HTBP - Routine
The subconscious differentiator or overlooked tool?
Abstract
When talking about a routine, what would first come to mind?
Does your first thought go towards a specific time in the day like a morning routine, or routines for specific activities like a skincare or pre-workout routine?
When looking at productivity, routine is an essential element to understanding what is actually productive and is what enables you to be productive.
Although some routines may be trivial holistically, they do play a crucial part.
It’s link to productivity may be obvious, but contrary to this, the importance of a routine may not be acknowledged by those who lack general routine.
In this post, we will explore why routines are essential to productivity, the purpose of them, and distinguish what can be considered to be a routine and what can’t.
Discussion
What does a routine mean to me?
Personally, grasping the concept of a routine is intangible even if a definition is provided.
This is because, there are common practices shared amongst the majority of people as well as the personalisation of the routine due to their priorities, circumstances, interests, etc.
So given this, I attempted to collate the ideas I have around what a routine is.
It culminated as follows:
“A system which regiments specific times/activities which reduces the need for decisions and allows me to focus on the important things.”
In order to break down this definition, I feel as if it is important to take note of the specific word choices within it.
First the word “regiments.”
When thinking about a morning routine, which is what I led with when forming the definition, I thought of it as a subconscious but fixed routine, one that is not subject to change.
Therefore, to articulate this, I knew there was a word which would capture this the right way.
Regiment caught the drift of what I was trying to say, but I did think I got the wrong word as I was seeing definitions talking about soldiers.
Nonetheless, as a verb it means “to organize rigidly especially for the sake of regulation or control.”
It was the rigidity I was looking for, as personally a routine is one that is constant.
This works hand-in-hand with the rest of the definition, as when accustomed to a routine, it shouldn’t take much thought and therefore it reduces the need for decisions.
As a result, more focus can be allocated to what actually needs consideration.
However, for this to be achieved, consistency is the backbone to having a routine.
If you find yourself holding onto a routine rather than developing it, most likely alteration to the routine would be necessary.
Habits & Routines - Research
In retrospect, it was inevitable that when looking at how to form and develop routines, I would come across habits.
Coming into this post with the sole focus of routine meant I had to answer many questions along the way, where the first one was:
What comes first, routines or habits?
In my head, this question had undertones of which came first, the chicken or the egg.
Completely uninformed of the relation, I took a shot in the dark.
Initially I thought that a routine could develop from habits, as my perception of habits was one where it is less strict than a routine.
The idea was that a group of habits create a routine.
However, when researching the relation between habits and routine, I found out that I was completely wrong. 💀
After many searches: articles, videos, and research papers, a minority of them had their focus on the relation between habits and routines.
This is where I came across Ella Sofia, a habit coach who concisely highlighted their differences in a video.
She provided the following formula:
Habit = (cue + routine + reward) repetition
This formed the basis of one of her later points; the fact that all habits have routines.
I found this fascinating, as even on the rare occasion that routines are talked about across social media, it is used interchangeably or intertwined with habits, meaning there is a general grey area about what a routine actually is.
Alongside this, it is clear that to form a habit, a lot more than a routine is needed, making them distinct from each other.
From this, it is clear that routines come first.
Therefore, by forming structure via a routine, you can work towards building your desired habits.
Alright then.
Now I became curious as to know what the dictionary definition of a routine is.
The Cambridge dictionary defines it as: “a usual or fixed way of doing things.”
Based on this, the formula made a bit more sense.
Essentially, routine is the degree of control you have in the order for you conduct actions/tasks, which could lead to cultivating a certain habit.
But an interesting caveat was one provided by Harvard Business Review.
In their article looking at habits, they also hinted towards the relation of routines and habits.
When discussing the role of intention in order to turn a routine into a habit, they said: “some routines may blossom into habits, but not all of them can or will.”
This was then followed up with routines not being possible without conscious thought.
This highlighted that routines require effort to conduct, which culminated to an idea I had around natural and learned routine, a duality I thought of.
This is something I will come onto later.
But this made me wonder:
To what extent can we have control over what becomes habit as a result of our routines?
The article discusses what it would take to stick to a routine, but with no confirmation or conviction as to whether it leading to a habit would be successful.
This is where Future Self Journal steps in.
In their blog distinguishing between routines and habits they advised: “Start small, set clear triggers for your habits, and gradually build consistency” in order to action a long-term change in habits.
Of course, nothing can be perfect or guaranteed, but by verbalising the formula given by Ella, this highlighted how you could increase the possibility/likelihood of developing a certain habit.
In the following section, I will place emphasis on ‘certain’, as choosing what habits we adopt is ultimately what leads to productivity.
Natural v Learned Routine
This led me onto the duality of routine: Natural v Learned Routine.
Inspired by trying to understand what a routine is and isn’t, I thought of whether there is more to routines than just having routines for specific times or activities.
This is because, routine is a word that can be used loosely to describe repeated practices.
But what’s the difference between it and a timetable?
Alluding to my previous point of routine being something that is personalised, it is key to highlight how our natural reaction to both may enable us to identify what is what.
The distinction I made between a timetable and a routine, is that a timetable requires more conscious effort to follow.
A dream for me would be having a calendar including a skeleton/framework of what my days include and doing it over a period of time to the point it becomes natural, where discipline to stick to it wouldn’t be in question.
But why is it a dream?
The reason it is a dream is because not everything can be influenced by us/controlled, which affects the consistency in the routine being maintained.
Now in reflection of the points made immediately above, you may realise where routine is natural and where it becomes learned.
The duality is introduced as soon as I discuss my dream of what my routine would be.
This is because, everyone has some form of routine.
Whether it is because it is something that is imposed on them, such as having to wake up at specific times, or whether it is due to a consistent practice, such as having breakfast or not.
A key point between natural v learned routine is that: one side is convention; making it easy to follow, the other side requires effort.
From my view, the dream routine is learned meaning it requires significantly more effort.
This is where productive gains are present.
Aside from essential/required tasks and activities, what makes your routine yours?
The routine that has been formed throughout my life is simply a baseline but is something that wouldn’t probe me towards the person I aspire to be.
Activities such as exercise, reading books, and generally prioritising health are amongst many activities that we know would be nice to have, but there is no urgency associated with them or pain associated with not fulfilling goals within them.
In an attempt to view this more holistically, I asked:
Could this be the reason there is a market for high life influencers - almost as if we are vicariously living our dreams through them?
They are doing the things that we may feel we should be doing, but this would require a significant shift in mindset and routine.
But why would you change your routine if you are comfortable with the one you have already?
There are many potential answers to this, and one point that might be drawn upon is fear.
Fear of the unknown, fear of pain, fear of failure, etc.
But understanding that the backbone of structure is routine, and the backbone of routine is consistency, means that you would realise that not adapting your routine to cater towards the goals/targets you wish to reach would only leave you falling short.
A way to articulate the consequence of integrating favourable behaviour into your learned routine is you gaining the unappealing benefits.
The benefits of an activity may be obvious, but the requirement of effort discourages majority of people, resulting in behaviours that are counterproductive.
Your potential lies in a learned routine, as it means you have successfully gained the ability to obtain those unappealing benefits.
At the forefront of this is the fact that you have actively chosen the direction in which you are headed.
A natural routine does not provide a conscious direction:
If you just let life happen to you, it wouldn’t go for you.
Knowing the ‘why’ behind change and being prepared for the challenges ahead is the first step to a learned routine, as I have learnt from experience.
That is where the mindset shift takes place.
Conclusion
Routine is a fundamental of your general life structure.
It is a consistency neutraliser but on a larger scale, a concept I introduced in my post on time blocking.
To not have any learned routine is to be ignorant to the potential within you and the opportunities ahead.
The only exception is when external change significantly affects your existing routine, in which adaptation and experimentation is key.
This leads me to a point on experimentation.
It is difficult to experiment when a routine is already established, as with every exploration, there is unwanted but unavoidable risk:
In times of change, experimentation is where opportunity lies. Instead of grasping onto what is falling away, propel yourself to something unfamiliar, something that intrigues you, and see what happens. It is impossible not to learn something.
But when circumstances for the most part are constant, a routine should be seen almost as automating the admin.
Admin work has to be done & never have I heard of it being appealing.
When combining this with the practice of building favourable habits independently, you will move closer to the person you aspire to be.
With action and attention towards distraction, your perceived goals would become dreams.
Master a routine you can control to master the time you have and how you use it.
P.S.
Did you know the difference between routines and habits?
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