A new habit feels less foreign after it has survived an unremarkable week.

Beginnings run on novelty, and novelty makes almost anything easy for a while. What settles a practice into your life is not the enthusiastic first attempt but the plain stretch afterwards, when nothing is interesting and you do it anyway. A dull week with no encouragement in it is the real test, and passing it quietly changes how the thing feels. It stops being a project and starts being something you happen to do.

So do not judge a new routine by its opening days. Give it one ordinary week, expect the flatness, and count showing up on the least inspiring day as the strongest evidence you have.