THE ROAD™ Road Rage: Learning New Beliefs

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THE ROAD™
Road Rage: Learning New Beliefs

Some people will die to preserve beliefs that others consider silly or trivial. This is so because deeply held beliefs are stored at the level of the unconscious mind and going against them can trigger major emotional and physiological responses.

Anger or distress occurs when beliefs are challenged. Many drivers fervently believe in "making good time". It is a fervour that has been used to justify killing another human being or driving in a self-destructive manner. People are dying on the roads to preserve their personal myths.

For most road-rage drivers, the virtue of making good time determines more driving behaviour than, "Do to others as you would have them do to you." This is not said to claim any high moral ground; it is simply a fact observable by the behaviour of hundreds of drivers. They are people who would be kind and considerate of your feelings in virtually any other setting, but who would cut across you on the road simply to stay on schedule.

Beliefs exist within specific contexts. The context in which a person is operating determines his or her reaction. This section of THE ROAD™ on Road Rage shows you how to change your context. You can shift from a context of rigid beliefs about other drivers’ motivation and behaviour to a more flexible appreciation of why the other driver might be behaving the way he or she is. At the same time, this shift requires learning new ways of deriving self-esteem - moving away from achieving rigid goals and towards appreciating life and relationships.

This approach to changing aggressive driving, described in these pages, is fundamentally different from previously adopted behavioural methods, which tried, through various techniques, to persuade drivers to slow down, to wear seat belts, to be courteous, to not follow too closely, to obey the rules of the road, etc. etc. The behavioural approach does not work, even though it is where many governments direct their efforts. The alternative is to regard aggressive driving behaviour as a symptom of the underlying problem - usually stress.

Holding to stressful driving attitudes or beliefs, not ignorance of the law, is the cause of aggressive driving. It therefore follows that after the aggressive driver is persuaded to drive with alternatives to these five attitudes, his or her driving will become calm and steady; in contrast to the previous aggressiveness.

This cannot be done by telling the aggressive driver to stop speeding, stop competing, stop blocking, stop cutting in, stop insulting or punishing others etc. The brain works differently to that. The brain does not stop anything. What the brain does do is to start something new. The old attitude then fades into the background through disuse.

Does this mean that every aggressive driver will need years of therapy to change his or her attitudes? No. These changes are much easier to make than that. Once a person, who previously drove aggressively, has been introduced to five alternative attitudes that the find more appealing than the stressful ones, he or she can easily be convinced to adopt the new attitudes.

Here are the five alternative attitudes that you need to learn:

Old Attitude

New Attitude

Make Good Time

You felt good when you achieved your personally set travel-time goal, and defeated when you did not.

You were preoccupied with the stress that accompanies driving on or over the limit of what is safe and / or your real ability.

You got angry about traffic circumstances that threatened your tight schedule.

Make Time Good

You fully experience the joy of the journey.

You see the beauty of the scenery, engage in meaningful conversation with your travel companions, feel relaxed, hear words or music, appreciate others you are with.

You allow yourself plenty of time to drive comfortably to your destination.

Be Number One

You believed that you always needed to win any competition on the road. You felt good when did, but defeated when you did not.

Your short-lived feelings of triumph were inevitably mixed with anger.

Be A Number One Being

You recognise that self-esteem is generated by more than winning a temporary competition.

Your self-esteem is enhanced by being good to yourself and treating yourself with all the consideration that you can muster, e.g. personalising your vehicle, keeping it clean and well-maintained, giving yourself plenty of driving time to enjoy your journey.

Furthermore, you become resilient when stressful events occur, thus reducing the anger you previously felt.

Try And Make Me

You believed that no one should get by you or that no one should cut in front of you.

You felt good when you blocked other drivers and defeated when they got by you.

Be My Guest

You now accept that courtesy, being the essence of civilized behaviour.

You give other drivers the benefit of the doubt concerning the motive for their behaviour.

You treat other drivers with the degree of consideration with which you would like to be treated.

You contribute to a pleasant atmosphere on the road and in your own vehicle.

Your attitude of willingness to cooperate is beneficial to you and other drivers. You are able to do this safely and without any significant delay to yourself.

They Shouldn’t Allow ‘Em On The Road

You were scornful of other drivers and believed that they were inferior to you.

You got angry at what you considered to be their offensive behaviour.

Live And Let Live

You admit that you have no power to control who travels on the same road as you; everyone has an equal right to use the road.

You assume that most people are reasonable, well intentioned and cooperative.

Where things happen that might indicate contrary to the above assumption you treat them as minor inconveniences easily surmounted.

Teach ‘Em A Lesson

You perhaps believed that it was your duty to punish other drivers who you considered were putting you at risk.

You felt good when you were teaching them a lesson and bad when they were getting away with it.

Leave Enforcement To The Police

You learn that enforcement of traffic law and regulations is the duty of the police.

You accept that most driving mishaps are not motivated by another driver’s personal intention to harm, threaten or endanger others; rather they are the result of lack of training, incompetence, speed, miscalculation, forgetfulness, fatigue and inattentiveness etc.

Unfortunately, just being intellectually aware of alternative beliefs is not sufficient to accept them, because roots going back to childhood nurture stress-promoting beliefs. Before they can be supplanted by new attitudes, some of these roots need to be hacked away and the new beliefs need to be nourished with a little friendly attention.

The process can actually be interesting and enjoyable. Memorise the new beliefs, practise them consciously until they become learned so that you do not have to think about them anymore. You will be amazed at how pleasurable your driving is. How can your brain allow you to do this so quickly? The answer lies in its ability to accept a change in perception, as described in the next section, the secret of the Necker cube.

Acknowledgement: The content of this training is based on Road Rage to Road Wise by John Larson, MD (Tom Doherty, 1999 paperback)