Thoughts Are Things
I’d forgotten this until today. I made the mistake of watching a clip posted on YouTube by a friend. It was all about the devastation left behind by drink drivers and featured graphic images of people being ran over and then emergency room?resuscitations?on children.
And here is the problem.By the time I realized it was upsetting me it was too late. I felt awful. I imagined how awful it would be if it happened to my babies or wife or all of them. Thoughts occur in the brain as you know, they are a spark of electricity between some neurons which then release feel good chemicals (endorphines) or feel bad ones (cortizol). Too many bad chemicals leads to free radicals which leads to disease.
I don’t drink and even if I did, I would never drink and drive. I suspect that those who do are already aware of the risk they are taking with their own and other peoples lives. They don’t care. They have made the drink a higher priority to them than their or other peoples lives. No amount of campaigns will change this.
I’m drawing on 12 years experience in the police by the way.
Anyway. My point is that if we watch, read and hear positive things we get the good feelings. If we watch the negative we feel like shit. Which one would you prefer? I know this is blindingly obvious but as Socrates said – We can never learn something which we do not already know.
Paul Browning
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9 Comments
Drunk driving is a terrible epidemic. So is texting/talking on a cell phone. Many lives are lost due to these distractions.
I believe in these campaigns. Will they stop every drunk driving from engaging in this dangerous behavior? NO. Will it touch the lives of someone, someday? I sure hope so. It is better to be proactive than to just shrug your shoulders at an ‘unstoppable’ problem.
I have seen videos like the one you described. They are VERY graphic and disturbing. I think they are aimed at ‘scaring them straight’ by showing the possible destruction that can be caused.
I think that drunk driving is awful. Please note that I am not trying to excuse their behavior in anyway?. I don’t think it is that they don’t care. Alcohol clouds one’s judgement. So a normally rational person does things out of character when they are intoxicated.
If you drink so much that you are not your normal self (drunk), then you don’t care about your own health and safety. Why would they care about the safety of others (on the road)? Getting drunk is irresponsible enough, why endanger everyone else by getting on the road?
Drunk drive is irresponsible and dangerous. They are not unaware of the risk, they just lack responsibility. Indignant we may be but sympathy dose not work in this case. Better take precaution than lament afterwards.
This post really touched me. I worry about the same things. People who are willing to put others at such a terrible risk are just so selfish. I can understand trying to satisfy yourself first, but I simply cannot understand why anyone would be willing to cause such tremendous pain for someone and their family.
We are surrounded by negativity and doomsday media. The only way to counter it is to introduce positivity into your life on your own.
You have to stay connected to the world so that you can truly be a part of it, but there is no need to constantly put yourself in the position to hear only bad news.
I agree with Blackmon’s comment. It drives me crazy when I see someone talking on the phone while driving. It is a conscious decision they have made, and yet they are willing to put so many people’s lives at risk.