Climb the ladder to success by celebrating along the way

BY CLEVE DeSOUZA

One of the best ways to have more in life is to celebrate more. Celebrating success is an established way to encourage more success.

For the final quarter of 2020, we’ve been focused on helping you achieve more out of life. It’s proven that in order to have more, you must be more and do more. This week, we conclude a three-part series focused on how to live that equation. In the first article, we explained how changing your mind-set and attitude leads to being more. In the second article, we offered tips for doing more.

Today, in our final 2020 article, we talk about the final piece of the equation – having more. The key to this step is enjoying your achievements.

Think about a child’s excited reaction to seeing a dog on the street. A child who loves dogs will joyfully point out every dog they see. Even shy children will ask about the dog’s name and if it’s friendly enough to pet. The child may talk about the dog long after the encounter ends.

Children don’t hold back when they experience a victory. Neither should you.

It’s not difficult to see how this plays out. If you typically sleep until 8 a.m. before dashing immediately to the office, then one of your goals could be to get up at 6 a.m. and exercise before work.

It’s worth celebrating the first time you are out of bed at 7:30 a.m. When you get to the office, tell your friends that you feel great because you had time for a short workout this morning. The first time you rise at 7 a.m., give yourself a small reward. You’re exercising now; maybe you can indulge in your favourite candy.

Once you start noticing and celebrating your successes, you’ll find yourself experiencing even more of them. Rising at 6 a.m. quickly becomes a habit. Celebrating your progress also makes the inevitable failures a little easier to bear. The key to failures is to learn from them so you don’t repeat your mistakes. When the going gets rough, you can draw on the energy created from early successes.

It’s never easy to change. But in this case, you will quickly see benefits come from making changes to your mind-set and habits.

To recap our series, it all begins by changing your mind-set. Carol Dweck, an American psychologist and author, encourages us to view our basic qualities as attributes that can grow and change over time. For example, Dweck argues we aren’t born with a predetermined intelligence levels. Instead, our intelligence grows as we learn. She calls this belief a growth mind-set. Those who have fixed mind-sets and believe growth isn’t possible don’t grow. Adopting a growth mind-set is the first step.

The second step in the process is doing more. We must stop procrastinating. Now is also the time to view mistakes as a gift. Our mistakes inspire us to learn to do better. Surround yourself with experienced and qualified advisors who can help you grow.

Many of us lack the mind-set to see opportunities and won’t put in the hard work necessary to have more. But if you invest in yourself now by changing your mind-set and doing more, you will reap the benefits in 2021.