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‎I was once a driving instructor. And in recent days, something has been sitting heavily on my mind. I keep watching the same mistakes repeat themselves on our roads, and I have come to an uncomfortable conclusion. A lot of us are not driving. We are simply reacting.

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‎I do not have the power to enforce road rules. I cannot mount a checkpoint or write you a ticket. But I have a pen, and a pen can still call the mind to attention long after the horn has stopped blaring.

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‎Two things have caught my attention more than the rest, and I want us to look at them together, not as a lecture, but as a conversation between people who share the same road and the same future.

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‎First is the headlight that has forgotten its purpose.

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‎You know the scene. You are driving behind someone. The person is moving a little slowly for your liking, and instead of patience, your hand finds the headlight switch. Flash. Flash. Flash. As though light itself can push a car out of the way.

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‎Let us ask ourselves honestly, what are we really communicating in that moment.

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‎Headlights carry weight because their reflection travels straight into another driver's mirror. That weight was never meant to be wasted on impatience. If there is genuine danger, a flat tyre, an open door, smoke rising from an engine, then a flash is a gift you are giving a stranger. But if your real message is simply move, you are borrowing a tool built for warning and using it for intimidation.

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‎There is a proverb that has followed me since childhood, a soft answer turns away wrath. Proverbs 15 verse 1 puts it this way, a gentle answer deflects anger, but harsh words make tempers flare. Our headlights, our horns, even our silence behind the wheel, are all a kind of answer. What are yours saying about the state of your heart today.

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‎And yes, I already hear someone saying, but this is Lagos. That is exactly the point I am making. We have normalised so much that we now defend it as culture. A thing does not become right simply because everybody around you is doing it.

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‎Second is the lane that never stays a lane.

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‎The second habit worries me even more. It is the constant, restless swerving from one lane to another, as though every open space on the road is a personal invitation.

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‎You are in one lane, then suddenly another, then back again, then into the service lane, then out of it, with no signal, no warning, no thought for the person who has to guess your next move.

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‎A competent driver understands one simple truth. You do not drive wherever there happens to be space. You drive where you are supposed to be, and you make your intentions known before you move. That is not weakness. That is discipline.

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‎Here is something I have learnt over my years of teaching, and it applies far beyond driving. There is a difference between being aggressive and being decisive. An aggressive person forces his way through every gap he sees. A decisive person knows where he is going, reads the road ahead, and moves with purpose and clarity. One creates chaos. The other creates confidence.

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‎Proverbs 4 verse 26 says , watch your step, and all your ways will be established. Notice it does not say force your step. It says watch it. Consider it. Then walk in it with conviction.

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‎I understand the argument. Many private motorists say it often. Have you seen how commercial drivers behave? Yes, we have. There are drivers who stop anywhere, cut through traffic without warning, and seem determined to frustrate everyone else on the road.

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‎I would still appeal to the relevant authorities to do their part. Enforcement matters, and road discipline should never rest entirely on individual conscience. But here is the deeper truth I want us to sit with. The recklessness of another person is never a licence for your own recklessness.

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‎If someone drives badly, your assignment is not to copy him. Two wrongs have never once produced one correct outcome, not on the road, and not in life. This is where I want to gently pull back the curtain, because what looks like a traffic problem is often something much older and much more personal. We tend to justify our worst behaviour by pointing at someone else's. It happens on the road, it happens in marriages, it happens in offices, it happens in how we treat money and opportunity. The real issue is rarely the other person. The real issue is what we have quietly permitted in ourselves.

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‎Perhaps what we need is not another argument about who is the worst driver on Lagos roads. Perhaps we need to return to the basics we already know but have stopped practising.

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‎Know your lane. Know when to indicate. Know when to slow down. Know when to overtake. Know when your horn should speak and when it should rest. Give other road users room to exist. And above everything, be predictable.

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‎A good driver is not the one who squeezes through the smallest gap or reaches the front of the queue first. A good driver is the one whose next move can be trusted by everyone around him. There is something almost spiritual in that description. Trust is built the same way on the road as it is anywhere else, through consistency, not through reckless manoeuvres.

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‎So my dear Lagos driver, let me say this, If you flash your headlights out of impatience, reconsider it. If you jump lanes because you believe every space belongs to you, reconsider it. If you have allowed the poor behaviour around you to become your own standard, reconsider it. The fact that everybody is doing something has never once made it right.

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‎We can do better. And before we blame the government, LASTMA, commercial drivers, or the state of our roads, perhaps we should first look at the person behind the steering wheel. The first traffic problem we need to solve is often the one sitting closest to us.

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‎I would love to hear from you. What is the one driving habit around you that you have quietly decided to stop justifying. Drop it in the comments, and let us build a more disciplined road culture together, one honest conversation at a time.

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‎Oluwatobiloba Gideon Oludayomi is a life coach, a practical writer, and a versatile entrepreneur creating wealth solutions through agriculture, real estate, and enterprise. He is the Convener of the Dominion Guild Network, an ecosystem of high value individuals, young and determined to becoming an empowered generation. He is the author of "Build It to Last", "I Thought I Married a Wife", a novel, and "Practical Love."