How we react when taken out of our usual routines

The column below appears in this week's INM Irish regional newspaper.

Michael Commane
Are you someone who thinks outside the box? Would you consider it a compliment if someone told you that you were such a person?

Or put it another way: do you think that you are adaptable, do you think that you are someone who can easily make changes, in other words, using 'cool' parlance, are you able to go with the flow?
I imagine most people are fairly confident that they are not stick in the muds and are well able to cope with changes in their lives.

Yes, certainly on one hand, there is something in the human psyche that makes us remarkably adaptable. Indeed, it is in many ways the signature tune of being human. When the most horrendous things happen we seem to be able to stand up and get going again. But in another sense, there is something about us that makes us such people of habit. And the older we get the more slow we are to change our ways. Somehow or someway or other we develop a lifestyle, a way or surviving that suits us and on we march. Maybe if that were not the case we would have universal bedlam and live in an anarchic world.

Just stop for a second and ask yourself how your daily routine works out. I bet you will realise that you do most things the same way every day, from how you eat your breakfast to how you get into bed at night time.

I remember on one occasion in a hotel watching people have their breakfast and it crossed my mind that's the way they eat their breakfast every morning. At the time it sort of struck me as all so weird.
I'm off to Zambia next Sunday. Flying to the capital Lusaka and then going on to Mongu, which is a good distance west of Lusaka

As you may know I work in the press office of Concern Worldwide. Concern works in Zambia so I am going out on a field trip. The plan is that I will see first-hand the work that we are doing and then write up stories for various print outlets.

Okay, I have lived in Italy and Germany, been to Australia, visited a Dominican friend in Taiwan but this is my first time to go on a Concern assignment and my first time to set foot on the African continent.

Two weeks ago I got all my jabs for the journey and have taken anti-malaria medication for a number of days. I have been to the pharmacy and armed myself with prescriptions the likes of which I have never seen before or even dreamt of. But it's all par for the course for anyone who visits certain parts of the world. The doctor also gave me expert advice as how to keep myself well when I am in Zambia.

I can begin to hear you say, 'who cares'. And that's exactly what I am thinking too. Here I am doing something that thousands of people do every day and I am making such a fuss about it. See, I am being taken out of my ordinary day-to-day living and to tell you the truth I am quite nervous.

I'm wondering and of course hoping that I'll do a good job. What happens if it all goes pear shape?

I'm asking the daftest of questions and worrying about such silly things. Better not lose my passport.

One day last week I checked the date of the flight, wondering if I had mixed up the dates and missed my flight. All really silly stuff. That's I.

But I have a sneaky suspicion that anytime any of us are taken out of our customary way of doing things we get some sort of jolt and it has all sorts of knock-on effects.
                               
I'm even wondering days in advance how long it will take the bus to get to Dublin Airport.

And I thought I was Mr Adaptable.