You know the feeling when you’re driving and you sense the car next to you slowly drifting closer into your lane? That quick flinch happens and you’re all of a sudden 10 times more aware of everything around you. I usually mutter “back off dude,” hug the outskirts of my lane and speed up. It’s the instinctual “too close, back up” feeling.
This happened to me the other day and I thought about the saying that goes “Stay in your lane.” I think it speaks to the “keep doing what you’re doing, don’t worry about the other people around you, strive on” motto, but we’re always in each others lanes, right? Always merging and moving, speeding up and slowing down. Sneaking in to the point of possible danger.
Kind of like the feelings that come up when others are trying to really get to know you. The basic questions are always easy to answer, but when the questions go deeper and more of your heart and soul are revealed, it’s harder to answer with ease.
When the car was drifting in my lane the other day and I said “back up dude,” I realized I’m like that with people sometimes too. I get the subtle flinch feeling for a brief moment when someone starts to drift into my space and life. In the moment it feels unguarded and unknown, but merging in other peoples “life” lanes is so much better than staying in our own where we can get too comfortable or stuck behind something slowing us up.
A recent example of this happened the other day when I was at the Apple store getting my phone fixed. I looked at all the people around me cause, you know, I didn’t have my phone to look at and saw a girl working there, standing near me helping someone else out. I casually said, “There’s a lot of people in here.” She nodded saying “Yes, always” and our conversations grew from “lots of people here..” to us talking about dreams and goals and hardships. We were happy just cruising in our own lane one moment and the next moment we were drifting back and forth into each other’s lives.
I imagine a muffled radio walkie talkie saying “Brace for impact!” So many similarities and discoveries can happen when we drift in, feel the flinch and actually impact with people.
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