If you’re in a hurry, you’re not in control

If you’re like me, you like to take the backroads. Windows down, with or without the music blasting. I may be speeding, or I may be driving slowly. But I’m not in a hurry.

They say 80% of drivers use only 20% of the roads. Well, maybe not if you’re a gig worker driving Spark or DoorDash.

Still, you get to see some unique stuff on the backroads. It’s fun to window-shop from a country road as you drive by and dream about life like that.

But it seems all the roads lead back to the highway, and there’s a noticeable difference when you get there.

The world is in a hurry

Tailgating, aggressive passing, flow of traffic riding at 10+ over the posted speed limit. Have you ever passed a cop zooming by in the other direction without their light on?

Now, let’s not assume others don’t have a good reason for getting where they need to go quickly. Even when done safely, there can be a lack of control involved.

Now, I’m not talking about control of the car, as it is every driver’s responsibility, regardless of the timeline of their destination, to drive safely. Driving is a privilege that many are unfortunate to lose.

What I’m talking about is that crunch like a deadline, with no room for error, and suddenly, someone not doing the same speed as you in an area with a double yellow line is a major inconvenience.

Maybe you’ve felt this: you’re watching the clock, the speedometer, keeping your eyes peeled for an opportunity to pass.

Chances are you’ve felt this way before.

What does it mean to hurry?

Ever notice that those who are in a hurry are always in a hurry?

I can speak firsthand on this with plenty of experience. When I drop my kids off at school in the morning. I know the morning announcements play at 8:15, or it might be 8:18, and my kids need to get into their classrooms before that plays, and so I am pulling into the dropoff lane at the school anywhere from 8:10-13 most days.

I quickly kiss my girls’ foreheads and tell them I love them and I’ll see them at home.

I’ll sometimes add the need to hurry to make it to their classroom on time.

Then, I slowly wait for my turn to begin the slow commute out of the school campus, and it’s like I have all the time in the world.

Here’s the thing, it was the same way when I was a kid, oftentimes I would have less than 5 minutes to get to class from the time of being dropped off when I was in secondary school myself.

Many days, I only woke up 5 minutes before I had to head out the door. I usually showered the night before after practice, and so it gave me just enough time to be dressed to go to school, but when it came to school, I was always in a state of hurry.

Hurry isn’t a speed; it’s a lack of options

Back on that two-lane, country back road, some cars go fast, and some go at a leisurely pace. The fast cars don’t always mean they are in a hurry.

To be in a hurry is when you risk maintaining timeliness at the expense of everything else.

When you have to risk safety, awareness for your journey, and your peace of mind to make sure you are somewhere on time, you are not in control.

To be in a hurry is to miss the journey.

Now, I’m not advocating for losing timeliness, but I would prioritize maintaining peace of mind and being safe for yourself and those around you before being in a hurry.

And to be clear, you can go at a decent speed while maintaining those things.

But the biggest thing I’d say you miss is the journey. So often, you’ve probably heard the phrase, to the point of it being a cliche, “life isn’t about the destination, it’s about the journey.”

Well, there is a lot of truth in that.

If you watch, or in my case, hear a clock tick, take a moment to listen to that. That rhythm, that frequency of time, stays the same.

Time is not in a hurry. It ticks through the day, it ticks while you sleep. It ticks the same when you’re in a hurry, it ticks the same when you’re not.

How to not hurry

I wanted to give you some practical tips on how to not hurry, but time is the biggest thing. Where it can be afforded, give yourself time to be safe, time to smell the roses, time to adjust to the things you can’t control, like other people’s driving.

The worst-case scenario is getting somewhere earlier than you wanted to, and I can relate to why this would be such an inconvenience.

I’ve heard it said that those who are chronically late decided at some point they don’t want to be early.

While those who are chronically late might not be in a hurry, I would counter that point with a thought to those who value timeliness, even if it means being in a hurry.

When you are early, what are you left with? Time. Time for you to control what to do with. Here are a few options for that time if you are waiting in your car, on a park bench, or wherever you are.

1. Read a book – This is an opportunistic time slot to make time for reading if you’ve been meaning to do so. If you weren’t thinking about this, you should. Books are awesome.
2. Meditate – Talk about being in control. Having the time to listen to your body and thoughts and just notice life.
3. Journal – A pen and a notebook with time to write in it can help you gather your thoughts, write reminders, or let your creativity loose.
4. Be bored – No, seriously, speaking of letting your creativity loose in number 3, being bored isn’t so bad. The cure for boredom is boredom, an old lesson many forget or weren’t taught in the first place. Boredom is where creativity thrives.
5. Doomscroll – This might be the reason why you end up hurrying in the first place, so why not just do it when you get to your destination, so you are ready and in control?

Control what you can by not being in a hurry

One of my favorite quotes, which has paid dividends in my life, is “life is 10% of what happens to you, 90% of how you react to it.”

There is so much in the world we can’t control, but one thing we can control is how we react to it. In other words, our actions are what we can control. With this mindset, it has allowed me to be in control.

I realize, as I’m writing this, one place I haven’t been in control is that aforementioned drop off at my kid’s school. So, as I write this in the early AM, my precious writing time, I’m going to wake them up a little bit earlier to combat that.

Sometimes, with the nature of the world with its busy schedules, there isn’t much wiggle room to not hurry. But, in a world where we often don’t get to control much, besides our reactions to life, hurriedness is our reaction when we don’t take control.