Learning to drive

[despairingbuttrying]

I'm learning to drive after 15 years when I first had lessons. 

I'm at about 30-35 hours in now and as I live in the UK I'm driving a manual transmission. I've had three different instructors (had bad experiences with two) until finally settling with one I'm comfortable with. He's the world driving guy (YouTube) who is very good, encouraging and patient. But my issue is that I'm still not at the level I should be at this point and I can't help but feel ashamed and embarrassed about it. Just passed my theory test earlier this week so I was feeling confident and looking forward to the lesson today and it was awful. I always thought as someone is sporty, well coordinated, athletic etc driving should be a breeze and to my dismay it has been a struggle for me. Some things I do well like clutch control, parking is OK but my focus and general awareness isn't great. 

I am very hard on myself and as an older learner (late 30s), I don't know if this has any bearing on my learning. I tend to get annoyed if I make a mistake or two and then it snowballs into a multitude of errors, some serious. But I think my main issue is focus and concentration. For example, I know what to do at roundabouts but just not executing them properly. 

Did you find that sometimes you had a good lesson followed by a bad one and part of you feels that you're not improving even though you should..? I don't think I could even do a mock test as there'll be too many faults.
 

[despairingbuttrying]

Sorry I've accidently put this in the wrong forum category 

[Wiseman2]

20 minutes ago, despairingbuttrying said:

I'm at about 30-35 hours in now and as I live in the UK I'm driving a manual transmission. I've had three different instructors (had bad experiences with two) until finally settling with one I'm comfortable with.. Just passed my theory test earlier this week

It's great you found a compatible instructor and passed the the theory exam. Just  keep practicing with the instructor. Is it your vehicle, the driving school vehicle or a borrowed vehicle? You seem to be freezing from anxiety, perhaps address that?:

 

[basil67]

It's normal to make mistakes when learning to drive - it's the whole reason that a learner needs a teacher with them.  It's someone to look out for things which we may have missed.  When our daughter was learning, the rules are that she had to have 120 hours of supervised learning.  120 hours!!!   This is exactly because learners make mistakes.  More than once husband or I had to verbally intervene to prevent an accident.  

Did you know that we have only so much working memory?  So, if you're really focussed on two or three things which you're finding difficult, you won't have the attention for the other stuff.   Imagine you're learning to drive on a highway.  It's raining heavily and you're focussed on seeing clearly.  You then get boxed in by a truck on either side, and you feel squashed and nervous and you instinctively pull your shoulders in tight as if to give you more space. Someone else then changes lanes in front of you quickly and you're watching them too.  Your brain is now at full capacity and doesn't register the red light ahead.   This is why learners make mistakes.  Of course, as you gain experience and confidence, you won't need that intense focus on the basics and you'll have so much more brain space to think about all the other things. 

Also, may I point out that you're driving a manual?  Until you start driving it by instinct, it will be taking a HUGE amount of your working memory.

Be kind to yourself.

[despairingbuttrying]

14 hours ago, Wiseman2 said:

It's great you found a compatible instructor and passed the the theory exam. Just  keep practicing with the instructor. Is it your vehicle, the driving school vehicle or a borrowed vehicle? You seem to be freezing from anxiety, perhaps address that?:

 

Thanks for the response.  Yes you see that post here by myself is after my second lesson I think.  It was terrible, stalling all the time and it felt I would never pick this up.  Now I have no issues with moving off and turning/steering etc.  I had to change that instructor as well as he was wasting time and money (spent far too much time talking and not enough driving).  The next instructor was ok but kept cancelling lessons and was on his phone texting during the lessons on occasion which in itself is illegal so yes not a great experience for the first few months and I think that set me back.  

Even so, despite the inconsistent training, my view is that I should still be in a better place and more skilled than I am.  I am still very upset over my faults yesterday and it ruined my entire day because I could not focus on anything else.  I believe the central issue is that when I make a few mistakes, it snowballs because I dwell on them and then you make more mistakes as a result of not concentrating and then it just goes downhill from there.  It just becomes this awful cycle which results in losing confidence in yourself.

I think back to when I was 23 and first learned to drive and had around the same amount of lessons that I have now, I think I was more confident and I definitely don't remember getting so worked up.  Maybe as I've got older I'm not as confident as I was, in general and that has affected my approach.  And secondly, I said this before I feel like driving is just something that should be so straightforward as you see everyone out there doing it.  If I was struggling to be a racing driver or learning to drift then that would be acceptable as it's highly skilled or whatever.  

[despairingbuttrying]

11 hours ago, basil67 said:

It's normal to make mistakes when learning to drive - it's the whole reason that a learner needs a teacher with them.  It's someone to look out for things which we may have missed.  When our daughter was learning, the rules are that she had to have 120 hours of supervised learning.  120 hours!!!   This is exactly because learners make mistakes.  More than once husband or I had to verbally intervene to prevent an accident.  

Did you know that we have only so much working memory?  So, if you're really focussed on two or three things which you're finding difficult, you won't have the attention for the other stuff.   Imagine you're learning to drive on a highway.  It's raining heavily and you're focussed on seeing clearly.  You then get boxed in by a truck on either side, and you feel squashed and nervous and you instinctively pull your shoulders in tight as if to give you more space. Someone else then changes lanes in front of you quickly and you're watching them too.  Your brain is now at full capacity and doesn't register the red light ahead.   This is why learners make mistakes.  Of course, as you gain experience and confidence, you won't need that intense focus on the basics and you'll have so much more brain space to think about all the other things. 

Also, may I point out that you're driving a manual?  Until you start driving it by instinct, it will be taking a HUGE amount of your working memory.

Be kind to yourself.

Thanks for the response.  Yes I think in the UK, the standard is around 45 hours plus 20 hours of private practice without a qualified instructor.  So I'm still under that.  Even so I feel my level is not what it should be at this point.  It's hard not to compare yourself to others as there are many people who can wrap this up and pass at this point.  

As I've said above I tend to get worked out over a few mistakes and then I lose focus because I'm dwelling on those mistakes. 

[Wiseman2]

Sounds more like anxiety. I remember a study group with brilliant students who knew just about everything but totally froze on exams. I'm not sure if that is considered performance anxiety, but you could google it.  The point is I don't think it's your skill level or getting the clutch/shifting thing down, I think you're getting too nervous.