Planning for imperfection: Building consistency through contingency
If you’ve ever attended one of my free talks, you’ll have heard me speak about the importance of consistency over intensity. Small, repeated actions nearly always beat grand gestures where you try to overhaul everything at once.
A daily effort of just 20–30 minutes will do more for your health than a single two-hour session that leaves you sore and wiped out for days. That said, a two-hour hike every weekend is still far more effective than an enthusiastic week at the gym in January, followed by six months of direct debit payments for a membership you never use.
Consistency is also key in injury rehabilitation. Let’s be honest—rehab exercises can be boring. But one or two exercises performed mindfully, with good technique, and done consistently can have a huge impact on how quickly you recover.
One of the biggest challenges many of us face when it comes to consistency is perfectionism. That feeling that if we don’t stick to a plan perfectly, we’ve failed—and that perceived failure drains our motivation.
Take Penny, for example. She sets a goal to walk for 30 minutes every morning. She starts strong—Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday go well. But Thursday she has an early meeting and misses her morning walk. She tells herself she’ll make up for it later, but the day gets away from her. By the time she’s settled on the couch, it’s dark and cold outside. The 30-minute walk now feels daunting. She feels frustrated, starts snacking on chocolate, disrupts her evening routine, and goes to bed late. Friday morning she sleeps through her alarm, misses her walk again, and suddenly the weekend arrives with two missed days behind her. “I’ll just start again on Monday,” she says. Can you relate?
Some people respond to this by avoiding goals altogether, or setting very vague ones. It’s an understandable way to protect ourselves from disappointment—but it also reduces the chance of real progress. When I work with clients who tend toward perfectionism, there are countless strategies we explore to help them stay on track. One powerful tool is contingency planning.
Together, we identify likely obstacles and create simple, realistic alternatives in advance—so when life inevitably happens, they’re ready.
Back to Penny. If she had anticipated that early meetings might occasionally interfere with her walk, she could’ve chosen to:
Set her alarm 30 minutes earlier to keep her morning routine;
Block out a lunchtime walk with a colleague;
Finish work earlier and stop for a walk on the way home;
Or follow a short indoor walking video before dinner.
By planning for these kinds of interruptions ahead of time, we reduce the decision-making burden in the moment. We avoid having to problem-solve when we’re tired, stressed, or feeling guilty. Instead, we’re prepared—and that keeps us moving forward.
Alternatively, Penny could make a conscious choice to skip Thursday’s walk, without guilt, and recommit on Friday. That option might feel uncomfortable to some, which is why part of my work is also helping people build strategies to manage feelings of guilt or shame—emotions that can quietly sabotage progress.
Ultimately, consistency doesn’t mean perfection—it means showing up more often than not, in a way that’s sustainable. Life will always throw curveballs. The goal isn’t to dodge them all, but to build flexibility into your plan so they don’t knock you off course completely. Progress thrives in that middle ground: between structure and self-compassion, between ambition and adaptability. That’s where lasting change is made.