At 6:30 this morning I heard the front door close. I rolled over in bed, choosing another twenty minutes of sleep. But Josh, my 13-year-old son, had chosen a five-mile run. He has a goal for the summer: to run 300 miles in preparation for his freshman year on the Evart cross country team.
A few minutes later my cell phone dinged. It was a text message from one of our neighbors, “Pretty impressive: Josh is doing what others are not.”
It’s true. Goals are easy to set, everyone sets them. But the hard part, and the difference between success and an ordinary existence, is the getting out of bed and running five miles part.
Here’s how I know Josh is going to make his 300 mile goal this summer:
- His goal is public. While he’s not one to talk a lot about himself, he has told people as they’ve asked, and he has made sure the important people around him know what his goal is.
- He is tracking his progress. We’ve talked about this several times, and, while there’s not going to be a sticker chart, he is working out a system that will help him log his miles and track his progress towards his goal. (For now, he’s keeping track the same way he remembers what page he’s on in a book—in his head.)
- He knows how he is going to achieve his goal. The math for this one isn’t hard. He knows how many miles he needs to hit each week, and knows how many he can and should do in a day.
- He has built-in margin. Josh knows that plans change, that some days the weather will be lousy, he won’t be feeling well, or we’ll be traveling. Because of this, he’s planning to be slightly ahead every week, which allows for these expected, but unknown changes.
- He knows what it will mean to reach this goal. There’s no prize, no t-shirt, and no trophy for finishing 300 miles this summer. But Josh knows that last summer, when one of his friends did 300 miles over the summer, she cut several minutes off her 5k time. That’s all Josh
needs. He has the end in mind.
So, I finally rolled out of bed, took care of my chickens and watered my new grass, and then sat down to write.
What will you do today that others are not?
