Car School

How I Learned to Stop Negotiating Against Myself

Part One: Don’t Settle.

I heard it over and over again.

And still…
I almost did.

My friend Kim wrote a beautiful version of this story—seeing it through the lens of alignment and something larger at work. You can read it here.

I believe that too.

But you know that saying—
It’s hard to see the whole picture when you’re the one inside the frame.

Here’s what it felt like from where I was standing.

I put myself in car school.

That’s what I started calling it.

Because somewhere along the way, this stopped being about getting a new car
and became something else entirely—

I loved the car I had been driving.

I’ve been driving some version of it for nearly twenty years—always pre-owned, always chosen carefully. And I loved it.

I loved the way it held the road—solid, responsive.
I loved how it accelerated, that satisfying surge from 0 to 60.
I loved the quiet. The comfort. The way it made long drives feel easy. Smooth.
It carried what I needed it to carry. It felt… like mine.

It wasn’t just a car.
It was a feeling I knew by heart.

But it was starting to ask more of me than I was willing to give.
Repairs were adding up. The writing was on the wall.

I knew it was time.

And in my mind, the answer was simple:

I’ll just replace what I have. After all, that’s what I wanted.

I would have been perfectly happy to wake up one morning and find a brand-new version of that exact car sitting in my driveway.

So I went to look.

And there it was—
a brand-new Mercedes-Benz wagon.

And right next to it, the price. Upwards of $86,000.

I didn’t linger long.

That’s out of the question, I told myself. Not happening. Not in a position to do that.

And just like that, something subtle began.

The negotiation.

Not with a dealer.

With myself.

You’ve driven a car like this for a long time.
Maybe it’s time to be more practical.

That voice snuck in quietly at first, then more convincingly.

You are nearly 70.

Maybe something better on gas.
Easier on your pocketbook.

It sounded smart. (It usually does).

So come down to earth, I told myself.
Be sensible.

I started researching. Looking. Comparing.
I landed on a make and model that would be… fine.

That’s the word I used.

Fine.

It’s a car, after all, I told myself.
It doesn’t define you.
Maybe you’ve been placing too much importance on how it feels.

That part almost convinced me.

Almost.

At the same time, I had a photograph.

The exact car I loved.
Deep navy—almost midnight blue—with a cream interior.

I kept it nearby. Looked at it often. Didn’t say much about it.
But I kept looking.

The photo I kept nearby.

So I began what I thought was the reasonable path.

Searching for a pre-owned version of what I loved.
Setting parameters—mileage, condition, location.

If I could find one that had been well cared for, that would be perfect.
I had done that before. I knew how good they could be.

Weeks turned into months.

“It’s a niche model.”
“They’re hard to come by.”
“People who have them don’t give them up.”

I heard that more than once.

And instead of holding steady in what I wanted…

I started listening to the other voice.

That’s when the definition of “reasonable” started to shift.

It no longer just meant finding a smart way into what I wanted.

It began to include…
walking away from it.

And I didn’t fully notice it at first.

But it was happening.

Slowly.
Reasonably.
Almost expertly.

Talking myself out of my own desire.
And somewhere in the middle of that, a question rose up—
clearer than all the others:

Am I the woman who trusts what I love…
Or the woman who explains it away?

And then there was something else.

I hated the idea of buying a car.

Something about dealerships, about the process—it made me uneasy.
I didn’t trust it. And I didn’t fully trust myself in it either.

I felt… susceptible.

And that didn’t sit well with me.

---

So I decided to find out why.

Because if I were going to do this,
I didn’t want to walk in, bracing myself for something unpleasant.

I wanted to be confident in it.

---

Before car school, I had already made one trip.

Pat and I went to a dealership
to look at a car I had decided would be… fine.

It was early in the process.
I hadn’t learned anything yet.

I did everything they tell you not to do.

I answered every question.
I engaged in every step.
I followed the process exactly as it was laid out.

And within a couple of hours, I felt it. That familiar experience so many people describe.

The slight pressure.
The misalignment between what was being presented and what it actually was.
The sense that I wasn’t fully in control of the conversation.

We left.

And as we walked out, I knew: I’m not doing it like that again.

That’s when I put myself in car school.

I found a few resources online—people who actually teach you how to buy a car well.

How to negotiate.
How the process works.
What to say—and what not to say.

But more than that—how to be.

I knew I didn’t want to be aggressive.
That wasn’t me.

But I also didn’t want to be swayed. I wanted to stay with myself.

And there I was—

with two conversations running at the same time.

One telling me to be practical.
To be reasonable. To adjust.

And the other asking something else entirely:

What do you actually want?
And are you willing to stand for it?

And somewhere in the middle of all of it, I saw something I hadn’t seen before.

How I abandon myself.

Not all at once—
But bit by bit.

I was adjusting what I wanted…
to match what felt available.

Kim was right.

Something was at work for me.

I can see that now.
I couldn’t fully see it then—but I could feel it.

And at the same time—

I wobbled.

This became an opportunity
to decide who I am.

I didn’t see it perfectly. But I saw enough.

And that was enough to choose.

---

From my table to yours,

Mary