The granite lining one end of my drive attracted cars like sugar-water attracts hummingbirds. Only in louder and more painful ways. 

Over the past two years, a number of friends and family and UPS drivers ran over the kitchen-trashcan-sized boulders. Twice cars drove on top of them and got stuck. One pickup truck ran over them scraping a side panel. A number of delivery drivers played ping pong with them.

Never realized they were there until they were. Granite rarely seems to lose.

Enough well-meaning individuals were unable to avoid them that I finally realized “It’s not you. It’s me.”

I had tried the opposite for some time. “I built a great driveway. People just need to learn how to drive better. It’s not me. It’s them.”

I had a change of heart after a delivery truck manhandled the largest chunk of granite like a pro linebacker facing a peewee team. “I’ll show you who’s boss,” the truck said, as it hooked that boulder with a bumper and left him lying in the ditch.

I widened the exit last Saturday.

Too often we refuse to own the problems we create.

Our anger. Our habit of speaking before listening. Our treating co-workers condescendingly. Our assuming people aren’t paying attention when in reality they’re tired of our forcing something down their throat.

Our making a driveway too narrow.

What needs changing in your life so that people enjoy driving next to you more often?

What proud structures need tearing down and building over so that people stop getting stuck?

Humility is a good thing. It was a core trait of Jesus’. 

Those places in your life that people keep running into? Perhaps it’s you more than them.