A realistic plan gives ordinary life a place instead of treating it as an interruption.

Plans tend to be drawn for an imaginary week in which nothing happens. No dentist, no sick child, no washing machine failing, no afternoon lost to nothing in particular. Real weeks contain all of that, and a plan with no room for it is not ambitious so much as inaccurate, and it teaches you to experience your own life as a distraction from your intentions.

When you next map out a month, put the ordinary things in first, as though they were appointments. What remains is the honest amount of time you have to spend.