Write it down; a rule held only in the head is a wish. Keep it to one page and to four headings. Prayer: the fixed times and the fixed forms — morning prayer, a set period of mental prayer, the Angelus▾, an examination at night, Mass and confession at named intervals. Word and study: what you will read daily and for how long. Penance and asceticism: the Friday penance, one small daily mortification, the concrete disciplines you have found you need. Charity and duty: the works of mercy you have actually committed to, and the duties of your state — spouse, children, employment — named as part of the rule rather than as what the rule competes with. Then obey two principles. First, make it small enough to keep on your worst ordinary week, not your best; a rule that fails is worse than none. Second, show it to a confessor or spiritual director before you adopt it, and review it with them twice a year, tightening what has become easy and cutting what has proved impossible. When you break it, resume the same day without drama. The Catechism is blunt about the necessity: we cannot pray at all times if we do not pray at specific times, consciously willing it.

The Catechism notes that the Tradition of the Church proposes to the faithful certain rhythms of prayer intended to nourish continual prayer — daily prayers, the Liturgy of the Hours, the Sunday Eucharist, the cycle of the liturgical year. A personal rule is simply the application of that principle to one particular life, and every school of spirituality provides one.

Kept daily; reviewed with a director twice a year