Recently during a conversation with a client over the summer she was telling about her 5 year old graduation from Kindergarten.  Kindergarten?!? I don’t remember graduating.  A few weeks later I discuss this concept with another consultant who said he never went to his graduation after receiving his master’s degree from University.  And then in dawn on me that in children we celebrate progress; any progress. We throw parties for every achievement.  We applaud their efforts. We hug them, kiss them, congratulate them, and reward them for the tiniest advances. According to early childhood research this atmosphere of encouragement can play a large role in the accelerated progress children make in the early months and years of their lives.

We are used to downplaying our successes and over-playing our failures, and it is so important that we change our focus! I’m not suggesting that we overlook any shortcomings or mistakes, since they are key learning points, but we do need to make sure we don’t pay so much attention to them that we have no time or energy to celebrate our successes. Our lives are so busy that we have programmed ourselves to always keep moving and keep working toward that next accomplishment, forgetting to stop and pay attention to what we just accomplished. We convince ourselves that we don’t have time to celebrate, and that everything else is more important than celebrating.

Our capacity for improvement is unmistakable and limitless. Whether it is professionally or personally, in the area of health and well-being, personal finances, relationships, diet and exercise, or character and spirituality, we have an extraordinary ability to improve.  I challenge you to change that belief and to increase the value of celebration in all aspects of our lives.

Celebrating our success is important for several reasons:

It makes us aware of what we’ve accomplished, building our confidence to keep taking BOLD ACTIONS and reach even greater heights.

It gives us a reason to pause in the midst of high-action, potentially stressful days and give energy to that which we want to grow. Stress is often caused by our fear that we won’t get things done or that we will fail in some way, so when we stop to celebrate a success, we change our focus from fear to belief.

The more room we make for celebration, the less room we have for criticism.

Who you are today is only a shadow of who you are capable of being. It is our potential that most excites and frustrates us.  Focus on this question to drive your pursuit of progress: “Am I better today than I was yesterday?”

Knowing we will be celebrating our successes gives us additional motivation toward achieving success. The more successes, the more chances to celebrate!

Call a senior consultant with Ember Carriers at (513) 984-9333 for a free strategy session consultation to learn how you can FUEL your workplace and learn to celebrate you companies success.

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