My wife asked me to run a few errands last week. I had to drive on a busy four-lane highway near where I live and was rounding a curve when I started to veer into the left lane. The Lane Departure Warning in my car detected that I was drifting out of my lane and flashed a yellow light on my dashboard and played an audible warning. I calmly pulled the car back into the center of my lane, the dinging noise stopped, and I continued on like nothing happened.
I’m a careful driver, but I’ve been thinking about the incident since it happened. Without the alert I could have easily run into the speeding SUV and tractor trailer truck that were approaching on my left. It wouldn’t have been a pretty sight.
The more I reflect on it, the more I think we need a Lane Departure Warning in real life. Start to say something stupid to your wife, beep, beep, beep. Drink too much at a friend’s party, beep, beep, beep. Yawn and start to say the wrong thing to your boss in an office meeting, beep, beep, beep. I can see where an alert like that could really come in handy.
Research from the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety found a few years ago that if all U.S. passenger vehicles were equipped with a lane-departure warning system, more than 85,000 crashes and more than 55,000 injuries would have been prevented annually. I can only imagine the problems a proactive alert system could prevent in real life.
I mentioned my idea to my wife and how I wanted to get a team of doctors, scientists, and IT folks working on my brainchild, but she reminded me that we already have a lane departure warning system. On first blush, I thought she was just pulling my leg. She likes to tease me about the sound my car makes when I drift over the yellow lines. She compares it to the tuh-tuh-tuh-tuh bionic sound that was used in the 1970s TV show, The Six Million Dollar Man. In the show, Steve Austin is an astronaut who is seriously injured when his spaceship crashes, but is rebuilt with bionic implants which give him superhuman strength, speed and vision. When I’m driving and not paying close enough attention to the road to her liking, my wife tells me to stop showing off my bionic muscles and get the car back on the road.
In any event, her point is that when we work too hard, our conscience or gut, whatever you want to call it, tells us to slow down or step away from our stresses. We’re born with a conscience, but often times we don’t listen. When work and home get to be out of whack, we push through, we tell ourselves we’ll take a break in a few weeks. We grab another coffee instead of listening. Of course, she’s right, our best self-care is to simply listen to our body when it tell us that work and home are getting to be too much.
In the meantime, though, I’m creating a project team to come up a Lane Departure Warning prototype for everyday life. I’m not much of an inventor, but I think I’m onto something! Mark Zuckerberg, Elon Musk, heck, Thomas Edison had to start somewhere, right?
What do you think? When do you follow through with self-care? When do you put it off?
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Check out my companion piece, Feeling out of control, at Writing from the Heart with Brian. You can follow me on Instagram at @writingfromtheheartwithbrian.
All the best, Brian.
Image by Pixabay.
The Heart of the Matter 
Put me on the team, please! I like the idea of some sort of biometric, semi-bionic prompt! Way better than a kick under the table or a scowl. Just a little ‘twitch’. 😉 And…I’m happy that your little swerve was inconsequential…those highway safety stats are horrifying.
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Oh, you’re definitely on the team Vicki. There’s not much pay, but there will be lots of laughs at my expense. Ha, ha.
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Oh…giggles at my expense, too — I just know it! 🤣
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The “Lane Departure Warning prototype” I far too often drift into troubled lanes by ignoring Brian is the Holy Spirit’s prompting to get back between the lines ☺️
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Yes, I’m not sure where my prompting is coming from. Maybe the Holy Spirit, but I tend to think it might be my guardian angel or the angel/devil on my shoulders needing a little laugh for the day. “Hey Brian why don’t you put your foot in your mouth here. It would be really funny.” Ha, ha. Oh, well, life is short, you gotta enjoy the journey, one step at a time!
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Better yet, send this idea over to the producers and writers of Black Mirror to brainstorm while they’re on this writer’s strike. A real like “lane assist” episode would be epic.
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Hmm, I like where you’re headed. Plus with Netflix’s $$$ behind the plan, it might be made sooner. Ha, ha.
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I’ll have my people be in touch with your people about the pitch hahaha
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Love it. 🙂 🙂 🙂
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The lane departure warning is such a great analogy! Our recent rental car was our first experience with the tech, and we enabled the warning but disabled the auto-swerve (and other features that gave the car a bit too much autonomy). Relating back to our conscience/gut, how often do we turn off the lane departure warning, but enable auto-pilot? How often do we let the “car” do the driving without any idea where we’re headed?
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Oh, I like where you took this. I was thinking of writing more on Lane Assist versus Lane Departure. I like where you took it Erin! Ha, ha.
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I’m not a fan of the lane departure warning when I drive. Once I changed the setting so the car on its own jerked back into the center of the lane — along with the lights and the beep. I felt like I had no control over the car. I read the manual when I got home, and got rid of that feature. The beeping sound and lights freak me out, but not as badly. In real life, I like the idea. Except who is going to decide and program what is too much? Or what is out of bounds?
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Details, details, details EA. Don’t go killing my million dollar idea here! Ha, ha. You bring great questions, the same type of questions that folks should be asking about AI! A friend got some some AI photos done for LinkedIn this week. They’re amazing shots, he looks amazing. The shame of it is that they look really professional, but nothing like him!
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I was thinking AI too. That’s so funny about your friend’s AI photo!
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Yes, it’s definitely funny
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I think a lot of folks really need and would benefit highly from your invention Brian!
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I don’t know about others, but I know I could use it. Ha, ha.
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A lane departure warning for people would certainly come in handy both for ourselves and for those we interact with. I’m also thinking that adaptive cruise control, which knows when to back off, accelerate and stay steady, would be extremely helpful for humans. Could you work on that too?
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I’ll add that to the list, goodness knows there adaptive cruise control could come in handy on projects and working together as a team. Ha, ha. Maybe I need to do a full user experience and add on a few additional options. Ha, ha.
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First off…I needed that lane departure warning thing this morning….so no…I think we are human, make mistakes, and do stupid things. If we didn’t screw up occasionally we wouldn’t learn…
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Oh, I’m at the front of the line in doing stupid things. Ha, ha, but that’s life, right?
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👍👍
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I love this analogy, Brian. And for the record, I just rented a car a couple of weeks ago that had a lane departure warning and was initially flummoxed by what that sound was.
And your point and your wife’s point is a good one. We do often have the warning and we don’t listen to them. Would we if the noise was more audible or visible to more than just us? I suspect people have either developed (or tried to develop) the ability to listen to the cues or not. If they are in the not category, the tech might not matter. But as someone who has tried to develop resilience on my inner voice, a much louder warning would be great!
Love this post, Brian! ❤ ❤ ❤
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Oh c’mon Wynne, “tech might not matter” … oh bite your tongue!!!! Tech can solve anything right!!!! Ha ha, I’m just kidding. We really do need to listen to our gut more …. We could solve so many problems
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My tongue is bleeding… 🙂
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Oh man, my lane departure warning system would be going off nonstop people would become deaf! 😆 Kidding aside, it is a great idea – and I agree that our conscience and gut are that natural built in warning system. May it always work in our favour.
And I’m glad you were ok during your recent drive!
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Smart wife you have! Do you follow her advice? – “Of course, she’s right, our best self-care is to simply listen to our body when it tells us that work and home are getting to be too much.”
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I think it’s a brilliant idea. Much better than a subtle kick under the table from the wife.
My favorite childhood toy was a Six Million Dollar Man doll. There was a see-through eye and you could peel back the rubber skin to reveal his bionics. Man, they sure don’t make toys like that anymore. Also, if I’d kept mine, it might be worth a fortune today.
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I loved that toy. It was sooooo cool. It came with an engine I think . . . so that could show off how strong he was. You’d probably need the original box and kept everything in pristine condition to get any money. Ha, ha.
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Love our project idea. I’m with Vicki, sign me up 😁
I dont think I’ve ever heard of Lane detection signals. But im not sure we have 4 Lane roads much here … maybe around London, but not in Scotland as far as I’m aware
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Oh Brenda, you’re definitely in the group!!!!!! I need all the help I can get. Ha ha ha
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