Not forgetting things

[jack]

Whenever I leave the house, I always take with me my wallet, phone and keys. It's really rare I forget this -- my subconscious is quite attuned to the "leaving the house" process, and if I feel there's nothing in my pockets, it really stands out, and I know I need to get them before I go.

However, I'm careful never to put any of them in my pockets except when I put ALL of them in. Because when I have one, my subconscious says "all OK, let's go".

I could alternatively make a conscious check I have ALL of them before I leave. But that seems too complicated. Human brains and bodies are really good at following habits -- except when you interrupt half way through and don't notice the possible ways it could go wrong later.

Comments

[gerald_duck]

Ah. In my left pocket I have penknife, keys, mobile phone; in my right, wallet and change. I know pretty exactly the weight of everything in my left pocket, so can tell if something is missing. Then I just have to be sure I have my wallet.

Then again, I always leave everything in the pockets of one pair of trousers until I atomically movbe it all into the pockets of another pair.

The only excception is if temporarily wearing formal wear, at which point I may pare down what I'm carrying, put mobile in jacket pocket, etc. That's how car keys get locked in the boot…

[emperor]

I had too high a failure rate of correctly attaching my pannier or zipping up the key pocket (mostly the latter, which caused me to lose ID cards), so now I do a "clip, clip, zip" check before setting off. If I set off and realise I forgot the check, I stop and double-check.