I obtained my driving license in last December and practiced several times in the neighborhood. However, I never had the confidence to drive on the street in a real traffic situation. I decided to take this challenge as the personal one for confidence muscle challenge. I talked to my husband Habout it and asked for his support.

On Sunday morning I started to practice in the neighborhood, same as before. It’s been one month since my last practice and I felt so nervous that I almost forgot what to do first. H  encouraged me, “Don’t worry. I’ll be sitting by your side. Just remember and follow what I told you before.” I appreciated his encouragement, but I could also feel his concern to some extent.

I thought I was doing fine as it was definitely not easy to drive a manual transmission car well for such a beginner like me. Obviously H’s standard was higher than mine. He started to coach me lots of theory and kept reminding me of so many rules, such as, “Do remember to turn on the direction signal light at least 5 seconds before you change the direction”; “Speed decides the gear. If the speed has not reached 20km/h, you should not switch to 3^rd gear. If the speed has not reached 35km/h, you should not switch to 4^th gear”; “When the speed is down, you should switch down the gear, otherwise it will be harmful to the car.” I got so annoyed by constant receiving corrective feedback and was not able to fully focus on driving. Suddenly a truck appeared from my right side and moved slowly across the road. I intuitively slowed down but had the hesitation to stop the car at that moment. Thus, the car started off as I forgot to switch the gear down. It meant a disaster to me and made me almost frozen in mind. I restarted the car after seconds and H started to coach. I could smell the coming argument and I felt it was time to do something to avoid it. I stopped the car along the roadside and said,”Well, I have to admit I didn’t do it right. I’m just a beginner so I definitely need more practice to do better. Keep coaching does not help, but only make me distracted. I appreciate a lot for you to remind me when I’m incorrect, but I appreciate more if you can encourage more and stop criticizing.” H realized something and he responded, “Sorry I didn’t know I was distracting you. I will stop and avoid it. Actually I think you’re much better than I was. Keep on doing it and you will be alright!”

We finished the conversation without any argument, but with understanding, appreciation and encouragement. After 20 minutes’ practice, I really did it! I took a deep breath and drove to the street. It was not easy but I finally survived!

It will be quite useful when applying Dale Carnegie principles to our daily life.

-  Don’t criticize, condemn or complain.

-  Give honest, sincere appreciation.

-  The only way to get the best of an argument is to avoid it.

-  If you are wrong, admit it quickly and emphatically.

GOAWAYCOMEBACK COMMENTS:

Prevention is always better than making up.

The wisdom of the writer is to take immediate prevention action when she smelled the coming argument. Our negative emotion is building up when we are frustrated, irritated, or upset, it will accelerate and drive us into a world of conflict if we just follow the mood.

Take a deep breath, take a break, and talk about our feeling with Dale Carnegie principle as the writer did, find a constructive path for our negative emotion and we will be our normal self again.

卡内基训练简介：https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=8QOnBFFWDU0