Teaching our teens to drive…on the road of life

At present I’m teaching not one but two teenagers to drive. And somewhere in the midst of the shrieks and skid marks, I’ve wondered:

Is teaching my kids to drive a microcosm of the entire parenting process?

For those of you parents who’ve already done this (or if you can imagine how you’ll do it someday), I don’t know about you, but here are some things I’ve never said while sitting in the passenger seat as my teen was driving:

“You just do whatever feels best for you.”

“I just want you to be happy.”

“It’s your decision, and I’ll support you, no matter what you choose to do.”

“Don’t let anyone else tell you what you can and cannot do.”

“Follow your heart.”

“I’ll always be here if you need me.”

There are numerous reasons why I haven’t even considered saying any of these things, and all of those reasons are so warranted that I won’t rehearse them, because the bottom line is this:

My teens know next to nothing about driving.

And the little that they do know is just enough to make them dangerous; that is, it’s enough for them to entertain the thought that they might actually know how to drive:  “I’ve seen it done on TV, and I’ve watched mom and/or dad do it these past 15 years… so how hard could it be?”

But as I’ve been teaching them to drive, what’s most interesting is how often I simply and stupidly expect them (1) to already know something or (2) to already know how to do something:  surely they know that when you merge from one lane to another, you do it GRADUALLY, right?

Nope. Absolutely not. Not remotely.

And why on earth would they?  In truth, they don’t know, nor would they have any reason to know.  And YET I’ve found that for some completely stupid reason, as I teach them to drive, I can be far too passive and permissive in my parental role:  surely they’ve got this.

Um, no, they really, really don’t.

In truth, from day 1 our kids are nearly clueless about what they should (or shouldn’t) do:  “Don’t put that in your mouth!” “Say, ‘Thank you!'” “Look at Mrs. Smith when you’re speaking to her.” “Haven’t you been wearing that shirt for the last four days? PUT IT IN THE DIRTY LAUNDRY–NOW!!”

And when it comes to getting behind the wheel, the blindingly obvious truth is this:  they desperately need to be shown (repeatedly) how to do it, and then under close supervision to do it themselves (repeatedly). In fact–and this is key:

they need to be equipped–through both (verbal) instruction and (embodied) example and execution–with a very specific skill set, if they can navigate safely to the right destination.  Several observations should be made:

(1) over the years this very specific skill set has changed little, if at all;
(2) strictly speaking, mastering this skill set has nothing to do with one’s gender, ethnicity, class, etc.;
(3) only by learning this specific skill-set can they then obtain the liberty to go wherever; that is, freedom has nothing to do with their feelings about driving; freedom is found in driving not with feeling but with facility.

There is a name (at least, in classical Hebrew and Hellenistic Greek) for a mastery of, or a facility with, a particular skill-set (like driving):  wisdom.  In fact, both the Hebrew and Greek words regularly translated as “wisdom” could, more often than not, be fairly translated as “expertise” or “skill” (see, e.g., Exod. 28:3).

Now wisdom, when it’s passed on from generation to generation, acquires a new name:  tradition.  When I teach my teen–er, my teens–to drive, I am in effect passing on a particular form of “tradition.”

And here’s where things can go wrong (ha!):

If, as I’m passing along that tradition, in the midst of the very helpful wisdom being imparted, are found skills or practices that are either unhelpful or extraneous (what we might call pseudo-wisdom), they will be eventually found out.  For example, if I don’t wear a seatbelt while driving, or if I put on makeup while driving (although I gave that up years ago), or if I text while driving–these can interfere greatly with how effectively the tradition will be transmitted.  How so?

Well, if there’s enough pseudo-wisdom mixed in, it can cause the rest of the tradition to be called into question:  it will feel unnecessarily constraining, costly, or even capricious, and, well, merely constructed.

And this is exactly where we who parent in the first quarter of the 21st-century American / Western context find ourselves:  all manner of traditions, customs and norms across numerous spheres of life regarding, e.g., work, education, sexuality, gender relations, finances, friendship, etc.–have come to be doubted and even dismissed somewhere in the past 50-60 years, discredited as mere “social constructs.”

Why has this happened?

I’m not going to pretend that I know the answer–there are probably a variety of contributing factors, but here’s what I take to be a significant factor (based on reading lots of really good but really nerdy books):

We 21st-century Americans love our freedom. We place a premium on individual human choice.

After all, who wants to be told what to do?

Answer:  a 15-year-old with a learner’s permit, when they’re driving in rush hour traffic.

If as a culture we cherish–worship?–individual choice, we will want that choice for others:  thus, love–including parental love–begins to look like giving “the gift of choice” to our children (we’ve all been–or seen–the parent who’s asking their 2-yr-old which flavor of ice cream they want).  And this choice-cherishing form of “love” most often manifests itself well-intending passive, permissive parenting:

in its milder form, it’s like assuming that our teen already knows to merge from one lane to the next GRADUALLY;

in its extreme form, it’s like tossing the car keys to our 15-year-old and saying, “Follow your heart! Don’t let anyone tell you what you can and can’t do!  I’ll always be here if you need me.”

Now this hyper-prioritization and pursuit of individual human choice, free of any external hindrance, spells the death of any/all tradition.  Why?  Because traditions constrain:  they insist that individual persons be required or compelled to learn certain skill sets and practices.

But why?  Why would tradition intentionally constrain?

Well, ideally, it’s for the same reason that many parents (especially) force their teens to get a driver’s license–viz., so that their teen can have the freedom to drive themselves to piano lessons or soccer practice or that last-minute babysitting job or to a party with friends–SIGH. 

But, wait, if this is true, why do we as a culture place such a high premium on individual human choice?  Why do so many voices today vilify and nullify tradition?

Well, whereas good tradition (which conveys real wisdom) constrains its recipients in a way that leads to emancipation, bad tradition (which conveys pseudo-wisdom) constrains in a way that leads (whether intentionally or accidentally) to really bad things like subjugation and exploitation.

Recall from above the possibility that, when teaching my twins to drive, I could be passing on (whether intentionally or accidentally) pseudo-wisdom by, e.g., texting or putting on makeup while driving.  Or perhaps out of laziness or insensitivity I required that my daughters drive my car without ever adjusting the seat or mirrors, even though they’re both 5’7″ and I’m 6’1″.  Such “tradition” would be not only fruitless but fraught with danger, and how would it make them feel?

So, rather unsurprisingly, Scripture is quick both to (1) put down “human tradition”–what we might call received tradition, and (2) to pass on “heavenly tradition”–what we might call revealed tradition.

Citing the prophet Isaiah, Jesus repudiates the useless “rules taught by men”:  “Having let go of the commands of God, you are holding on to the traditions of men.”  Paul criticizes his “pre-Christian” self as being “extremely zealous for the traditions of my fathers.”  And Peter celebrates how his readers have been “redeemed from the empty way of life passed down from your ancestors.”

And yet Scripture also urges parents to pass on a revealed tradition–“revealed” in that it was a Wisdom from Beyond, “revealed” because its Wisdom was both counterintuitive and countercultural:  humanity had “hopelessly lost its way” and desperately needed a Life-giving Word.  And so, as counterintuitive and as countercultural as this Wisdom was, it actually had the capacity to cultivate a community that would flourish–a community of humans who would at last be truly free.

When the Pentateuch prescribes the Passover meal or when it proclaims the primary commandment of the Shema (which Jesus would call the greatest commandment), it speaks immediately of parents passing on to their children the interwoven Stories and Stipulations central to God’s people.  Not only does Paul instruct parents to raise their children “in the training and instruction of the Lord,” he speaks more generally of the Christian’s responsibility to “receive that which was passed on to him,” and instructs Timothy to pass on what Paul had taught him to others who would in turn pass it on to others.

Indeed, to be a Christian is to be a disciple of Jesus–i.e., to be under Jesus’ “discipline,” or training.

As Christian parents, we actively pass on a tradition:  the Scriptures are like an heirloom, an ancient and exotic tapestry of prose, prescripts, practices and proverbs that reveal a highly counterintuitive, countercultural and yet ever so compelling way to life, both now and forever.

But the choice-cherishing form of parenting of our day tends to be both passive and permissive:  it often has the immediate benefit of high approval ratings from kids–imagine the excitement of the 15-year-old whose parent simply hands them the keys to car and says:

“You just do whatever feels best to you. I just want you to be happy.”

Of course, even as they attempt to drive out of the neighborhood, their excitement gives way to a hidden anxiety.  And as they attempt to merge onto the highway in the morning rush hour, their anxiety intensifies into alarm, as they do their best to pretend to know what the hell they’re doing.

Is it any coincidence that today our teens and twenty-somethings are exhibiting unprecedented levels of anxiety and depression?  When we unintentionally and/or indirectly communicate to our kids that “Life is up to you!”, it may at first feel freeing for them, but in time it leaves them fettered with fear, fatigue, and the feeling that they’re probably missing something–because they almost certainly are.

When we “free” our kids to think, say, and do whatever they (think they) want, we actually enslave them to the drawbacks, doldrums, not to mention the depravity, common to adolescence.  Unwittingly, we consign them to the very limited horizons of their known proclivities, pastimes and passions.  We confine them to the echo chamber of their (understandably) oversimplistic and makeshift outlook on the world, until that echo chamber coldly collapses under the overwhelming external pressure of something called Reality.

Some years ago a twenty-something told me how throughout junior high and high school her father was delightfully permissive about whatever she wanted to do.  Living mostly with her father after her parents’ divorce, she said, “For most of my teen years I was thrilled that my dad didn’t care what I did–I was the envy of my friends:  I could go wherever, wear whatever, and hang out with whomever I wanted.  But somewhere in my senior year, when the consequences of a number of bad decisions on my part really hit home, and the shame, guilt and regret set in, it suddenly hit me in a whole new way:  my dad really didn’t care.  And that’s when I realized:  when staying with my dad, I was on my own.”

A final story:  Recently while one of my daughters was driving, with me in the passenger seat, another car suddenly–and very dangerously–cut her off.  Right a way she cried out, “Dad?!!”  I immediately, calmly but firmly said, “Sweetie, BREAK!”  As I grabbed the wheel and veered us into the shoulder, she slammed on the breaks, and an accident was avoided.  We pulled off the road and parked for a minute to gather ourselves.

Somewhat shaken, we sat there in silence.  

“Thanks, dad, for telling me what to do back there.”

“No, thank you for listening, sweetie.”

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