Wisdom comes from the back seat

I do not write to be agreed with, but to wake something up

LETTER — TO BOB HALSO
Subject: Thank you — from a truck driver who writes

Dear Bob,

I read your letter three times before I sat down to reply. Then I read it again.

You compared me to Covey, Collins, and Frankl. I want you to know what that does to a man like me. I am a former taxi driver, now a truck driver, who writes in the margins of long shifts. I did not go to the great schools. I did not sit at the feet of the men you named. I read them, later in life, the way a thirsty man drinks. And I learned from them.

To be placed in that company — even briefly, even generously — is not something I will take lightly.

You wrote that I “force” you to see things in a new light. Bob, that is not me forcing anything. That is the work itself. When a man has spent twenty-eight years behind the wheel, carrying almost two hundred thousand fares, he hears things. He hears the confessions of the successful and the regrets of the dying. He hears the hurry in a man’s voice and the peace in a woman’s silence. He hears the same truths repeated by people who have never met. That is where the writing comes from. Not from me. From the back seat.

You said I make you think. That is the greatest compliment a reader can give a writer. I do not write to be agreed with. I write to wake something up. If something woke up in you — even a small thing — then the writing has done its work.

Your mention of “Confidence” and “Competition” tells me you have read closely. That matters more than you know. A writer can feel the difference between a reader who skims and a reader who sits with the work. You sat with it.

I would like to know more about your own journey — the life you have lived, the writers who shaped you, the roads you have driven. A man who reads Covey and Collins and Frankl is a man who has been searching. I would be honoured to hear what you found.

Thank you for writing to the editor. Thank you for putting my name beside theirs. And thank you for the gift of being read with such care.

With respect and gratitude,

Shangox
PowerAfrika · Golden Stool Music Publishing

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I. Ras Gad Shangox owned and operated a Taxi in Toronto for 28 years before 2016 when he sold his plate and became licensed as a delivery truck driver. His series “Pocket Wisdom for Sovereign Minds” was born of his curiousity about the relationship between individual words and their impact on human consciousness and behaviour. Shangox’ writing is founded upon his original ideas and then polished with AI.