The Ministry of Circular Motion

How running errands can help keep you healthy and sane

Determined and Ready (So We Thought)

It began, as these things often do, with an innocent thought: The next task on our relocation checklist is to register at our local health centre. The purpose: To be able to make use of public health services, such as book an appointment to see a doctor. The prerequisite: Being residents and having our health numbers assigned. Check, check.

If you are new to Relocurious — the podcast and posts about the emotional side of moving — you might not know that Kathy and I moved from Canada, infused in the rhythm of how things worked there, to Portugal where, invariably, lots of things are different. The nearly three years since our move have been about re-rooting in the new place: figuring things out, getting established, and gradually feeling at home in our new community. That said, our focus in this post is less on Portugal, and more on how experience emerges as humans and human-created systems interact. Perhaps these reflections will resonate, wherever you live.

I ran a mental checklist in my head, and felt reasonably certain that we had what was needed for a successful mission. We had walked by our nearest health centre before, so we knew where to go. We had also recently taken a photo of the posted working hours. ‘Confident’ is too strong a word to describe how we felt, but we were ready, determined, and optimistic. Naïve as well, though that didn’t come to light until later.

Trying to Make Sense of It All (One Step at a Time)

We had been told that once you have your health number, all you need to do to access health services is, register at the health centre nearest you. Well, the “all you need to do” bit turned into a saga, with our experience unfolding along a series of attempted and occasionally actual visits to both existent and nonexistent health centres.

Here are the facts of our royal runaround experience, as best I remember them. (We’ll get to the thoughts and feelings that these sparked, and our resulting wants, shortly.)

#1: We went to the health centre nearest our home. It was daytime on a weekday. Not lunchtime, not a public holiday. The centre was closed. No explanation was posted. Among the signs that had been taped to the building’s entrance, there was one that said: Unless you are already registered at this centre, go to your next closest one.

#2: Google Maps showed the location and phone number. No one answered. We walked. This stop, too, featured a collection of notices. One of them, dated 2014, said: Please walk right in. Next to it was a notice that stated that the office was permanently closed: You can be served at this other health centre, some distance away. We took Bolt.

#3 was open! The security guard asked about the purpose of our visit. He pointed to the ticket dispensers (a digital one for white tickets, and two tear-off-a-ticket ones with yellow and blue tickets). We got blue tickets. After a short wait, the person at the counter stated that new registrations are processed on Fridays. It was a Wednesday.

#3 again. We had some time a couple of Fridays later, so we were back. Blue tickets, short wait. At the counter, we were asked for our address. And we were promptly told that where we live is not within this health centre’s catchment area. We would be served at yet another health centre. The employee gave us the address, and we left.

#4. This centre was farther yet from our home. We got there by Bolt. Got numbers, and approached the counter when called. We asked for patience with our very limited Portuguese. The clerk rolled her eyes, and gave us registration forms to fill out. Name, address, health number. The staff said we would be registered within two weeks.

Two days later, the eye roller called, and said the centre does not serve our address. Their doctor determined so. I asked for the address of the centre to go to, and wrote it down. It sounded familiar. As soon as the clerk hung up, it struck me that it was the address of #2. Yes, the nonexistent, permanently closed unit we had already been to.

You know that sensation when you wonder whether life is just a test? As I stared blindly out the window, it crossed my mind that the true purpose of the system might not be to register us, but to test our determination. Or self-control. Or cardio.

Over time, experiences like these ripen into fun anecdotes that we can use to assure friends that their you-won’t-believe-what-happened stories actually are believable: We’ve been there. But they leave an impression. They can spoil your day (or week, or months), and they make an impact in terms of how we learn to relate to systems and the invisible power holders behind them. I’ll take ‘this is how we’ve always done it’ as an explanation, but don’t try to sell it to me as an excuse. We can do better. Sure we can.

Are you annoyed running errands, or enjoying the opportunities to keep healthy?

Pondering and Wondering (The Four Sides of Human Experience)

Gervase Bushe, professor of leadership and organizational development at a university where I used to teach, studies human experiences. He offers a way to break them down into observations (what actually happened — such as the series of events in my runaround), thoughts (how we interpret or judge or make sense of such observations), feelings (the emotions the experience evokes in us, and how it can throw us off), and wants (the choices we have in what we — individually or collectively — do next).

The experience I described above (as observations) might further break down like this:

Thoughts: If you are like me, being sent around in circles with no end in sight is not what you expect, or appreciate. As you try to make sense of things, you may begin to question yourself. Not great for your self-esteem, self-efficacy, or mental well-being. You wonder what you are missing. You cannot imagine what might cause simple tasks to get so complicated (or why someone would not prevent them from becoming so). You wonder about the unclear, contradictory, circular messaging. And you question the confidence with which obviously incorrect information is given. Again and again.

You may also ponder the disrespect shown to you and others seeking to accomplish everyday tasks. You know that someone has figured out how to do this better, because you have tasted it elsewhere. When proven practices exist, why not implement them? Do people not see the problem, know the solutions, feel uneasy about the bizarre reality, want to make things work, care about me, the next person, one another?! You get the idea. Your thoughts about something like this can quickly spin out of control.

Feelings: Even before thoughts arrive, our bodies respond with emotions. Whether you feel mad or sad, your initial (and idealistic, as it turns out) optimism has turned into confusion. Your feelings have gone on the roller coaster of irritation, deflation, and eventually mild (hopefully mild) existential fatigue. Emotions can get overwhelming, unhelpful, wasteful. But in terms of how we experience the reality around us, feelings are just as real as the observed and interpreted (and occasionally 100% unappreciable) words and actions (and equally so inactions) that we observe in the world around us.

Wants: Interestingly, not everyone gets to wants. A person may get stuck in thoughts (eagerly sharing them with friends, neighbours, the poor person at the counter of the wrong office), or they may be overpowered by emotions (this may not be the first time this is happening to them, and the person may value their time, sanity and order more than the system would seem to). But once our emotions have had the chance to cool down, and we have sorted through our observations and thoughts, we may be well served by identifying a want, so we can move on: What’s next — and how do I get there?

Is There Another Way to See It? (Yes, But You Need to Shift Your Mindset!)

Now, if all of this strikes you as being a tad reactive, perhaps that’s because it is: You notice something, label it as a problem, try not to overreact, just make it go away, and live happily … until your next errand? How easy it is to get trapped living this way! Whether we feel offended, annoyed, or simply robbed of time, the experience is uncomfortable, so we want it to be over. The thing is, though: Unless we shift our mindset, we will almost certainly have a similarly miserable experience next time.

So try a little experiment to train your mind to notice more of what is going well, and look for ways to interpret events in constructive, positively challenging, playful ways.

You may find yourself entertained by noticing (like I did) that the person who smiles the most, speaks fluent English, and is actually keen on helping is almost always the security guard. Does it have something to do with their training? Have they lived overseas? Are they less burdened by the inefficient system? Or, have they found that their little expressions of care are what’s actually most rewarding about their job?

Or, you get philosophical: Noting that the system exhausts you in a couple of visits (like it did me), what may it do to a busy parent with a full time job who can’t take a day after day off to tour random offices? How does an elderly person, or someone in a wheelchair, move through a system like this? And how do the staff at these offices handle the work and the clients day in, day out? No wonder you rarely see them smile!

Your more psychologically curious mind may take you in another direction yet: What does a workplace like this do to the staff? Can optimism survive in rigid systems? Is the royal runaround how the system is intended to work? What purpose might it serve? When no one ‘owns’ a dysfunctional system, how can it be changed? Am I as a newcomer experiencing things differently from someone who had grown up here?

The Twist (Your Little Treat for Reading All the Way Here)

Ready to let your mind play even more? What if the system is not ill-designed or broken, just misunderstood? Maybe you just thought it was intended to get you signed up for the overloaded public health system. What if its true function is completely different, and its impact greater? Could it be mischievously architected to help with:

• Employment, by creating more job opportunities for local residents?

• Onboarding, by providing a free scavenger hunt to help you get to know the town?

• Social cohesion and social capital, by prompting you to meet and interact with more people, since you are new to town and in need of friends?

• Community integration, by nudging you to do something about your Portuguese?

• And ultimately, health promotion, by getting you to walk all around this hilly town and enjoy fresh air as you amuse new friends with your health centre hunt stories?

Then a question about the purpose of it all hits you: Did you go to all these health centres because you needed something, or just because someone (or a checklist) had said you should? Are you actually in need of any health services? And are you sure the office you are eventually supposed to ‘arrive at’ actually exists!? Maybe the idea of a health centre ready to serve you is just a myth! (I truly don’t know at this point!)

Tomorrow (What Will You Make of It?)

Some days, relocating feels like planting roots. Other days, it seems like a futile effort to make sense of weird systems. It may also bring profound realizations and shifts. I keep walking, breathing fresh air, connecting with people around me, practicing my Portuguese, keeping a positive attitude. I’ll get registered with a health centre when I actually need it (assuming the beast exists). For now, life is good. (It really is!)

We may run into each other on a walk along the river, or at a local gallery. Or at a café, if you are a coffee lover like me. I mean, I don’t think I’ll be running errands tomorrow.

Every week, Relocurious brings you a podcast episode featuring a unique story of someone on the move, or a reflection post like this one. We’d love to hear how you are handling the ups and downs of relocating — to reach out and start a conversation, please complete this simple form.