Driving Under Influenced !!

By the title of this, you can tell that once again I had an epiphany while driving. I am going to start calling them EWD’s. I’m sure you have noticed that near major holidays, or extended weekends, the signs appear on the roads and the commercials show on television about the importance of not driving under the influence. Sometimes the commercials and warning signs on the road describe in more specific detail what driving under the influence means. They talk about driving under the influence of illicit substances, particularly alcohol.

What accompanies these not so gentle warnings is the increased police presence on the roads. Please don’t swerve, change lanes without signaling properly, or drive more than the allotted speed limit, for if you do, then you stand an increased chance of being pulled over on the side of the road by your local law enforcement agency. There is another accompaniment to this more than seasonal dance --- the designated driver. For if you determine or someone else determines for you that you are not capable of limiting your intake and then having sound judgment when it comes to your mode of transportation, than a friend of local bartender will make the decision to provide you some much needed assistance. The irony however, in the designated driver is that the person under the influence has to summon up enough common sense to acquiesce and allow another person or force to determine their safety and destiny.

So once again, I am in my car, contemplating this notion of driving under the influence. And then it dawned on me…. What about DRIVING UNDER INFLUENCED?

What ever does this kind of DUI mean? More times than not, I have arrived at a particular familiar destination, without giving a lot of thought to how I have gotten there. It’s sort of like moving from one place to another on automatic pilot. Then I thought, “No, that’s not what I think I mean by DRIVING UNDER INFLUENCED. So after a few more miles, and given a little more thought to the original connotation of the DUI, it became increasingly clearer to me. DRIVING UNDER INFLUENCED – the absence of influence. Movement without influence; activity without influence; thinking without influence, contemplation without influence. Driving under influenced.

Influence has been defined by Webster’s dictionary as a power affecting a person, thing, or course of events, especially one that operates without any direct or apparent effort. WOW! That bears repeating: A power affecting a person, thing of course of events, especially one that operates without any direct or apparent effort. Then follows the AHA moment. To drive under influenced means to operate without this affective power; without the impact on the person, thing of course of events; and to exist in abstentia from this force that has the ability to change, challenge, and indeed influence effortlessly.
Now, it is not for me to say what this influential power or lack thereof, is in your season. Call it what you will, but it sounds to me like living without this influential power is a negative versus a positive. To move without influence, to be without influence sounds like the absence of really moving and BEING.

So yes, there will continue to be warning about driving under the influence, and for some, the connotation and understanding of this notion will remain the same. But for others, DUI will never have the same secular, simplistic meaning again. For those who understand the power of this oxymoronic notion and flight of thought and fancy, their daily goal will be to drive under the influence; moving under the power of an effortless will that leads and guides to purpose. For those who recognize the message in the words, the goal of everyday life is to drive under the influence, because DRIVING UNDER INFLUENCED is to live without inspiration, meaning, or acceleration. Driving under influenced is to live without purpose.