Somewhere New

A few days ago, I found myself somewhere new. It wasn't somewhere I'd planned to visit or somewhere I'd always wanted to see. In truth, I'd probably never have gone there at all had I not happened to be in the area. As I looked around, it struck me how easily I could have lived my whole life without ever experiencing that place. Not because it was hidden or difficult to reach, but because life had simply never taken me there before.

It made me wonder how many experiences we never have, not because we avoid them, but because we never give them the opportunity to happen. We tend to return to the places we know, follow familiar routines and make decisions based on what has served us well before. There's nothing irrational about that. Familiarity makes life feel efficient, comfortable and dependable.

I've noticed the same thing happening in my work. The longer I've been a chauffeur, the easier it has become to recognise the bookings that are likely to make for a straightforward day. Experience gives you a fairly accurate sense of how a journey is likely to unfold before you've even left home. Most of the time, those are exactly the bookings I choose. They fit neatly into the day and, more often than not, they run exactly as expected.

Every now and then, though, I'll accept a booking that sits just outside that pattern. Not because I think it'll be better, but because I simply don't know. Usually it's just another journey, but occasionally there's an unexpected reward. It might be a place I've never visited before, an interesting client or a conversation that stays with me long after the day has finished. None of those things appeared on the booking request. They were simply the result of allowing something different into the day.

I'm not suggesting we should spend our lives chasing the unfamiliar. Experience exists for a reason, and predictability has earned its place. But I have started to wonder whether our experience can sometimes become a little too good at steering us towards the familiar. We become so efficient at recognising what we know that we leave fewer opportunities for something unexpected to happen.

Perhaps that's the real value of occasionally breaking our own pattern. Not because we know there'll be a reward waiting for us, but because we accept that there might be. Looking back, some of the journeys I've enjoyed most weren't memorable because of where they ended. They were memorable because they began with a decision that allowed something new to happen.

Another note from the front seat.