Safe Driving From a Millennial

Since I was young, looking forward into my future one day, I knew I would be on the road driving. As scary as it sounds it definitely carrys lots of responsibility, and having awareness of what is going on in front of you and around you. I remember finally turning 15 and I was 6 months away from being on the road. I could not be more excited because this was the biggest thing happening in my life and it gives you a huge responsibility. Being 15, I feel as if I was almost too young to carry that much responsibility and it was honestly frightening. I feel as if just by taking a paper test you do not have enough knowledge if your parents did not train you correctly and give you the help you need. It is so sad and scary seeing things that happen daily; it might be texting while driving, not paying attention, and the list goes on.

I feel that drivers education is considered necessary in todays world to truly learn things that some may not know or just not practice while driving everyday. Truly through drivers education you really learn something you will need your whole life. It educates you on how safe driving is such a big part of your day because anything can happen at any time. Without these classes you would never know what to do today. You would be driving with no purpose or knowledge of what is going on and will lead to major problems in your life and can potentially harm others.

Have you ever been just driving to the mall or on your way to work and see an accident or two cars hit in front of you? It happens daily and as a driver of two years I’ve seen it many times. It truly does scare me but I know that as long as I know what is going on inside my car I can not really control what happens on the outside dealing with others vehicles. The biggest issue with my generation is texting and driving. You know how easy it is to hear your phone ding and without even thinking you just go and check it. In the 10 seconds of looking down and losing focus you can put your life and others lives in your hands. When I got my license my parents were worried at first, but they have to have trust in me because I had matured and got a job and I need to practice, because this will be a part of my entire life and will have to teach my future generation one day. A lot of parents with children my age downloaded an app called Life 360. Although some teens may hate it because it gives their parents their exact location at all times, I feel it is very beneficial. My parents can always know where I am and make sure I always get to my destination safely, and if something were to happen they would get notified as soon as it occurs. I feel another way we can reduce deaths is the new feature on iphones where it puts your phone on do not disturb as soon as it detects you are moving. This is a great way to focus on the road with no distractions because you will not hear your phone go off or light up. Once you get to your destination you can send that text or snap when you do not have to have use your complete focus on the road. I feel this is a smart and ingenious way for our generation to be more proactive about what is going on and in the end reduce the number of deaths because the biggest number of them come from texting while driving.

Luckily I have never been in the car with anyone while in an accident. My parents had always taught us how important safe driving is and what can happen if the guidelines are not followed. I feel as if the reason I am such a safe and cautious driver is because of what I see on the internet. In this day and age teens my age probably spend atleast 20-30 percent of our day on our phones if not more. With that being said you see a lot of accidents, bad driving, driving under the influence, and the list goes on. Although people should not be posting about this kind of stuff I feel sometimes it is good to see because you can put yourself in others shoes and see what potentially could happen to you or anyone else. It truly is scary what can happen out there but you just have to be cautious and prepared for what could come next.

I feel there are a lot of steps and practices you can take to become a better and more consistent safe driver. The main problem is going to be to put the phone away or make sure it is turned off at all times, this can take the deaths down by over 30% for the year. This is a simple solution because the text can wait but if it is completely urgent make a call, but more than likely 95% of the time it can wait. While driving you really just have to give the road your full attention, make sure your music isn’t too loud, your phones away, anything that can potentially create a distraction and put your safety in danger. Not only do you have to worry about yourself you really have to worry about others and what is going on around you because just because you are fully paying attention the person behind you may not be looking or the person next to you might not double check before they get over.

In conclusion, I feel as if driving is a very important part of our life but also one of the most dangerous parts. Everyone will get the freedom to partake in it but may not be able to handle it. Working together and thinking of ways to solve some of these problems can truly help our community and hopefully cause less deaths and tragedies in our world today.