You’ve finally found a rhythm that works. You exercise a few times a week, consciously make time to work on your business rather than just in it, regularly review your numbers, and create space for that one project you’ve been wanting to move forward for a long time.
And then something changes. You go on holiday, start a new role or move house. Your children start at a new school. Someone close to you becomes ill or passes away. Or an unexpected project suddenly demands much more of your time and attention. Before you know it, the things that matter to you are the first to disappear from your calendar.
We quickly assume we just need a little more discipline. But it’s not that simple.
Why change disrupts your routines
Much of what we do every day doesn’t happen as the result of a conscious decision. When we repeat certain behaviours often enough under the same circumstances, our brains begin to form associations between the situation and what we do. Research on habit formation shows that a particular place, time or preceding activity can eventually become an automatic cue for a behaviour.
For example, you exercise after taking the children to school, review your numbers every Friday morning, or set aside a fixed time for focused work. As long as that context remains more or less the same, your environment helps you maintain that behaviour.
Research into habits shows that when our context changes, existing habits are more easily disrupted. The cues that used to trigger our behaviour almost automatically are suddenly gone or have changed. So it’s not necessarily your motivation that has changed. The structure that supported your behaviour has changed.
Why important things are often the first to disappear
Change almost always brings new demands. Decisions need to be made, people need something from you, and new appointments, problems and deadlines appear. They have one major advantage over your long-term goals: they make it very clear that they need your attention now.
No one sends you a reminder because you haven’t worked on your strategy this week. Nothing dramatic happens today if you postpone that commercial action for another week. That important project can wait until tomorrow. Until tomorrow becomes next week, and next week becomes next month.
As an accountability mentor, I see this all the time. Most people know perfectly well where they want to go. The challenge isn’t knowing what you need to do, but continuing to make time and space for it when other things demand your attention.
That’s also why good intentions alone are often not enough. That’s also why good intentions alone are often not enough. Research into so-called implementation intentions (concrete plans for when, where and how you will take action) shows that we are more likely to follow through on our intentions. “I want to spend more time working on my business” is an intention. “On Tuesday morning from 9 to 11, I’ll work on my commercial plan” is a concrete commitment. The difference may seem small, but it makes taking action much easier.
How to become consistent again
When our routine disappears, we often wait for life to calm down again. We tell ourselves we’ll get back to it once the busy period is over or when our schedule returns to normal. But your old normal may never return.
So instead of only asking yourself how to get your old routine back, ask: what do I absolutely not want to lose sight of in this new situation?
Then decide what is realistic. Maybe you can’t exercise three times a week for now, but you can manage once. Maybe you don’t have a full day for strategy, but you can protect two hours. Maybe a project needs to move forward more slowly, but that doesn’t mean it has to stop completely.
Research on habit formation also shows that new behaviours take time to become automatic and that missing one opportunity doesn’t immediately undo your progress. Being consistent doesn’t mean you never fall out of your routine. It means you keep picking it up again.
This is exactly where accountability mentoring can help. Not by adding more pressure, but by regularly looking at what you intended to do, what you actually did and what your next concrete step will be. This form of accountability coaching helps you keep your attention on the commitments and goals that might otherwise easily slip into the background.
Final thoughts
Change is part of life, which means our routines will inevitably come under pressure from time to time. The solution isn’t to hold on to how you used to do things at all costs, but to adapt your structure to the reality of your life today.
You don’t have to keep doing everything exactly as you did before. What matters is consciously deciding what you want to maintain and making space for it again.
Would you like to bring more consistency to the plans and goals that matter to you? I’d be happy to invite you to a free introductory call. Together, we’ll look at where you are today, what you want to achieve and how accountability mentoring can help you keep moving towards it consistently.
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Not entirely sure what accountability mentoring involves? You can find out more on my FAQ page under “What is accountability mentoring and how does it work?”
