Sticking with a goal or building a new habit is hard. Half the battle is just remembering to do the action. As such, there’s a whole industry of planners and apps designed to help with this problem.

And while they can be helpful, the trouble with using paper planners and apps to track progress is that they require you to choose to open them. You could just not open your planner for a few days, and the chain of habits is broken. Apps are supposed to solve this problem with reminders. But I’ve found that their notifications just become one more digital distraction for me, another thing I learn to tune out.

By putting your plan somewhere visible, in the real world, there’s no decision to check it. You are just passively confronted with it every time you walk by.

This is just James Clear’s first law of habit change applied to building a new habit: Make it obvious.

A couple of months ago, I created a simple print out of a new workout plan for myself, and I stuck it on the wall in my office. Each morning, I walk past it and I see the line drawn through all the days I’ve completed, and a simple outline of the day’s workout.

There’s just something very satisfying about seeing weeks of progress all in one place. And it keeps me motivated not to break the chain.

In our day of prolific productivity tools, one of the biggest battles we face is resisting the urge to overcomplicate everything.

You don’t need the perfect planner or the perfect app or the ultimate productivity system. Whether its exercise, a Bible reading plan, or something else you want to do more consistently, just create a simple plan and put it somewhere visible.