Stop!  Check your calendar.  If you didn’t realize it already, today is the last day of June.  Which means we are halfway through the year.  Hard to believe, but it’s true.

What that also means, it’s time to revisit your yearly goals.  We should do this exercise regularly, but most of us get too stuck in our day-to-day activities, and before we know, we’re halfway through the year wondering where the time went.

How are you pacing to the goals you set for yourself?

Are you on track to end the year where you wanted?  If not, it’s time to do some reverse engineering of your goals.

I was reminded this past weekend of the importance of reverse engineering goals while doing my morning workout.

My kids have been out of school for a month, and work activities are high, so my workouts have fallen victim.  My total steps in a 30-minute elliptical workout have decreased by 10%.

When I start a 30-minute workout, I have my end goal – the total number of steps I want to achieve.  And while it’s with the best intentions to begin my workout saying I will hit that number, the truth is, I need to break it down into smaller pieces to make it manageable, and more importantly, achievable.

And so, the workout begins.  Each level of intensity is broken down into two-minute blocks, and I set a goal for each.  After 25% of my workout is complete, I quickly multiply steps by 4 to see how I’m pacing to my end goal and adjust my effort as needed.  I do the same at 50% complete and 75% complete.  

I go all out for the last two-minute effort because we can all push ourselves to max capacity for a short period.  And by breaking down my total goal into shorter, more achievable pieces, I’ve figured out what smaller actions I need to take to achieve the bigger goal.

And, not only did I achieve my goal, I beat it.

OK, only by eight steps, but darn it, I beat it!

How will you reverse engineer your goals for the second half of the year to make sure you end up where you want to be?