Celebrate Daily
What is keeping you from celebrating today?
Celebrations don’t have to be big or grand. It could be as simple as treating yourself to a coffee, sharing a success or gratitude with a friend, buying your partner flowers, building a fort out of pillows and blankets with your kids, etc. Too often I think we wait to celebrate when the conditions are “just right” or when we’ve “really earned it.” The problem is that we delay joy when we push off celebrating. And when we delay joy for too long we become miserable grumps.
I’m inviting you to build a practice of daily celebration. Don’t put it off any longer. Celebrate today.
I’m not saying to do something irrational or blow through your hard earned savings. I am saying that choosing to celebrate daily makes life feel more rich, connected, and meaningful. If you’re waiting to celebrate something until the conditions are just right, you are missing many opportunities to cultivate joy.
Here is the Oxford definition of celebration: acknowledge (a significant or happy day or event) with a social gathering or enjoyable activity.
Why are we not celebrating all the time? There are nearly infinite opportunities to acknowledge significant or happy moments every single day that we’re alive!
Here are the 2 key skills of celebration:
Acknowledgement: To celebrate something, you must first recognize it as something worth noting. This is a matter of perspective. And to get perspective you must slow down. You can choose to see your life as having virtually nothing worth celebrating, or you can choose to see your life as overflowing with things worth celebrating.
Do something enjoyable: Celebration also means doing something enjoyable, preferably with people. When we do things together, it creates a sense of synchronicity. This being “in sync” with others quite literally soothes our nervous system. There is supposedly a Swedish proverb that goes: “Shared joy is double joy; shared sorrow is half sorrow.” When we celebrate with others, our pain is soothed and our pleasure is amplified.
What can you choose to celebrate today?
Maybe you could celebrate that … you woke up this morning, you have breath in your lungs, you have clothes to wear, you have food to eat, you accomplished something at work, your kids took baths without losing their minds, you have an upcoming vacation, the sun is out, you can feel the chilly weather on your skin, something made you laugh, you have opportunity to grow, etc.
Life is too short to not celebrate daily. Acknowledge the good. And do something enjoyable.
Happy to be in your corner,
Tom Page, LCPC
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