# Plans vs. routines By [The Slow Hunch by Nick Grossman](https://paragraph.com/@nickgrossman) · 2018-10-09 --- Sunday night over dinner, my son, parents and I were discussing the [saving / investing system](https://ngis.lndo.site/2018/teaching-kids-to-invest/) we set up for our kids in the spring. The idea was/is: set a monthly budget for purchases (in their case, mostly online movies, tv shows and games), and include a really healthy interest rate (20% monthly) to encourage savings. What a great idea! I got lots of really nice feedback on the post back in March. My son described the system to my parents, but instead of describing the concept, as I just did, he described the reality: we set the budget, did it for a few months, and then basically forgot about it. So, rather than teach my kids a valuable lesson about saving and investing, I thought them how weak my own follow-through can be. Ouch. It reminds me of a psychology study that found that announcing a plan is, in fact, detrimental to seeing the plan through — because, you get a nice dose of good feeling by announcing the plan, so much so that you [lose the motivation to actually do it](https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/ulterior-motives/200905/if-you-want-succeed-don-t-tell-anyone). This is, of course, problematic, and to be avoided. If I’m honest, I can think of plenty of times where this has happened to me. I’ll refrain from listing them all out here, but trust me, there are more than a few examples. Looking back, the times I have been the most successful at seeing something hard and long-term all the way through are the times when I have just done it and not said anything about it. [Show, don’t tell](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Show,_don%27t_tell). The holy grail is when something goes from being a plan to being a routine. Routine is so powerful, and yet somehow, sometimes, so elusive. At USV, we have built-in routine in some very useful ways — most notably, around our Monday team meeting (similar to most investment teams). The cadence is valuable and sets the tone for a lot of our work. I have personally found it harder to get good routines going when it comes to writing, exercise, and a bunch of other things I think are important. Generally speaking, I find myself to be more bursty than reliably consistent. It is something to work on (but not talk about until it’s done…) --- *Originally published on [The Slow Hunch by Nick Grossman](https://paragraph.com/@nickgrossman/plans-vs-routines)*