honda because you do not know them; the difference is the person who thinks of their grandmother while they are behind the Honda is less likely to act aggressively.  

In our profession, just like driving, sometimes situations will remind us of something that we have experienced before. 

We may have a buyer that we know is going to be this way or that way based on a first impression that triggered a memory. 

Patience is taking the time to listen and be self aware that you are making an assumption with out all the details.

Patience means knowing you have to do whatever it takes to become more connected in moments that challenge the effort you are willing to give. 

When you feel challenged, and you are struggling to find patience for someone try this:

Remember a time that was difficult and someone was patient with you.

Remember the feelings of relief that you felt in that moment.

Remember how you assumed no one would consider sticking the situation out with you?

…But then someone did

Then remember the person who was not patient with you during that time and decide going forward that you are going to be decent and that the least you can do is to be patient. 

We do not always have to pull from our negative experiences. 

The reason we remember our negative experiences first is because we don’t want to relive them. 

Focusing on the positive experiences you have had and seeing the positivity that patience can bring to a situation is the best way to actually prevent having to relive negative experiences.  Look for the positive and grab onto it because you cannot simultaneously have both optimistic and negative thoughts.

Daily skill building activity:

Every time you are in the car driving challenge yourself to be patient.  Think about the worst thing that will happen if the person in front of you drives 40 mph and not 50 mph and think about if your anger even makes sense with that outcome.  Challenge yourself to think about the person in the car in front of you as someone you know and care for. 

Would you be so aggressive?

If that were your grandmother wouldn’t you rather be behind her not getting to close so she doesn’t nervous than some stranger who would tailgate and honk?

Wouldn’t you rather someone tailgate you rather than your Grandma if you had to chose?

Think about the concept of protecting the car in front of you if you had to. 

Would you maneuver the car differently? 

Think of the cars around you the next time you drive as the person that owns them instead of just a car.

When your clients/other peoples clients are demonstrating behavior that frustrates you try not to react right away.

Just wait.

Take a break.

Consider the cause for the behavior as more than the behavior itself.

Think about the people IN the cars around you.

It is people who drive cars. 

People with children, people who lost someone they love in a car accident, people who are new drivers, people like me, and people like you.

Sometimes the only commonality we can find between some drivers or clients and ourselves is that we all have a heartbeat.

 Is that not enough to have in common to be worthy of us working on our patience and tolerance?  Talk to your clients about patience and how you plan on treating them with the same care, as you would expect a friend to be treated by someone in your position.

Patience is something that takes practice. 

You do not have to set time aside to work out it however.

Just drive to work.