There are milestones that are considered very momentous, and celebrated wildly by friends, family and even strangers that witness the event. Weddings, children, graduations or buying a new house are all grand celebratory moments in life. But these events are one time events, or maybe even things you are not interested in, causing long lapses between the high moments. But, there are a lot of things to celebrate, that maybe we do not focus on enough.
I will get to things we can celebrate, but first let’s review how this is not gratitude. Daily gratitude is a wonderful practice to keep you present, grounded and appreciative. These moments of daily gratitude help you focus on the positive, and not the struggles that are bound to present themselves daily. Gratitude can be the smallest joys, like the perfect cup of coffee, or gratitude for a sunny day. But these are not celebrations of yourself.
Lets also quickly add that a celebration is not necessarily a reward. You don’t need to go out and buy yourself something (you can if you want). The celebration of the achievement is acknowledgement. Maybe you share something on social media, or take a day off to rest. Maybe you go to dinner with people that helped you achieve the goal and are important to you. It is more about reflecting and appreciating the achievement, than buying something unrelated.
Celebrating yourself can feel awkward. Am I being conceited? I don’t need to celebrate, this is what was expected of me. This is not big enough to make a big deal about. This is not bigger than graduating, or getting married. I have already achieved my biggest goals. I will celebrate when I hit a bigger milestone. These are probably all things we have considered. But stop. Full stop. We can always grow and improve. We can always learn new things. And just getting started on a task is a huge milestone in and of itself. It seems so important to me to not only focus on your past, and think nothing else will be as good as the previous big achievement. Having pride and self confidence are important, and should not be conflated with selfishness.
Learning to celebrate yourself brings about self confidence, and motivation for what you have achieved. When you take a minute to realize how far you have come, you can appreciate the moment. And realize you can achieve more. You learn it does not matter if you did more or less than someone else, or if your goal was less impressive than what someone else achieved. You did more than you did last year, or maybe than yesterday. You have achieved more than maybe you thought you could. And I think this tends to spill over and you start to recognize the small goals of others around you.
What if you became your number one fan, which inevitably made you support those around you. What if we did not minimize the small steps that move us forward and eventually lead to big changes. Instead of comparing yourself, you are recognizing your own life and appreciating those achivements.
So, lets discuss some amazing acts to celebrate.
- Taking the first step for your mental health and seeing a counselor.
- Getting your own place, whatever that means to you.
- Being consistent with exercise, a small step in perhaps a larger goal of fitness or health. Just going out there and showing up for yourself.
- Leaving a job that was draining. Celebrate making a hard choice and putting yourself first
- Promotion.
- Making positive changes in your life to align yourself with your values. Maybe changing who you follow on social media, leaving a partner, finding a partner, moving.
- Reading a self help book.
- Making your bed everyday.
- Making changes to be more ecofriendly!
- Not missing any bill payments for a full year. Or downloading an app and setting it up to be more consistent with your bills, that is the first step!
I also took a poll and asked what things people accomplished this year but didn’t celebrate. They thought the actions were not big enough, or did not even realize they succeeded because they were focused on the next achievement.
- Paying off student loans.
- Staying in touch with family and friends throughout the year.
- Student evals with high marks.
- Improving body image by throwing away a scale!
- Doing one small aspect of a goal a day, which add up to big changes.
- Not being so hard on themselves.
- Being more present with the kids.
Lastly, taking a second to congratulate someone on a goal is so easy, and probably immeasurably valuable to that person. Complimenting a look is fleeting, but noticing someone doing something consistently is much more impressionable.
What goals have you seen someone completing, what routines have people around you committed to, that you could compliment? What did you not celebrate this year that you should take the time to acknowledge?
