Asking the question “to whom am I thankful”, more than feeling thankfulness, is the superstitious behavior here. If we allow thankfulness to have no object, the conflict is resolved.
You may be thankful to the other driver. You may be thankful to yourself or the relevant parts of your body that helped avoid a worse outcome. You may be thankful to your past self, or your alternative universe self. You may be thanking the laws of physics. Maybe we can just drop the to preposition and be done with that.
As to why you are feeling thankful, I find Antisuji and DaFranker explanations plausible.
As to what should be done about it, I can’t identify negative consequences to being thankful. Do you suspect it trains you to for risk or clumsiness?
Asking the question “to whom am I thankful”, more than feeling thankfulness, is the superstitious behavior here. If we allow thankfulness to have no object, the conflict is resolved.
You may be thankful to the other driver. You may be thankful to yourself or the relevant parts of your body that helped avoid a worse outcome. You may be thankful to your past self, or your alternative universe self. You may be thanking the laws of physics. Maybe we can just drop the to preposition and be done with that.
As to why you are feeling thankful, I find Antisuji and DaFranker explanations plausible.
As to what should be done about it, I can’t identify negative consequences to being thankful. Do you suspect it trains you to for risk or clumsiness?