Ruthlessly pursue your goals

In a previous post, I talked about asthma, diet, getting fit, and other life changes.  I have continued running as a regular part of my fitness routine.  A few of months ago, while I was logging a run on the Garmin Connect web site, I ran a report of all my running activities since I started using a GPS-enabled running watch.  It turned out that I was just a few hundred miles short of 1,000 all-time recorded miles.  In my case, "all-time" means since Father's day, 2011 - about 14 months ago.

I calculated my average miles per week to-date and set a weekly mileage goal for myself that was slightly higher than that average.  Based on that miles-per-week number, I also set a date to hit 1,000 recorded miles.  The date was August 31st, 2012.

Then I went about meeting or beating my goal each week.  In the end, I beat both my minimum per-week miles and therefore, I beat the date too.  As of today, I have recorded 1,000 running miles!  It is enormously satisfying to set and achieve a goal like this.

Is there a lesson to this story?  Maybe.  If you like lessons.

Ruthlessly pursue your goals and you can achieve great things.  Set a big goal.  Break it into smaller, more immediately achievable goals.  Get to work.

Now if you'll excuse me, I think I'll go for a run and ponder my next goal.  Maybe 1,000 miles in a calendar year?


Shameless plug:
I have spent the past thirteen years writing code and managing teams of software engineers in the financial services industry. To learn more, look me up on LinkedIn.