To Yield or Not to Yield?

By: Kathy4Wellness

Yield: (verb) To give up, as to superior power, authority, or the like; to surrender, admit the force; to allow; to concede; to grant; to relinquish or let go; to give way to physical force; to give place; to lose precedence, leadership, etc.

Better known as "giving way" to approaching traffic. Wherever this sign is posted, we know that we must surrender our lead to any moving vehicle that will quickly pass in front of our path.

Knowing what it means to yield is somewhat of a burden, now. Seeing this sign, with the big bold letters YIELD, will now play a part of our conscience.

It is up to us to determine how we will proceed at this sign. The correct, and lawful, way is to slow, determine approaching vehicles (or the lack of), and then wait until they have passed and it is safe to pull into the pathway.

What is the urge that drives us when approaching this particular sign? Not to Relinquish? Not to Give Way? Absolutely. The force inside us that says, "if you let them get ahead of you, you will be late for…" or "…they will slow you down."

This is the season where everyone is dealing with his or her own versions of stress. If we allow ourselves to out-run approaching vehicles just to get ahead of them we could very well become one of this season's statistics.

Is it that difficult to slow down and wait patiently until the oncoming traffic passes? As the holidays pass and we all settle into a more routine daily life, let us keep giving (as the season suggests) in the form of YIELDing. Give up the 20 seconds that are lost, while we are sitting and waiting. Maybe count to ten, do some breathing exercises to release the stress in our lives, or even smile at the people we have just allowed to safely pass us.

Then enjoy what has just happened. By conceding, we have sent a message to others that there is more to life than just getting ahead…and you only had about 20 seconds to think about it.

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