CA053: 6 ways why you should celebrate success

‘The more you praise and celebrate your life, the more there is in life to celebrate.’ Oprah Winfrey Introduction We all like celebrating don’t we?  But do we do enough of it. There’s lots of reasons to celebrate – sporting victories, birthdays, weddings, new job, and ways of doing it – party, slap-up meal, presents – and so the list could go on and on. Important and great as all of those are, that’s not the sort of celebration we’re talking about here. Because we’re interested in why and how celebrating can help us make changes in life and business and achieve our goals. it all comes down to 6 reasons why you should celebrate success. All too often this side of review and evaluation gets missed. We focus on what’s not working so we can change it and forget to recognise what’s gone well and to purposefully stop and celebrate it. And not just in passing but – but also to recognise it and do something positive about it – in other words to celebrate it – on purpose. We’ve got lots to celebrate this week The Changeability Podcast turns 1 year this week In top 100 self-help podcasts on UK iTunes Our 9th wedding anniversary Surprise birthday night out These are all special occasions but what about the more everyday things we do – especially around achieving our goals, making changes, and getting more success. Why should we celebrate? So that’s all nice and lovely but what’s the big deal with celebrating our achievements and successes – is there an actual reason why we should do it. In other words how will it help our changeability. You wont be surprised to hear that there is? 1. To learn and adapt To recognize what’s working well and why, and if there’s is something you can take from it to inspire or replicate in other actions and goals. So basically you can do more of it. And what about from a mind management perspective? 2. Developing a success mindset Whatever we want to change, achieve or have more of – be it money, health, fitness, romance, happiness – success lies at the heart of it. A large part of success is about your state of mind – so it’s about having a success mindset. And this success mindset requires cultivation. Yes, techniques like affirmations and visualisation have a part to play, but celebrating your success is another tool for cultivating a success mindset. Focus on what you’ve accomplished, rather than a long overwhelming list of what you’ve still got to do.  Celebrate every success, no matter how small the win, to cultivate your success mindset. By telling yourself ‘I am successful’ or ‘I can succeed because I’ve succeeded before’ you build up your self-belief and success attitude. Conversely by not noticing or downplaying your success, or thinking it’s down to luck or others, you may be telling yourself you haven’t done enough to be proud of, or you don’t deserve to celebrate. Whereas when you notice and celebrate your successes you then start to see yourself as someone who is successful rather than someone who’s trying to become successful. 3. Motivation Motivation is also connected to mindset - because we are motivated by our successes. So give yourself as many opportunities to be successful as you can. Notice the small wins along the way. If you break your goals down into milestones, actions, and trigger actions, each give you the chance to mark up a success and reinforce the changes you’re making. This can have a cumulative effect leading to the magic of momentum. 4. Feeling good One of the best reasons to celebrate success is simply that it feels good. Feeling good is what it’s all about after all, isn’t it? We’re driven to make changes in our lives because we want to feel better, be happier and feel good.  Or as Esther Hicks puts it, ‘There’s nothing more important than that you feel good’. 5. Happy chemicals There’s a reason why it feels good when we celebrate success and it’s to do with the neurohappy chemicals in our brain. Dopamine is released into our brain when we anticipate achieving something or we achieve it - and it feels good, so we want more of it. We also get it from not such healthy pursuits, so why not build lots of opportunities for that dopamine rush into what we do, like setting small goals so we have lots of chances to celebrate success. 6. Sharing success Celebrating success isn’t necessarily just about you. It might be, but it can also give others the chance to join in with your celebration, be motivated and have a share in your success. And a good point to remember is you have to recognise your own success if you want other people to as well. How you do it is up to you – but just do it and have some fun. Episode 53 of The Changeability Podcast You’ll hear about all of this and much more in episode 53 of the Changeability Podcast, which you can hear on iTunes, Sticher, TuneIn or the top of this page. Including: What a good old knees up is What’s weird about celebrating our birthdays Julian singing his favourite song from High Society What went from medication to meditation Is there a difference between lilac and lavender Celebrating #1 on iTunes and Kindle When people don’t want to celebrate success with you Learning through celebration How celebration can change your mindset Feeling good and releasing happy neurochemicals The link between celebration and momentum How celebrating success motivated us this week Sharing success   Links mentioned in episode 53 Episode 52 - Stop and think. The importance of evaluation Episode 51 - Avoiding the 'F' word, the fear of failure Changeability Starter Kit Kimanzi Constable (website) iTunes and Stitcher for nice reviews for our success folder! Brilliant Living HQ Facebook page and Brilliant Living Twitter for nice messages for our success folder!   Thank you for reading or listening We’re celebrating you today for reading this and listening to us and for generally being amazing. So what about you – what are you going to celebrate achieving today and how? Let us know in the comments below. Don’t forget to sign up for your Changeability Starter Kit