For the longest time I was nothing more than a passenger. For the first 16 years of my life I sat dutifully in the front or back passenger’s seat of my parent’s car, being toted around to church, to practices, to public auctions and to well, everything. No one would have given me the clearance to drive at age 8, 10 or 12. I wasn’t ready.

Then in a span of a year everything changed. Permit…driver’s ed class…written test…road test…license. Boom! All of a sudden I could drive. And not even with an adult in the car. I could drive all by myself!

My role in the vehicle certainly changed at that point. No longer was I a mindless robot staring out the window at the endless farms that dotted the landscape where I grew up. Instead I was an active participant in moving a multi-thousand pound vehicle from point A to point B, with the hope of not incurring or inflicting any damage along the way.

What I soon realized when I first became a driver is how valuable passengers are. It didn’t seem like I had been doing anything important all those years I served as a passenger, sitting in the back seat of my parent’s car. I mostly felt like an innocent tag-along who didn’t impact the process of driving. But passengers can impact the driver in many ways, both for good and for harm.

The Passenger Effect

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