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“Next month, I’ll start investing properly.”
You’ve probably said it at least once.
The salary comes in. Rent goes out. EMIs go out. Groceries, fuel, school fees, subscriptions, a few unexpected expenses and suddenly the month is over.
So you tell yourself: “Next month will be different.”
Next month, I’ll start that SIP.
Next month, I’ll increase my insurance cover.
Next month, I’ll finally build an emergency fund.
And because next month hasn’t arrived yet, it feels completely possible.
Then next month comes. And life happens again.
This is where Optimism Bias and the Planning Fallacy quietly enter our financial decisions.
We tend to imagine our future selves as more disciplined, more organised and less financially stretched than we actually are today.
We underestimate how many unexpected expenses will come our way and overestimate how easily we’ll be able to stick to the plan.
So the plan isn’t necessarily unrealistic. Our picture of the future is.
We aren’t lying to ourselves. We genuinely believe that next month will be easier.
That’s what makes this bias so powerful.
Think about how this affects investing.
Someone decides: “From April, I’ll invest ₹20,000 every month.”
But if they are currently struggling to consistently save ₹5,000, the problem isn’t motivation.
The plan is built around an imagined future version of themselves.
A version who will spend less, earn more, face fewer surprises and suddenly become extremely disciplined.
And when that version doesn’t appear, the person feels like they have failed.
Sometimes the better approach is not to create a more ambitious plan.
It’s to create a plan that the current version of you can actually keep.
Start with what you can sustain. Increase it when your circumstances genuinely change.
There’s a useful question to ask before making any financial plan:
“Am I planning for my real life—or for the life I hope I’ll have?”
Because a financial plan doesn’t become good because it looks impressive on paper.
It becomes good when real life can actually follow it. And sometimes, the smartest investment plan isn’t:
“Next month, I’ll finally do it properly.” It’s: “What can I start doing consistently today?”
