Human Beings as Bumper Cars

There’s a part of me that suspects most of adulthood looks less like a carefully choreographed dance…

and more like a late-night bumper car ride.

Bright lights.

Loud music.

Too much momentum.

Very little instruction.

We climb into these little metal vehicles called selves, grip the steering wheel of identity, and off we go — bumping, ricocheting, spinning, occasionally laughing, occasionally swearing — often with absolutely no idea what just hit us.

Or who.

Or why that particular collision felt so familiar.

Most of us are moving through life powered by old electricity.

Unquestioned momentum.

Inherited speed.

Experiences we didn’t choose but learned how to drive with anyway.

And because the ride keeps going, we assume we’re in control.

But if we’re honest — many of our interactions are less intentional than we think.

They’re reflexes.

Old trajectories.

Patterns on repeat, dressed up as personality.

The Hidden Steering Wheel

Here’s the thing about bumper cars: you don’t see what’s powering the motion.

You just feel the impact.

In real life, that power source is memory — not the tidy, narrative kind we tell at dinner parties, but the embodied kind. The kind stored in tone, posture, timing, defensiveness, humour, silence.

The part of you that flinches before you think.

The part that overcorrects.

The part that braces for impact even when the ride looks smooth.

We like to believe we’re responding to this moment —

but often, we’re reacting to an earlier one.

A voice that wasn’t heard.

A boundary that wasn’t honoured.

A moment we learned to armour up, speed up, or shut down.

So we bump into each other — not because we’re careless, but because we’re carrying momentum we don’t know how to slow.

Mirrors on the Ride

One of the great cosmic jokes of being human is this:

We can see everyone else’s bumper cars perfectly.

Their sharp turns.

Their habitual crashes.

The way they always seem to hit the same corner.

We think, Surely they must see that.

Surely they know what they’re doing.

Surely they can feel how that lands.

But here’s the humbling truth:

Most of what shapes our impact on others lives in our blind spots.

Other people see our speed before we do.

They feel our edges.

They experience the ricochet long before we recognise the pattern.

And just as often, they are mirrors for us.

That irritation you can’t quite explain.

That instant tightening in your chest.

That person who seems to “always” knock you off course.

It’s not always about them —

sometimes it’s about the angle of impact revealing something you couldn’t see from the driver’s seat.

Mirrors don’t show us what’s wrong.

They show us what’s hidden.

The Collision Isn’t the Problem

Here’s where I want to soften this conversation.

Collisions aren’t evidence of failure.

They’re evidence of contact.

Of proximity.

Of relationship.

Of movement.

The problem isn’t that we bump into each other — it’s that we do it unconsciously, then tell stories that harden us instead of wake us.

We say:

• They’re difficult.

• I always attract this.

• People are just careless.

But what if some collisions are invitations?

Not to blame.

Not to fix.

But to notice.

What speed am I carrying?

What am I protecting?

What part of me learned this way of moving through the world?

Stepping Off the Ride (Without Leaving the Fair)

Awareness doesn’t mean we stop living.

It means we start driving with curiosity.

We don’t have to abandon the carnival — the colour, the joy, the mess of being human —

but we can begin to feel the steering wheel in our hands.

To slow where we once accelerated.

To soften where we once braced.

To laugh gently at the places we mistook momentum for destiny.

And perhaps most importantly, to extend a little grace —

to ourselves, and to the other bumper cars careening beside us.

Because most of us aren’t trying to hurt anyone.

We’re just moving fast through a world that never taught us how to pause.

And the moment we notice the ride — really notice it —

something shifts.

The lights don’t dim.

The music doesn’t stop.

But suddenly, we’re not just colliding.

We’re choosing how we move.