They Know Not What They Do

The morning began with my favorite song.

“Unstoppable.”

If you’ve ever driven beside me, I’m sorry in advance. I don’t just listen to music—I become the concert. I was singing with my whole chest, breathing in the lyrics like they were oxygen. My windows might as well have been the stage lights.

For a few minutes, life was beautifully ordinary.

Then a car began merging into my lane.

Except… I was already there.

The driver kept coming.

I laid on my horn.

Not one polite beep.

Several.

Loud enough to say, “I’m here!”

Thankfully, she corrected and moved back into her lane. The accident never happened.

But something else almost did.

For years, I thought healing meant never feeling anger.

Now I know better.

Healing doesn’t stop the adrenaline from showing up. My body still reacted. My heart still raced. I still grabbed the horn.

The difference wasn’t in what I felt.

The difference was in who answered next.

The old version of me immediately stepped forward.

“She almost hit us.”

“She needs to know.”

“She needs to pay attention.”

For years, that voice would have taken the wheel without me even noticing.

But this time another voice spoke.

Quietly.

Gently.

Almost interrupting the first one.

“But that’s a person too.”

Everything slowed down.

I pulled beside her car.

At first, I wanted to point to my own eyes as if to say, “Watch.” Not to shame her—just to remind her to pay attention.

Then I looked over.

She wouldn’t even make eye contact.

Her face told the whole story.

She already knew.

She didn’t need another lecture.

She didn’t need another angry stranger reminding her she’d made a mistake.

She was already carrying it.

So I drove ahead of her.

I opened my sunroof.

I held my hand out into the morning air and flashed a peace sign.

Then, without even thinking about it, I folded my fingers into half of a heart before driving away.

As I continued down the road, I found myself wondering about her.

Not because I needed closure.

Because I wondered if that tiny moment changed her morning the way it changed mine.

Maybe she thought I was being sarcastic.

Maybe she smiled.

Maybe she cried.

Maybe she forgot about me five minutes later.

The truth is…

I’ll never know.

And then another thought landed.

One that felt much bigger than traffic.

For years I have reflected on Jesus’ words from the cross:

“Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.”

I used to hear those words as an impossible command.

Now I hear something different.

What if Jesus wasn’t minimizing what they were doing?

What if He was recognizing something profoundly human?

So much of what we do comes from places we haven’t yet become conscious of.

Fear.

Pain.

Conditioning.

Trauma.

Habit.

We wound each other.

Not always because we are cruel…

But because we are asleep to the forces moving through us.

That doesn’t make harmful actions harmless.

It doesn’t erase accountability.

It doesn’t mean we stay where we are mistreated.

It simply reminds us that the person standing in front of us is more than the worst thing they’ve ever done.

I think that’s what I saw in that car.

Not a reckless driver.

Not an idiot.

A human being who made a mistake.

And suddenly I realized something.

Don’t let the unconscious actions of another rob you of the beauty of seeing your shared humanity.

That sentence has become a compass for me.

Because here’s the trap.

When someone acts unconsciously, it’s easy for my own unconsciousness to answer back.

Hurt meets hurt.

Fear meets fear.

Anger meets anger.

The chain continues.

Healing, I’ve discovered, is quietly refusing to hand fear the microphone.

It’s remembering that I don’t have to become unconscious just because someone else is.

That doesn’t mean I don’t honk my horn.

Sometimes love honks the horn.

Love protects life.

Love sets boundaries.

Love says, “Watch out!”

But after the danger has passed…

Love gets to decide what happens next.

That morning, love chose a peace sign.

Then half a heart.

As I drove away, I realized something else.

For years I thought changing the world meant doing something extraordinary.

Now I think it often looks much smaller.

A kind response.

A handmade gift.

A silly song sung at the top of your lungs.

A moment of patience.

A conscious breath.

A choice not to pass pain from one person to the next.

Perhaps the world isn’t changed all at once.

Perhaps it’s changed one interrupted reaction at a time.

One person choosing awareness where unconsciousness would have been easier.

One human being remembering that the person in the other car…

…is another human being trying to get home.

And maybe…

That’s how the world heals.

🌼 A Gentle Invitation

The next time someone else’s actions stir something inside you…

Pause.

Take one conscious breath before you respond.

Ask yourself:

“Who do I want answering this moment?”

The frightened part?

The wounded part?

Or the part of you that remembers your shared humanity?

You can’t always choose what happens to you.

But you can choose whether the pain stops with you.

Sometimes changing the world looks surprisingly small.

One interrupted reaction.

One conscious breath.

One act of kindness that refuses to pass pain along.