Week 251- angry drivers, a raging world and the strength of kindness...

The world feels like a very angry place to live in at the moment.

There is so much rage.

Every time you turn on the news or open a paper there in another example of hatred and fury.

And it feels like it’s spilling into every day life.

Into seemingly ‘normal’ events.

Since Brexit there has been a significant increase in the number of hate crimes being reported.

People who have lived in Britain their whole live being told to ‘go home’ because of the colour of their skin, their accent or the clothes that they are wearing.

What has happened to us? When did it become acceptable for people to be so fucking cruel?

Only yesterday I was driving to a meeting on a busy dual carriage way, and, having moved lanes to let a lorry in had obviously riled the driver behind who had to slow down to let me in.

Having flashed his lights at me, he then proceeded to undertake me and then slam his breaks on, leaving me no other option that to do an emergency stop or crash into the back of his car at 70 miles an hour.

As he drove past me, he and his wife, both in their mid 50s, scowled at me.

There’s no way they could have not seen the child seats in the back.

Or the fact that I was clearly shaken.

What kind of red mist descents on a person where they feel their only way to express themselves is to risk at least three people’s lives?

As I continued with my journey, jumpy and shitting myself every time I heard a beep or a loud noise, I started to get angry myself.

How fucking dare he behave so irresponsibly?

What if I had crashed into him, what then?

Had he thought past that?

What about my children? How would Ben explain to Nancy and Thomas where I was? That I wasn’t coming home, that some fucking prick had acted on his some misguided instinct and changed the course of so many lives in that split second.

I could feel the anger starting to bubble away.

I was gripping the wheel, my teeth clenched.

And then it struck me.

The idiot in the car was winning. I was angry and he was winning.

But I didn’t have to be.

I was shaken but I was OK.

He, on the other hand, has to live with that fury day in, day out.

His wife has to listen to him raging, and shouting and taking risks everyday.

But we do have a choice.

We can decide how we react to things.

How we treat people.

How we live our lives.

To listen.

To think before we react.

We have a choice.

So let’s choose kindness and compassion.

Because we can’t change some of the shit that is going on in the world at the moment.

But we can change how we make people feel in our own lives.

We can hug our children tightly.

 We can stand up for those who can’t stand up for themselves.

We can show kindness.

Because the world is a fucking nasty place at the moment.

But if we feel angry, let's channel it.

Let’s not let it get the better of us.

Let's not be that guy.