"Sometimes I can't really think clearly and this vengeful feeling overtakes my body and mind."She is referring to when a person cuts her off on the road. This quote really relates to my driving because I sometimes feel this exact same way. I can feel the anger build inside of me, and I just wait to see when I will explode. There are times that I tell myself that I should just forget about it, but in certain situations I find that this is simply not an option. She also goes on to explain that,
"...when people cut me off, I get so irate, I just have to tail that person. I feel a sense of satisfaction when that person realizes that I'm tailing him or her."This is also true of the reaction that I find myself engaging in.
Denise attempted to change her habits by making observations while driving, and when she reached her destination, she would write everything down. By doing this, she has found that it is easier to control her undesirable driving habits such as tailgating when she finds herself in a rush. She resolved this by simply giving herself ample time to reach her destination.
The second report from Generation 2 is from Aaron Takahashi. His report deals with common driving habits that many people find to be "normal" and "acceptable". The first of these is speeding. Speeding occurs everywhere, and just about everyone does it. Whether one speeds five mph or 20 mph over the speed limit, it is still considered speeding. This is one aspect of driving that I have a really hard time with. Every day that I get behind the wheel, I tell myself that I should obey the speed limit. Although I tell myself this constantly, I always find that I speed at least five mph over the posted speed limit. The exception being residential areas, and traffic. I also agree when Aaron quotes Joleen Lai as saying, "...it bothers her when people are in a rush and that they know they're in heavy traffic, but they insist on weaving in and out cutting people off just to try and get in front of every car that is in front of them." The next topic that Aaron comments on is tailgating. He says that the only reason why people tailgate is because they are in a rush. I agree with this statement because I find that when I get up late for school or an important appointment, I tend to tailgate. I don't know why I do this because it really irritates me when someone is on my tail. Aaron suggests that you pull over and let someone go if they are tailgating you. I find that this statement is unrealistic because if you were to do this every time someone tailgated you, it would take you twice as long to reach your destination! I realize that tailgating is a very dangerous act to engage in because it can cause a lot of unnecessary accidents.
Next, Aaron talks about driving personality makeover. He quotes from Adele Kimura, "...we must keep in mind that we cannot change other people's personality." This is true in attempting to do a driving personality makeover. While engaging in this tedious task, we must always keep in mind that we should be concerned with our actions only and not react to how others drive. Aaron hits the nail on the head when he says that, "We wonder why are people yelling at us when we are blocking the intersection but when we see someone else blocking the intersection we yell at them as well. We need to see what we are doing wrong and not get mad at others for the same reason."
From generation 3, I chose to report on Angie Inouye and Tina Suehisa. First, Angie takes a topic that I find to be very interesting and applicable to my life. She reports on smoking while driving, and how it is really dangerous. She states that, "smoking and driving are just as bad as drinking and driving." She goes on to discuss step by step the process that she goes through to light and smoke her cigarette. It all sounds pretty dangerous to me. She says that while trying to light her cigarette, she notices that she is just driving for just one hand. The most interesting thing that I had noticed is that she describes how she almost caused an accident of her own. She was distracted by a long ash that had landed on her leg. This made her release her leg from the gas pedal, and luckily there was no one tailgating her, otherwise they would have rear ended her.
This topic hits home with me because my mom smokes. I remember that there were a few times that she had almost caused an accident due to flying ashes. If it's not flying right back into her eye as she flicks it out of the window, then it's worry about setting the car on fire with the lit ash. I feel that as it is a crime to drink and drive because it endangers the lives of others and slows down one's reaction time, so does the act of smoking while driving. The whole process of looking through a bag, lighting and putting out the cigarette distracts a driver for at least 3 minutes, if not more.
Next is Tina Suehisa's report 3. She discusses her driving makeover plan. Tina attempts to succeed in a driving make over. Haha, easier said than done. The first "bad" habit that she notices is that she tends to speed at least 10 mph over the speed limit. She believes that, " ...one can get to their destination faster by speeding." She understands that her acts of speeding can be very dangerous because it can cause many accidents. Although she realizes this, she still continues to speed. She also realized that she cannot only cause other drivers and passengers harm, but pedestrians as well. She tells of an incident where she needs to slam on her brakes to avoid hitting a person crossing the road, and this is only after her passenger had to call the pedestrian to her attention. She also says that even this horrible incident failed to curb her speeding habit.
The one incident that did help her to realize that speeding is detrimental to everyone around, was that she had read a sign that was constructed out of cardboard that had read, "Please Slow Down!!! We Love Our Children!!" She says that she realized that speeding in residential areas was really dangerous. This is what she needed to give her the final push into becoming aware of the seriousness of speeding. Tina also goes on to say that she is also a danger to her passengers. Her speeding not only risks her life, but that of her passengers as well. She also says that she would not be able to live with herself if one of her passengers were injured in an accident.
In conclusion, she states that after taking Dr. James' class, she looks at driving in a whole new light. She now is very aware of when she is speeding, and half her battle has already been successfully fought. Now it's all downhill from here. She found that writing down her observations and later reflecting on them benefited her the most.
Tina's report really relates to me because I too have a personal problem with my speedometer. I always think that it's wither broken or just plain wrong. I often find that I speed at least 10 mph over the speed limit, and this is when I'm not in a rush to get to my destination. I also need to remind myself that I am in charge of a machine that is capable of doing great damage should I handle it irresponsibly. For generation 3a, I chose to do Lori Kim and Grant Muranaka's reports. First, Grant reported on why driving makeovers are important for all of us. The first and most astonishing fact that he points out is that there are fifty thousand deaths and three million injuries every year on the roads. This should make it quite obvious as to why driving personality makeovers are essential in making our roadways a safer place to be driving. It not only betters the drivers in all of us, but once this is done, you will find that it is possible to relate it to other aspects of your life, like responsibility, and respect for law and order in general. One may ask who is in need of a driving personality makeover. My answer to all of you, my friends is that anyone and everyone who uses the roads is in need of a personality makeover. No one is a "perfect" driver. Next, he tries to explain how one can attempt to go about in doing a driving personality makeover. The first step is to know that you are not alone. There are many people that are in need of a personality makeover. A majority of them don't even know it yet. When I first enrolled in Dr. James' class I was totally blind to the fact that I needed one. I figured that as long as I used by turn signals, and thanked everyone who let me cut into their lane, that I was a really good driver. Boy was I wrong!! The second step is to observe yourself. This was the turning point for me. There are many different ways that you can go about doing this. Some recommended ways are: run a tape recorder while driving so that it catches your every sound, or you can simply make mental notes and write everything down in a notepad as soon as you reach your destination. What I opted to do during this stage is to have someone ride in the car with me, and tell me what my bad habits were. I couldn't get out of my drive way without some sort of comment!!! Lastly, it is the actual carrying out of the self-modification. This is the most challenging part of all three steps. I had a really difficult time trying to correct my "bad" driving habits, but till this day, I still find it hard to do. I sometimes catch myself speeding and I remind myself that I should be working on that aspect of my driving. The second report from generation 3a that I chose to cover was written by Lori Kim . She also speaks about some aspect of traffic psychology and a driving personality makeover, but she points something out that others have not. She states that, " (You) must also look at your stress level. It is also a concept to think about." After reading this, I looked back at the times where I notice that my driving was at its worst. As I have come to discover, they were all times of high stress. Once it was right after I had found out that I was pregnant. Boy, did I speed race home! Often times, I drive like a mad man when I am late for a class where lack of attendance and punctuation count against your grade.
Another interesting item in Lori 's report is that she identifies herself as having three driving personas. No, this does not mean that she has multiple personality disorder. It just means that she notices that she drives differently, depending on who is in the car with her. The one driving personality that I could definitely relate to is the one where she drives mighty carefully making sure to look back over her shoulder each time she changes lanes, etc. I am the exact same way when my six month old son is in the car with me. I take no risks. I actually stop at stop signs and look both ways before proceeding.
Now for generation 4. I chose Canaan Machida and Ryan Mitsui's report to look at. First, Ryan's report. He gives a definition of what a driving personality makeover really is. First of all, what is a driving personality? Ryan says that a driving personality is the fact that, we act a certain way when we step into a car, or are put into certain situations when we are driving. He also goes on to say that we are like this simply because as Jayson Nakasato puts it," we are already programmed to react a certain way to a particular situation. The only thing that fluctuates is the degree to which we react..."
Another good point that Ryan bring to our attention is that "...we have to realize that we are the only ones who can ourselves angry." This concept is true with all aspects of our lives, not only with driving. If someone irritates you at a store or something, you might try asking yourself why this is so. Most likely the answer that you will come up with is because he/she is ugly, bitchy, wearing too much make-up, etc. But what you don't realize is that these are all things that don't conform to your standards, and who's to say that you are right?!
Driver C is a reckless driver. She speeds in and out of cars. Her car is her toy, and she takes it to the limit. She tailgates people, and when people tailgate her, she gets very upset. She either yells at them, sticks them the finger, or lightly taps her brakes. She will even go so far as slowing down until the person decides to switch lanes, and then she speeds up to show the other person that she is still in the lead. Her one positive driving aspect, she always used her signals, and thanked someone if they let her in.
Driver D is a mix of drivers A and C. When she is in a rush, she speeds like there is no one else on the road with her. She swerves in and out of lanes if the one she is in is moving slower than the one next to her. But when she is not on a time constraint, she drives the speed limit and lets people cut in front of her.
Lastly, driver D is a maniac. His motto is that when he is on the road, it is the job of the other drivers to get out of his way. He is the type of driver that speeds even when there is no room for it. Many times, he needs to slam on his brakes to avoid hitting the car in front of him. He swears at other drivers who get in his way, and never uses his turn signals. He is also not afraid of using his horn, even when it is HIS fault.
As you can see, I have my work cut out for me. I let each driver know of all of these things that I have just explained to you. We went over each persons evaluation, and discussed them all. Driver A totally refused that he has a "bad" driving habit. He swore up and down that he uses his signal; every time. I know for a fact that he doesn't. The rest of the drivers were interested and amazed that they were even doing these things.
I found that these QDC's were a great help in pointing people in the right direction to a driving personality makeover. It should be used throughout our society and hopefully as a result, there will be less automobile accidents and fatal crashes. The QDC also lets people know that they are not the only people who need to go through the makeover. It may also encourage people to better their driving. The leaders of these groups should be people who have successfully completed a makeover. Then the participants currently undergoing the makeover can see that there really is some hope and that it really can be done. Likewise, the leaders can also relate to the participants because they themselves have suffered through the frustration too and can give them more advice on how to get through it all. This should be offered through the DMV and should be a requirement before teenagers are able to get their license. This would be a great advantage because the teenagers will not be able to form "bad" driving habits yet. If people are always found to be causing a traffic accident and have been through the program time and time again, then I feel that their licenses should be taken away.
SETTING UP AND RUNNING MY QUALITY DRIVING CIRCLE: AN EXPERIENCE TO REMEMBER
I conned my family and some of my close friends into being a part of my quality driving circle. All together, there were five people in my quality driving circle (QDC). Since I don't want to embarrass them, and because I would still like to have friends and family as a part of my life, I'll call them persons A, B, C, D, and E. They all come from varied age groups. A is my father, 57 years old, B is my mother, 51 years old, C is my best friend, 22 years old, D is my sister, 26 years old, and E is a good friend, 30 years old. We all met together at my house every Monday evening at 7:00 in the evening.
Session One
During this session, I explained to them the purpose of my quality driving circle, and tried to explain to them what traffic psychology is. My goal of the evening was to try and get them to realize before hand that they all have some sort of unacceptable driving habit, and I also wanted them to try and figure out what type of driving personality that they had. At first, they were all in denial and swore up and down that they were all perfect drivers. Then I asked them to write down on a piece of paper what they saw wrong with the other members' driving habits. This showed that all of them exhibited some sort of "bad" habit. This was just an introduction for what was to happen in the weeks to come.
During this session, I also had each participant take the driving test that I had made.
Session Two
Throughout the past week, I made it a point to ride with them each individually and I took note of what their undesirable driving habits were. From this, I found that they all had different driving personalities.
Driver A was a slow, patient driver. While riding in traffic, he always let someone cut in front of him, and never got angry if the person had failed to thank him. He never goes more than five miles per hour over the speed limit. The fault that I did see though, is that he hardly ever used his turning signals.
Driver B on the other hand is a speed demon. She races from here to there, and always seems to be in a rush. She also lets people cut in front of her, but if this person fails to thank her, she says "Asshole!!" in a soft voice. She also fails to use her signals. Both drivers A and B fail to notice of someone is tailgating him/her. Either that or they are aware of this, but it doesn't bother them.
Session Three
This was our last session. Throughout the week prior, I had them take note of all of the driving habits that I had pointed out. They were to try and remedy the problems and see if they could try and improve on those things. During this session, I had them discuss whether or not they did notice that they were engaging in those particular actions. They all admitted that they did have those driving habits, and some even pointed out a few extra areas of their driving that needed some help. I ended the session by asking them to continue to notice all of the things that they have learned and please drive safely.
Some of the problems that I encountered were real typical of people because I know that I would have the same reaction is someone were to try and correct my driving. The first and most difficult problem to deal with was stubborn headedness. My father just did not correct some of his driving habits even though he knew that they could eventually one day cause an accident. Another problem that I encountered was denial. Both my sister and mom felt this way. I even pointed out their "bad" driving habits while they were driving, and they refused to admit that they had even done such an action. These are all just initial reactions when someone tries to correct your ways. In my opinion, it's an inborn defense mechanism that with time, will wear away.
To you generation 6 people, my advice to you is to START EARLY!!! Have a set time and day that you want your group to meet. The most important piece of advice that I can give to you all is to be prepared!! Know what you want to discuss and stick to your plan. You also need to let everyone in your group know that there is nothing wrong with them. And that you are not doing this to ridicule and badger them. DRIVING RESOURCES ON THE WEB: WHEW!! THERE IS HOPE OUT THERE
Dr. Driving's Homepage If you visit this web site, you get to see the workings of Dr. Driving HIMSELF!!! He gives sources on how to stop road rage,and gives you step by step instuctions on how to do a driving personality makeover.
Driving/Transportation Safety Information This site gives facts about both bicycle riding and driving safety. It also offers other links that are related to traffic safety.
Liberty Mutual - Youth Driving This link explores all of the issues that deal with a teen driver: why they speed, why they don't use their seat belts, etc.
What You Can Do About Impaired DrivingThis site gives helpful hints on your best defense against a drink driver. This is an important one site to visit because we always hear on the news about some sort of traffic fatality as a result of drunk driving. By reading this site, you may be able to avoid taking someone else's life while on the road.
Auto Safety This site focuses on how to set teens in the right direction when it comes to driving. It also gives tips on how to keep insurance down.
Street Safe Driving This interesting site gives a weekly tip on safe driving. There is also a question and answer forum that you can look at.
Safe Driving Tips For Teens This site gives teens tips on safer driving.
Safety Tips This site gives useful information on how to be a better, safer driver. Some of the topics that it conquers are fatigue, and two lane roads.
Liberty Mutual Quiz Check out this site and test your driving knowledge!!
Honolulu Traffic Cams Ever wonder what it's like to look through the eyes of a traffic cam? Well here's your chance!! You can choose to look at all cams simultaneously, or individually. Have FUN!!!!
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