July Is the New January: 4 Simple Steps to Your End-of-Year Success

July is the new January for lifestyle entrepreneurs.

Think about it.

Cubicle-minded professionals start making plans, resolutions, and target objectives just moments after they've put away their December decorations.

By March, goal gusto diminishes significantly.

By the end of June, it's all but non-existent. Why? Because everyone's waiting until September to ramp up and maestro that last-quarter push to cash flow success. And by then, they're lost in the stressed-out mix of everyone else desperately trying to make their numbers work miracles.

Please, don't be a biz calendar lemming!

Use July and August to Review, Reward, Regroup, and Reinvent your path and plan, so you'll be toasting to your amazing, breakthrough success come New Year's Eve.

Here's how.

1. Review. Block out time to check in on the progress you've made on your January goals. No taking or making phone calls, no sending or receiving emails. Don't judge or sulk, just breathe in the summer vibe, evaluate with objectivity, and review the steps you've taken to achieve (or thwart) your goals so far.

2. REWARD! One of the things small business owners almost never do is stop to appreciate what they've already achieved. Well, what DID you accomplish during the first six months of the year? Identify five specific successes, and celebrate them by doing something nice for yourself and/or your business team.

3. Regroup. Okay, so you're not in the exact place you thought or hoped you'd be way back in January. Who is? The question is, where ARE you? What's working? What isn't? Are you on (or near) the right track? Have your vision and priorities changed? Once you understand the reasons behind your progress or shortcomings, you'll have a much easier time with the fourth and final step.

4. Reinvent. It's time to course correct. Look at your successes, challenges, and other discoveries, and decide to either:

• Keep doing what you've been doing, because it's working or you're convinced it will if you give it more time.

• Make changes to your tactics, strategies, and methods, because you think the ideas are good, but the execution needs tweaking to make it effective.

• Abandon the goals altogether, because they're hurting your business, or taking too much time away from things that are working well in your business, or because you're just not getting the kind of results you hoped from them.

So after a long hot July day, take some time in the cooler evening to pour yourself an ice-cold drink, enjoy the late sunset, and reflect on what you've done so far this year. Allow yourself to be pleasantly surprised at how far you've come, and use the quiet space to decide how to make the rest of your year even more successful.

And by the time everyone else jumps on the second-wave goal wagon come September, you'll be cruising with confidence on your new-and-improved path, enjoying the gifts of autumn as well as your well-deserved prosperity.