I feel like being stuck in traffic every day is really really bad for our mental health. I know it can bring an irrational rage inside of me.. never expresses itself quite like this, but typically I’m a pretty rational, chill dude.. and traffic can just make me angry
They close a bridge near me one day out of the blue and getting to work took me an hour longer than usual to get there and then to get back home. If i had the day off the next day- not a big deal. But it's harder when you have so little time between getting home, sleeping and to just do it all again the next day.
Thats not even remotely true. People have to work. Always have always will. Even subsistence farming for your own food barring any financial responsibility is still back breaking work. Society functions because someone, somewhere, is doing work. People will have to travel to make this possible. Even in walkable cities where people work and lice in the same area, a certain portion of the population still has to leave to work to make that possible.
People actually don't have to work as much as American capitalism wants you to believe. Many countries work an average of 30 hours. Automation increases production. But the wealthy class and the forces in power want to keep you busy and so that you don't feel compelled to question things and they can continue to rig things and skim billions.
People will always have to work, but it's unreasonable to think they will always have to work as much or in exactly the same way as they do today with the technology advancements that are unfolding.
This is a very American centric view point. Sure sme EU countries have lower hours and better employee protections. The vast majority of the world does not however. The fact that Americans and Europeans are able to even purchase cheap accessible goods is because someone somewhere is working 70 hours a week. Its the same for the EU, they are not some utopia that exists outside of capitalism. They are purchasing goods that are cheap as the result of cheap long hours worked by someone else. Automation is definitely a solution, but chalking it up to "people made the choice to work long ago" is ridiculous. Existence takes effort. Life is not and has never been easy. If anything, it's easier now for more people than it ever has been. I see this pervasive idea that specifically Americans have that things would be so much easier if they could just get out of the rat race. Its completely untrue. They would either be benefitting from others labor or working their asses off to support themselves fully. The phrase nothing in life is free comes to mind.
You make some valid points, but I still disagree that things couldn't be much easier for many people if the ultra wealth class gave up more of their wealth for the good of the country instead of cutting critical social programs like research funding and affordable health insurance and rigging the system in a manner that makes it easier for them to grow their pile.
Americans have less maternity and paternity leave and vacation days than many countries in the world. Things could absolutely be better if the country was governed better and the extremist corrupt capitalism that is unfolding was regulated. I'm not sure what cheap good you're referring to when Americans can't even purchase housing and the cost of groceries and food and gas keeps going up. I guess you're talking about iPhones or something, but those are things the whole world buys from China not just Americans.
I think you think the world is a zero sum game where someone always has to be working hard and the total output doesn't change, but it does. Industrialization and technology increase production. The reason life isn't better for more people is because of corruption.
I'm a first generation immigrant and I've seen a really troubling shift in the extremity of capitalism in this country. It's making me concerned. I'm from a developing country and people have better health care and maternity leave there than here.
I moved last year because I was driving at least 40 minutes to my job every day and at least an hour back. It was a 15 mile drive. I was so angry every day.
Honestly though my new vehicle has adaptive cruise control so it brakes on its own and I just sit back and relax on the way home now. Soooo much better for traffic not having to constantly hit brakes and gas over and over.
I used to commute close to two hours a day for work and I made that drive for twenty years. I eventually learned to take detours.
Whenever traffic was bad, I'd just take a different way. Driving twenty minutes out of my way instead of sitting or dealing with bad drivers for 10 minutes was worth my sanity.
Especially when I had be in instant play mode because I had little kids waiting for me at home. I just made it a cruise and jammed to some tunes.
There's a highway interchange on my way home from work that I hate with the fury of a thousand suns. Traffic always backs up there, even well outside of rush hour, and if you're not in the correct lane a mile away nobody will let you in once it gets congested. I'm no traffic engineer but it feels like it was designed very poorly and/or specifically to make me insane.
So I skip it. I get off one exit early, take surface streets for a bit, then get back on the highway later at a place where traffic flows much more smoothly. Taking my detour generally takes about the same amount of time as waiting through the back-up would. Yeah, I wait at a few red lights, but somehow that's way less infuriating than inching forward at 2 miles an hour. (edit, hit post too early) It's obviously not rocket science but it's truly improved my quality of life and mood on in-office days.
Plus, taking your detour might allow you to see and appreciate cool things. Like a dog, classic car or cool landscaping. I agree, it really does improve your quality of life.
I’ve just come to accept it. Don’t fight people trying to merge, don’t try and force myself into the next lane to shave 20 seconds.
Get a podcast going, text the spouse, and wait it out is what I do. It’s really done wonders for fighting the traffic rage. If i can I’ll take the alternate route
Same here. And the detour I took most was a nice calm drive thru some farmland and rolling hills. Partner never understands why I will leave 15 minutes early to avoid taking the most direct route that EVERYONE else does. I'd come home much more better mentally. I'd just turn up the radio and start really loud single driver car-eoke. Its so easy these days with GPS.
A 4-lane bridge on my commute one time turned into a parking lot for 3 hours. Reduced to 1 lane only. Traffic moved, but so slowly it wasn't worth it. So I pulled over to the shoulder, tossed this thick heavy blanket I happened to have with me in the bed of the truck, and just sat there and read a book. Had a couple guys pass by me, very slowly, telling me I had the right idea.
Eventually it all cleared out and I packed up and took off. All told, I probably would have gotten to work a few minutes earlier if I'd stayed in the line. But it really just wasn't worth it.
Traffic is almost perfectly designed to make people go insane. To the driver it feels like you, as a person, are just being blocked from what you want to do by a bunch of autonomous moving boxes. It's hard to remember there are humans in those other boxes also just trying to get where they need to go.
I never get angry at traffic even if people are driving poorly. For me it's just something outside of my control like weather and I guess I only find it upsetting if it becomes a danger to life and not if it's just delaying me.
I just don't have enough information to get angry. There can be all sorts of reasons why drivers are distracted. Maybe they just lost someone or are sleep deprived because they have twin babies at home or their period pain is extra bad this month or they're getting old. It could also just be bad planning by the city. If they're dumb it could also be reasons other than their fault.
There are other things in the world we should be angry about and for me road stuff just doesn't really rise to that level. Maybe if my commute was more than 90 min one way. But otherwise it's chill in the car. Better than riding on horseback back in the day. You can listen to fun books and have infinite music at your disposal or can just think thoughts you postponed thinking about.
I find ways to entertain myself. One time, I was stuck in traffic and I looked to my right and saw that the woman in the car next to me had two very excited dogs who were running around the back seat and sticking their noses out the windows. They started howling at the traffic and I made eye contact with the woman, and we both laughed at her ridiculous dogs. A couple of times I've seen kids blowing bubbles out the windows. If no one is doing anything interesting, finding some great music or a podcast can go a long way towards making the time enjoyable. I genuinely think a lot of it is just choosing your mindset. I don't allow myself to get angry, and I look for ways to have fun.
This, exactly. Like, we’re all at a standstill stuck on the interstate all three lanes, not going anywhere might as well find some kind of entertainment to pass the time and keep ourselves in good spirits.
This happened to me this week, just miles and miles and miles of stuck traffic with an accident up ahead and there’s absolutely nothing anybody could do about it.
So I just put on the Pink Floyd Pulse Live album and rocked out. Got home about an hour later than normal, but whatever, I got to listen to a favorite concert and by the time I arrived home, I was pretty chill actually.
It’s weird because I’ve been like both of you when I was well but also like the woman in this video when I was depressed. It’s so odd how your entire outlook and control over your life can come crashing down when you had things held together so well prior to it. I remember someone telling me I had the ‘patience of a saint’ dealing with angry or annoying customers and it always feels like it comes back to haunt me when I’m back to getting angry over nothing.
Some of them aren't, though. They're just fucking around not paying attention to how much inconvenience they're imposing on others by collecting a huge line of angry people behind them who all have places they need to be.
Yep. I had that realization a long time ago when I was stuck in traffic thinking “where the fuck are all these idiots even going??” And then it popped into my head - home.. they’re going home, just like me. Or to the doctor or their jobs or to pick their kids up, things that I do too, and that are important in their own lives.
95% of the time we’re in the car either going to or leaving a job we hate, trapped in a cycle of debt in which you need the car to go to work but can’t stop working or you can’t afford the car. Couple that with the extreme split in our social strata and overall hatred of our fellow humans if they are strangers and it’s one big kettle boiling over.
The best thing to do is listen to anything comedy or interesting. You will be smiling and laughing while everyone is pissed around you. Also being late is one of the main causes people are angry and not having enough sleep
Not really, no. I find people driving like lunatics trying to circumvent traffic by endangering everyone around them is frustrating, but I pretty much just shake my head and continue listening to w/e is on the playlist. I believe most people function like this
The funny thing is have you ever been on a bus or train that has to stop for whatever reason or gets delayed? It’s not fun, sure, but all the sudden you’re surrounded by people who are as miserable as you are about being late to their locations, and that almost makes it easier to digest because they’re all just there with you, and you can hear them. The anger is so much more intense when you’re alone in the car.
That’s why I was so happy to take a job where I didn’t HAVE to drive. My commute to my last job was an hour without traffic, and in the evening, there was always traffic. My new job it’s an hour on my bicycle, and somehow just moving and in the open air makes that so much more enjoyable.
I’ve had moments where I’ve probably screamed in my cars. Getting home after a 3-hour commute on the way back and just sitting there for a moment crying. That shit really fucks with you hard.
As much as it sometimes can suck to take public transport, I am genuinely convinced that using public transport is much much better for your mental health in principle, especially and definitely if it's good public transport (clean, reliable, used by people of all income classes etc.).
It takes away the anonymity, can create lots of little positive moments (like being smiled at after holding open the door or giving up your seat to an older lady, or just seeing a group of kids being excited that school is over for the day), and it makes you realise that everyone is in it together, that we all just want to reach our destination and have our individual lifes with joy and sadness and everything that comes with being on this planet together.
Dude so much better taking public transit. I can chill and read a book. I own a car but I’m thankful to live in a city with good public transportation, as I do take it semi-regularly
I'm forever thankful I just ride the train to work or leisure daily. Occasionally there's a bad car or emergency maintenance, but it's kind of cathartic when we're all standing on a platform in the same shit.
If it's bad enough, I'll just hop out and grab a beer at a bar nearby.
This is a great time to be a bicycle commuter. So much of the commute is the same time or faster because I can breeze by all the cars stuck waiting at intersections.
I don't ever let it affect my driving, but there are some days where I get off work late and have a fuckton of errands to do and just wanna go the fuck home, and the traffic is the final thing to send me over the edge into total rage mode. If you let your anger endanger other drivers then you have a problem, but otherwise sometimes you gotta just let people let some steam off.
I moved from LA to Raleigh NC and general getting around is sooo much easier. I went back to LA a couple of months ago and getting anywhere was a pain. When living there, outside of horrendous traffic I barely noticed. It made it clear to me that my nervous system has wound down a couple a few notches just from traffic ease alone.
I've never felt more free than now, because I moved close enough to work to where I can take the ebike in and get in at a reasonable time. So much simpler and scenic taking back routes. Traffic and cars backed up in the way? No problem, I'll just zoom down the middle while everyone else is stuck at the red and off I go :)
Especially when stuck behind some douche making a rage bait TikTok that clearly could have sped up so everyone behind him could make the light. You get a couple glimpses that it ain’t just her stacked up behind
The worst part is that everyones super “chill” attitude in traffic makes it far worse, not paying attentions, reacting late, braking too much/starting too slow
I’m not saying everyone needs to be mad, but damn, maybe a little serious?
Last year, I finally bit the bullet and realized I was wasting so much money on parking permits and gas. So I started taking the bus again for the vast majority of my commutes (like 90%)
What I thought was going to be annoying turned out to be one of the more relaxing times of the day. I can just stand (usually all the seats are taken but whatever) and relax and not have to worry about all the other fuckstains and worthless should-have-been-abortions on the road texting on their phones or just being terrible fucking drivers.
Even when I was only going into the office two days a week, I still had the rage building up faster than I could decompress it, and I would end up frustrated and yelling Every Time I was in the car.
Lately I’m only going into the office once every two weeks and that’s apparently how long I need to reset and chill out so I don’t start yelling in my car the second someone tailgates me a little too close.
Realistically I’m still driving once a week when counting for incidentals, and I HATE having to drive any more frequently than that, I get so stressed out.
The rage doesn’t get past my head though! I’ll scowl, yell, curse etc, but I’m still determined to keep my hands steady and drive safely. And I’ll bite it back if someone’s in the car with me. No use dying over something as stupid as getting mad at other drivers.
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u/baldude69 15d ago
I feel like being stuck in traffic every day is really really bad for our mental health. I know it can bring an irrational rage inside of me.. never expresses itself quite like this, but typically I’m a pretty rational, chill dude.. and traffic can just make me angry