Nerves or Self-sabotage?

I took my driving test today, to upgrade from automatic to manual. I failed.

I got my license ten years ago and drove confidently for a year. Meanwhile, I passed my bike test, and drove a 650cc sports bike long distances daily through heavy traffic.

This should have been easy.

We bought an old banger and I practiced as much as I could, testing James’ patience with my repeated reversing round a corner. I booked plenty of lessons with a careful instructor who praised my car control, and at my final lesson, said my driving was perfect. “Just stay calm” he told me.

I thought I was calm, I certainly acted calm, chatting with the examiner about the weather, before getting in the car. I should have known when I couldn’t answer a simple ‘show and tell’ question, that I was not quite ‘myself,’ but I was too ‘not myself’ to realise. The catalogue of mistake upon error and actual dangerous driving that followed is embarrassing. I have the document to prove it all really happened.

It wasn’t just bad driving. At one point, I did the very opposite of what I was asked to. What’s that about? It’s too easy to say, ‘it was nerves’- that the pressure was on and I flunked it.

The feeling of having gone into a ‘not-me’ zone reminds me of a gig where, performing familiar material I messed up the words, the tune, everything. The gig was important to me, and I filed that clearly under ‘self-sabotage.’ Does this belong there too? Am I still really doing that?

Deep sigh.