Perspective…on driving fast

perspective:  the state of one's ideas, the facts known to one, etc., in having a meaningful interrelationship

If there is one concept to keep in mind to help make sense of the daily grind, it is perspective. It has a few meanings, most concerned with art and perception, but the useful one here is largely a synonym for point-of-view. Referring back to my initial posts, “we’re all in this together but we’re all on our own,” to get along together in the first part it helps to keep in mind the different perspectives we all have in the second part.

For instance…let’s talk about the issue of “driving too fast.” We should start by defining the term: not mental fast, or as fast as you can go, but 10-15 miles over the posted limit, which is a speed that statistically a great many people (though still a minority) are comfortable at, including me. I think it’s perfectly fine to go 75-80mph, that it’s not dangerous, and that speed limits are too low. Most people think otherwise. We have different perspectives.

In fact, the issue here is our perspectives. The meaning of “driving too fast” is the hidden problem, because both sides assume that their definition is the topic at hand.  It’s not, and it hit me like a ton of bricks when I suddenly realized… I borrowed a friend’s car a few years ago, a new luxury-type car from one of the Big Three (Ford,GM,Chrysler), and I thought, “OMG, I wouldn’t go over 65 in this thing, either.” It plowed in the turns, the brakes were mushy, the suspension too soft, etc., and I was shocked at how bad I thought it was. Meanwhile, being an “enthusiast,” a winning road-racer, an extremely focussed and attentive driver, I have always driven performance cars. For 25 years, every car I’ve had is further from its limits and more in control at 80mph than the average car at 65mph. You look at the two sides of the argument…(for the most part) we don’t drive the same cars! It makes the discussion of driving too fast an “apples-n-oranges” deal. If you say you would never drive 80mph, well, neither would I, if I was you. And I’ll bet if you drove my car for a day, you’d see the rationale in my (wait for it) perspective.

Perspective is everything

This is an awfully clean and tidy example, but still useful as a reference model for any discussion or argument. We might be using the same phrases when we talk, but they don’t necessarily mean the same thing. Depends a lot on our respective experiences, on how and where we learned something. It doesn’t hurt to ask a few questions up front to help ensure we’re all on the same page. I know now the few speed limit discussions I’ve had were just a waste of time. 



Enjoy the impressive dioramas of '50s and '60s America by Michael Paul Smith, seen here in one of his settings.