1. You need to deeply desire the goal or resolution.
I've been working at this goal for about 9 years now. I shouldn't say I've been working at it...because I really never had a definite plan like what I'm about to show you. But I have been consistently running, entering races, and wanting to reach the goal. To be honest I was almost content to just let it go and give in to "slowing down with age". Then I decided to give it one really systematic hard effort. I wanted to give it my best shot.
2. Visualize yourself achieving the goal.
One thing I always do before a race is to make an iPod playlist specific to that race. I choose songs and order them in the list based on where in the race I will hear them. For example, I usually start with a slower, catchy beat to get me into a rhythm. In the middle of the race are longer songs with a steady beat. Towards the end of the race I put songs that are fast or inspirational. Then I listen to this playlist on some of my training runs and visualize how I will feel and where in the race I'll be during that particular song. I found this to be very effective at boosting my confidence and in turn, my performance. It helped that "Eye of the Tiger" played as I was nearing the finish line!
3. Make a plan for the path you need to follow to accomplish the goal.
In order to push myself, I joined a running group through a local running store. They had a specific training plan for the race I wanted to run. I knew that if I followed the plan and attended all the group training runs, that I would be giving myself the best shot at achieving my goal. I had a map of the path I needed to follow. It was up to me to put in the work.
4. Commit to achieving the goal by writing down the goal.
Rather than writing down my goal, I committed to it in two different ways. I hung up a copy of my training plan both at my office and at home, so it was visible to me no matter where I was spending my time. And of course, it was visible to anyone who came into my office. Second, for certain long runs the training group was divided into "pace groups" based on how fast they wanted to finish the race so that we could practice running our goal pace. By joining a certain pace group, I made it known exactly how fast I wanted to run this race. The people with whom I ran all knew my goal.
5. Establish times for checking your progress in your calendar system.
Luckily, this was built in for me in the form of the training schedule and running group. I knew that halfway through my training I needed to be able to run 10 miles without feeling completely exhausted at the end in order to be able to run 13.1 miles as fast as I needed to on race day. I also made it a point to run a segment of the race route at various points in my training to get a feel for the terrain. By race day, I had run every segment of the route at least once so that it was all familiar to me. I knew every hill and curve ahead of time only because I used them to check my progress during my training.
6. Review your overall progress regularly.
I've blogged about my beloved running partner before and I couldn't have reached my goal without it. My Garmin allowed me to save all of my running times and routes and download them onto my computer. Visualizing my progress was incredibly powerful. Reviewing your progress will allow you to make adjustments if necessary and will hopefully give you a little boost 'o motivation when you see that you actually are making progress.
This achievement of mine is certainly nothing to brag about and many people have achieved my race time with minimal effort and training. But that's not the point. The point is that this was my goal and I was, in a sense, competing with myself. Or at least the part of myself who thought getting older meant getting slower. That's just not true.
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