Ego — Blog — Healy Chen

Let the ego lose

I’m somewhat of a connoisseur of dashcam videos on YouTube. Watching them helps me learn from the mistakes of others, if you will. I must say, it seems like half of the accidents caught on camera can be avoided by one simple device: the brake pedal.

Drivers hate this one trick!

Too many times, the entire collision can be avoided if the non-offending driver simply used the brakes. Slow down. Avoid the accident. I get it: braking is bruising to the ego. Why should I slow down when it’s the other person who is not following the rules or acting stupid?

Instead, the onus is put on the offending driver to course correct, to realize their mistake in split seconds, and avoid the accident. In an ideal world, sure, we all wish that’s the case. In the real world, that is giving up our agency. The only person you can control is you. Try as you might to influence the action of others, that action belongs to them ultimately.

Remember the goal is to get to the destination safely. Let’s say the ego won. But by not backing down, the other car failing to yield hits your car. Now you’ve got to deal with insurance, getting the car fixed, and wasting a lot of time. God forbid there isn’t bodily injury, too. Worth it just to satiate the ego? Absolutely not. Avoid the accident; let the other jerk win.

There’s a huge sense of justice in American culture. That rule-breakers ought to be punished properly. Often times then when we get behind the wheel, we feel like the last stand before the fall to anarchy. We want to police bad behavior on the road. Speeding in the fast lane? I’m not moving over. Cutting in line at a merge? Not on my watch! I dare you to crash into me.

Not me. I’ll take a bruised ego and chip on the shoulder to preserve a clean car. As the saying goes, the cemetery is filed with people who had the right of way.

How dare you pass me!

Ego is a heck of a thing.

Even as I mature into my thirties and give less and less care about what other people think; even though I drive a six-figure car that’s easily in the fastest top 1% of all the vehicles on the road - therefore no reason be self-conscious at all, certain moments can still momentarily awaken those base and rabid emotions.

Case in point this past weekend when I was doing my usual drive on the mountain roads in the GT3, going at a reasonable clip: not enough for jail time, but definitely faster than the posted speed limits. Suddenly I noticed in the back mirror two cars coming up rather quickly onto my tail, and soon I became a mobile roadblock to their desires to go faster. Had it been my younger years in a similar class of machinery (an impossibility, but indulge me), I would have eagerly taken the challenge and sped up into pseudo race against them. Me at 31, highly cognizant of my mortality, cannot be tempted such foolishness.

So I kept to my pace, and at the earliest passing opportunity (thank goodness these guys weren’t assholes who pass over a double-yellow line or in a blind corner) allowed them to by. The leading car was what looked to be highly-modified Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution X, while the follower is a current-generation Chevy Camaro. No harm no foul: if they want to go triple digits on these mountain roads, I’m not about to play citizen police. I’ve encountered those sorts of people too, and they are I would say equally as dangerous as those who overtake illegally.

I was ready to move on my merry way, but for some reason, feelings of embarrassment and anger started to well up from within. Those guys must be laughing their asses off thinking I’m some chump who can’t pilot a 911 GT3 to its best ability: “Look at this guy, all money and no skill!” (the no skill part is very true) In turn, I was seething over their audacity to pass me with their lowly cars that are not only slower on spec than the GT3, but when combined is still worth less than my German sports car.

Needless to say, my ego took over; I had brief thoughts of chasing these guy down, though thankfully those feelings were indeed fleeting, and I was able to detach from the situation and calm myself down. The fact of the matter is the two drivers wanted to go faster than me, and they passed me in an objectively very safe manner. There’s really nothing to fume about, but something about the ego’s inability to accept slights, especially those pertaining to manhood like who can go faster in a car.

I’d thought owning one of the best driver’s car ever produced would alleviate such juvenile tendencies; there’d be no need for comparisons and battles. It seems it may in fact exacerbate situations: last thing anyone wants is to look utterly stupid inside an expensive car. The ego probably wouldn’t have reared its head had I been driving a Honda Fit.

As always, a work in progress.