Change the Friction, Not the Whole Routine

A useful lesson from looking at habits: when a routine keeps slipping, it’s easy to label the whole plan a failure. But that’s an interpretation—not yet an observation.

Start smaller. Notice where the routine breaks, keep the part that still helps, and revise one point of friction. If reading happens reliably but the planned hour doesn’t, perhaps the hour is the problem—not the wish to read.

Try the revision for a week, then check whether it made the routine easier to return to. No grand restart required; the old plan can keep its useful pages.