Eyes On The Road

A sample of Eyes On The Road

eyes on the road

michell c. clark

Copyright © 2023 Michell C. Clark.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or any means, electronic or mechanical, without prior written consent and permission from Thought Catalog.

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Produced by Chris Lavergne and Noelle Beams
Art direction and design by KJ Parish
Creative editorial direction by Brianna Wiest
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First Edition, Limited Edition Pressing
Printed in the United States of America

ISBN 978-1-949759-76-1

For my wife and my daughter, who inspire me to be a better man, and subsequently a better writer.

To everyone who is searching for peace...

I hope that this book helps you to accept your past, embrace the present moment, and get excited about your future.

I hope this book helps you to keep your eyes on the road.

“Keep your eyes on the road.”

I heard this phrase from my father, right before I sat in the driver’s seat of our family’s green Ford pickup truck for the first time. I was fifteen and a half years old. He gave me one of the loving but firm looks that fathers give their firstborn sons, and then we were off. He drove us down the road to the nearest high school, so that I could safely swerve all over the empty parking lot next to the tennis courts.

“Keep your eyes on the road.”

Neglecting his instructions wasn’t consequential—not yet. Then, a few weekends later, I left the safety of the parking lot. I turned left onto a busy two-lane boulevard, checking my rearview and side mirrors obsessively to make sure that I was staying in my lane—because now, one small lapse in focus could have me swerving directly into oncoming traffic, or into a grassy ditch. One second of compromised focus could lead to huge consequences.

I got in three car crashes before I graduated high school. Two of them were my fault. My teenage mind was no match for the distractions that came with being a high schooler with friends, a car, a cell phone, and a decent sound system. None of the tasks required for safe driving were complicated—it was a matter of staying focused on the fundamentals, no matter how many urges popped into my head.

“Keep your eyes on the road.”

Today, this phrase is permanently engraved in my subconscious. I still get distracted, but I can’t afford to stray off course. If I got in a car crash today, I wouldn’t call my parents—I’d call my insurance provider. I might have my wife next to me. My daughter might be in the backseat. If my car was totaled, there wouldn’t be a school bus or a disgruntled parental figure ready to take me everywhere I need to go.

The stakes are higher.

So it goes with learning to drive, and so it goes with life. If high school is a parking lot, adulthood is a busy highway—we no longer have the luxury of idling in traffic. Some of us have specific destinations in mind. Some of us just know that we can’t afford to sit still. We’re all conditioned to remain in motion. None of us can control everything that we experience along the way.

This persistent feeling of urgency that we contend with keeps us moving, but at a cost—there’s no time for introspection when rest stops are so heavily stigmatized. So, we keep moving. We weave through traffic, swerve around potholes, and cut off anybody foolish enough to get in our way.

We know that our pace isn’t sustainable, but we continue to press forward with the blind assumption that things will even out at some point in the future—but that future never comes, and as the road stretches on indefinitely, our eyes inevitably wander.

“Keep your eyes on the road.”

I know that I should focus on what’s in front of me, but my heart can never escape the gravitational pull of my rearview mirror. When I do manage to look forward, I see too much. On a good day, I’m overwhelmed with excitement about what the future could bring. I see a better life for me and my family. I see happiness and fulfillment. I see deep-rooted peace.

Other days, I feel paralyzed by the thought of how many obstacles are in front of me. I struggle to see a future where I don’t make the same mistakes that held me back during previous chapters of my life. I’m burdened by intrusive thoughts that tell me that my life might not ever get any better. I see emptiness, and I wonder if anything of substance will ever fill all of that empty space.

I don’t always "trust the process."

I don’t always enjoy my journey. Some days, I wonder if my self-trust is misplaced. Sometimes, intrusive thoughts push me into a space where I’m so scared of getting lost that I forget where I’m trying to go. For as long as I can remember, there’s been a voice in my head—a voice that tells me that my greatest accomplishments were lucky breaks. This same voice tells me that my failures are tied to deficiencies that I can’t fix—that I’m not good enough, and that I never will be.

During certain seasons of my life, I’ve given this voice too much power—but today, there’s a new voice in my head. The more I learn to trust it, the louder it becomes. I do my best to listen to this voice, even when my insecurities are pulling me in a different direction. This voice reminds me that failure is inevitable, contrary to what my ego wants me to believe. It tells me the truth: that I’ve always been good enough, and that my low moments don’t refute this truth. When I hit rock bottom, this voice reminds me to take a deep breath, be proud of myself for trying, and give myself the time that I need to get back on my feet.

This voice has always been inside of me, but as I’ve grown more aware of its existence, I’ve chosen to listen to it, nurture it, and—perhaps most importantly—believe it. Considering that the average human being has more than 6,000 thoughts per day, this is one of the most important choices that I make every day.

Some thoughts are fleeting—if left to their own devices, they vanish in the blink of an eye.

Some thoughts are irrepressible—you can’t ignore them, no matter how hard you try.

Some thoughts are shifty—just when you think they’re out of your head, they sneak back into the picture.

It’s impossible to hone in on the thousands of thoughts that flow through our minds on a daily basis—instead, we experience reality subjectively, through the lens of our judgments, interpretations, and belief systems. We are beautifully imperfect human beings, and contrary to what we may believe, we don’t process information rationally—we are subconsciously influenced by our cognitive biases—or in other words, the mistakes that our brains make while trying to simplify the complex world that we live in.

With this understanding, it’s important that we ask ourselves: how are our belief systems impacting the way that we experience the world?

What voices are we listening to, and how are they influencing our thoughts?

A lot of us struggle to keep our eyes on the road ahead because of the voices of fear that we’ve been nurturing—and as we nurture these voices that chip away at our confidence, amplify our insecurities, and poke holes in our worthiness, we start to find more things to be afraid of.

Our brains become wired to look for threats before seeking out opportunities. We give away our power and agency in exchange for fear and defensiveness. Instead of seeing a future full of opportunities, we see a future in which we’re doomed to repeat our past mistakes.

It’s human nature to feel a broad spectrum of emotions, but ruminating over negative feelings without working our way out of them can be dangerous. A lot of the content that we consume contributes to the feelings of fear and inadequacy that we carry in silence.

We need to be intentional about giving ourselves the tools that we need to counteract these tendencies. I hope that this book helps. I hope that the affirmations and encouraging sentiments in the pages that follow give you more of the perspective that you need to build an inner dialogue rooted in self-acceptance, self-belief, and self-love.

I hope that this book helps you to re-discover a version of yourself that can more readily choose self-belief, reject excessive self-criticism, and opt into a more empowered mindset—so that the next time you feel like you’re hitting rock bottom, you know that you won’t be there forever. I hope that this book helps you to make peace with your past, embrace the present moment, and get excited about your future.

I hope this book helps you to keep your eyes on the road.

Great things take time.
(It’s you. You’re the
great thing.)

You had assumed that it would be safe to run from your inconvenient thoughts until you were ready to confront them, but you never felt ready to rock the boat, and you never ran out of convenient distractions to chase after, until your legs gave out.

You were hoping to orchestrate your own gentle awakening—but life punched you in the chest instead.

You never knew that clarity could sting until it did. You never knew that self-awareness could feel so incapacitating. You thought your revelatory moment would feel triumphant, but instead it knocked you off your feet. Now you’re on your back, gasping for air, trying to figure out how you didn’t see the punch that leveled you.

As you catch your breath and your eyes flutter back open, every inconvenient thought that you had been avoiding floods back into your consciousness. Your heart pounds through your chest as you come to terms with the fact that the life you’re living isn’t the life that you want. You remember all of the choice points along the way where you chose comfort and complacency over purpose and progression. You see how you’ve compromised who you are and what you stand for.

You look up and see your regrets standing over you, staring back down at you.

But as you lay there, exhausted from running in circles and dizzy from the impact of your head slamming onto the pavement, you manage to find the silver lining.

You realize that the same pain that shocks and stings has also awakened you to the new possibilities that you deserve. You know that you’re not done fighting. You know that you’ll get back on your feet. You know that you don’t have to run anymore.

How do you pick yourself back up again?

Confidently. Deliberately. Decisively. Without shame. You forgive yourself in full. You believe in your ability to break the cycles that used to hold you hostage. You remember that your mistakes will never define you.