Sean Moncrieff: Habit is a survival mechanism, but it can also be a trap

The older you are, the less surprised you get. When your first child comes, for instance, it’s an astonishing and, at times, overwhelming experience. It’s less so for the subsequent kids. Not that you don’t love them every bit as much; it’s just that experience, and habit, have prepared you better. The neural pathways have been etched in your brain. Every birth and every child will have their unique qualities, of course, but now you are armed with a template. As time goes on, there tend to be fewer surprises, because you’ve seen something like this before.

And this applies not just to children, but to most aspects of life: jobs, house-buying, going on holidays. In our house, the long-established habit is that I organise holidays. I find the flights, the places to stay, the restaurants, the list of things we might do. Herself’s holiday isn’t just the thing in itself, but the delicious surrender of not having to organise anything and not having to worry that there might be any unwelcome shocks.

It’s a trade-off. For life to function efficiently, we have to do things in a habitual way. But what’s often sacrificed is the surprise of the new, good and bad. These well-established mental templates explain why time seems to speed up as we get older – because we’ve seen a lot of it before – and why younger people can sometimes seem disproportionately excited by relatively humdrum experiences.

Survival mechanism

Habit is also a survival mechanism, a tool for dealing with the unexpected. According to medical research, I’m at exactly the right age to die while having sex. I’m prepared to risk it, but Herself makes sure the will is up to date and the medical insurance is topped up.

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And habit is also how most of us dealt with the past two years. Of course, at first it was a novelty; even a bit exciting. Politicians making speeches we actually listened to. The streets deserted, gardaí operating checkpoints. For a few weeks it was a Hollywood blockbuster and, for the conspiracy-minded, everything they’d ever wanted.

But as it dragged on, as it became apparent that it wouldn’t be over any time soon, we all developed new habits. The masks, the Zoom calls, the social distancing. The staying indoors. The new normal quickly became the old normal; and I suspect that for many people it became increasingly difficult to remember what it felt like before. Certainly, it did for me. It still is.

Over the past two years, Friday nights in our house involved staying in with takeaway and wine. At first, it was a novelty, then a comfort. I would look forward to it and was mildly resentful on the few occasions when it didn’t happen. But such habits can also be traps, and now that we are on the off-ramp of the pandemic, it takes considerable effort to break them.

No hugging

Two years ago I wrote here that once it was all over, I’d immediately indulge in a rampage of hugging and hand-shaking. But it hasn’t been as simple as that. I find I’ve had to force myself to go back to the way it was before, to fight back the mild alarm at unmasked faces and people rubbing shoulders.

I suspect I’m not the only one. This is anecdotal, but on weekdays the centre of Dublin is still relatively quiet. It’s far easier than it was to get a parking spot. People still working from home may account for some of this, but no doubt there are people not ready to face the shops or the pubs, either for medical reasons or because they still can’t break the protective habits they’ve come to rely on.

Hopefully, in time they will. We all will, and arrive at a time where we’ll reminisce about the weirdness we’ve lived through. We’ll do it in pubs and restaurants and each other’s homes. And over a Friday night takeaway.