There is always a good choice

I was on the road Thursday morning near Phoenix. I left my house a little before 6 and hit the highway about 6:10. A thousand of my closest friends were already there, on their way to somewhere to do something. I was headed north, and my exit was in about 20 miles. In the meantime, some cars and trucks exited and others joined the journey.

As I drove I listened to my favorites list on Apple Music, sometimes skipping a song, sometimes repeating one. It seemed to me, as it almost always does, that several of my fellow drivers had mistaken what we call Highway 101 for a race track. With four lanes plus an HOV lane all going in the same direction, there were many who “stayed in their lane.” There were those, however, who were sure they could navigate their family sedan (race car) into a six foot long gap between two pickups — and do it at high speed.

As I exited the freeway back onto surface streets, a tiny little low-rider with a rear spoiler on stilts that were as tall as my SUV screamed up behind me in the single exit lane then darted around me like a hummingbird.

I (kind of) lost it.

No one but me and God heard me say (and I use the word “say” in the general sense), “Why did you have to do that?????” The maneuver had literally saved the driver no time, but he had risked not only his well-being but the safety of several others, including me.

I am not justifying my little fit of outrage, because the next thing I heard was me saying to myself, “Why did you have to do that????” (Alert readers will notice one less question mark. I was settling down.)

He (and I) had a choice

If I begin with my alarm waking me at 4:54 a.m., I could probably list forty or fifty conscious choices I had already made that day before I chose to verbalize my feelings to an unknown driver. And my number is no greater than yours. Most of those choices (cinnamon-raisin muffin or toast?) were of no consequence. Prepare for my meeting or check my e-mail? could have some effect on my day. Leave a little early or join the race car squad to arrive on time? It would be harder still to predict the possible consequences of that choice.

Leaving early means I am definitely more relaxed as I drive and arrive; rushing means the opposite while it also diminishes, even if only slightly, my chances of arriving unscathed. I chose to leave early, which was good.

But what about my choice to berate that driver after he had chosen to cut through traffic, weaving around me with a roar so he could arrive at the stoplight four or five seconds earlier?

I had a choice. I could have been understanding. I could have said a little prayer for the little car and its driver. I could have even been thankful that his aggressive driving was matched with some measure of skill. In the moment, and to my chagrin, none of those choices occurred to me.

My choice was “a reaction.” As a man of some experience, allow me to share that “reaction choices” often leave much to be desired.

In fact, choosing to react to what someone has just said or done is one of the worst things we can do, and we do it a lot.

Recipients of our instant “return of serve” include spouses, children, employees, good friends, and even random strangers on the road. What do we gain from that? Almost never anything good. Choose to control that reaction. That would be good.

More choices

My wife walks almost daily. On her route she often arrives at a surface-street intersection when the Walk light is on. She chooses, very wisely, to look at cars approaching from her left. Their light is red, but there is a right-turn lane, and turning right on red — after stop — is legal.

She has often reported that drivers will approach that intersection in the right turn lane with the light already red, and simply continue on. They may check to make sure no cars are coming, but they have no clue there is at least one pedestrian waiting to cross, standing right there with the right of way.

Turning after stopping would solve that, but the driver has made the choice to save some time, so stopping is not even pretended. If it were less than a 90 degree turn they would slow down even less. That seems like a bad choice.

Let’s leave the roads and head into the offices. The traffic isn’t as heavy, but even there some people are willing to run over other people to get ahead. Is that a choice you’ve seen made?

And because a lot of people work from home these days, let’s stop by the place where choices should be simple but often aren’t: the home.

Home choices

At Do Good U, we work with companies on leadership and culture. We’ve discovered that companies with “do good” cultures often have leaders whose home cultures are very much like that.

Men and women who make good choices at home around their families invariably do the same thing at work. In fact we’ve thought about skipping the whole office visit and just showing up at the home of a CEO who hires us!

Home is a great place to practice making good choices. Bad choices there are often forgiven, or at the very least understood and tolerated. Good choices at home feel even better than good choices at work, because you can immediately see the appreciation and gratefulness.

To choose well, choose good

My guess is that most of the time you know the difference between good and evil, so this week I’m not going to tell you how to choose good. I will next week.

In the meantime, share your good choices in the comments section. It will help us all.

Choose good. It’s (already) in you!