Celebrate Everything

According to Tim Hatcher, professor of leadership and human resource education,

“Celebration is an ancient ritual. It gives us a way to feel good about ourselves, and our accomplishments.” — Tim Hatcher

When we celebrate we are reinforcing something important to us. Without it we simply maintain the status quo and candidly have a lot less fun.

We typically don’t celebrate things that we dislike or do not value or that have no historical significance for us. Celebrations and be good or bad, joyous or somber. We celebrate beginnings and endings such as birth and death. We celebrate important acts through awards for bravery and accomplishment. We also celebrate the passage of time and longevity of people and events: people’s birthday, graduations, retirements, the birth of a nation, the inauguration of a president or other important leader. Celebration is historical. Without celebration, there would be no markers or milestones by which to gauge or judge history.

Even the Bible encourages us to celebrate:

“Be cheerful with joyous celebration in every season of life. Let your joy overflow!” — Philippians 4:4

When our children are small, we celebrate the firsts — first smile, first tooth, first steps, first words, first time to sleep through the night. We celebrate holidays, we celebrate family milestones. First job, good grades, college acceptance, and engagements.

Until recently, celebration happened on our own time — with our families, with our friends. Not during the work day. Outside of birthdays, not much is typically celebrated at work.

But much has been written and discussed about the benefits of celebration in the workplace.

Since celebration makes people happy, why not celebrate with cake for new clients. With pizza for progress. Happy, connected people make business better, and celebration is a great way to keep employees happy and connected. After all, celebration at the workplace has significant benefits — like reducing stress. Celebration is a formal invitation to take a break from the daily grind. It is an invitation to appreciate a job well done. Celebration helps people to bond — and what better experience for building teamwork? When a team gets together in a positive environment where success is celebrated, bonds are strengthened and the team grows closer.

Celebration also builds loyalty in the workplace. If a company celebrates its people, we see that the company values its people. When people are treated as friends and family, when people are credited for their work, they become an integrated loyal part of the company.

What about outside of the workplace, in our personal life? For the past five years I have seen the phrase “Celebrate everything.” When I first saw it, I thought it was a stupid idea. And then the pandemic hit, and no one was celebrating much of anything. In recent months, I have paid more attention to how and why we celebrate, and I spent time wondering what would happen to us if we did start celebrating more often. As I read about the effect that celebration has on us, I learned a lot.

“Any celebration, big or small, is really about taking a beat to notice the good stuff in your life. It can also be a reminder of our talents and abilities, skills and persistence.” — Polly Campbell

The primary benefit of celebration is that it helps us to stay in the present. When we celebrate the completion of small steps, we find gratitude and momentum. Celebrating at every juncture along our life journey is recognition of a life well lived and well worked.

Taking time to celebrate even the small stuff causes us to be in the moment — to be mindful and that boosts our well-being. According to social psychology researcher Fred Bryant.

“When we stop to savor the good stuff, we buffer ourselves against the bad and we build resilience. Even mini-celebrations can plump up the positive emotions which make it easier to manage the daily challenges that cause major stress.” — Fred Bryant

Celebration builds our self-respect. It is very important that we hold ourselves in high regard. Celebrating helps us to feel accomplished and respectable. And when we feel respectable we respect ourselves more, and then others treat us with respect.

Celebration is emotional nourishment. It might feel strange to celebrate ourselves, because we are more comfortable harshly judging ourselves. But when we celebrate we reduce our inability to love and accept ourselves.

When we get into the habit of looking for small moments to celebrate, something interesting begins to happen in our brains. We start to feel like we have something to look forward to, and we feel more optimistic. And when we feel more optimistic, we are able to see positive moments in our lives that should be celebrated better. So it’s a wonderful cycle of joy and positivity that becomes our mindset.

Oprah Winfrey describes it like this:

“The more you praise and celebrate your life, the more there is in life to celebrate.” — Oprah Winfrey

Celebrations allow us to put our everyday life stresses behind us and remember the things in life that truly matter. They can remind us of our life purpose and how to enjoy the power of our relationships with those around us.

Overall life satisfaction and feelings of self-worth are created from moments of noticing and appreciating positive experiences. Celebration is an experience. It doesn’t need to be grand or extravagant. It just needs to be meaningful.

We don’t always need big plans and decorations when we celebrate. All we need to do is to think about what we have achieved or what we are proud to, and then we are certain of find something to celebrate. Perhaps we finished a tough project, or we mowed the lawn, or we handled a difficult moment with a child, or we helped someone find courage or get through something.

In order to feel like there is a bit of specialness to the moment, we might want to go to a special place in our home, or to a beautiful location outside and give attention to the moment of goodness or achievement. Whatever we do, in order to celebrate, we should set the moment apart by stepping out of our routine.

Then we should take some action — make a toast, or say a prayer, or eat something or drink something or light a candle.

Whenever I have completed the run of a play that I have directed, I always take a special moment all by myself, on the empty stage, once everyone has left the theatre. I stand there and allow the celebration of the conclusion of the play to wash over me. I reflect on the feelings, and then I say softly out loud — “We all did our best. I am proud of what we did together. I am proud of what I did with this group of people.” And then I thank God for giving me the experience. Similar to these words written by Francis Lucille in her book, The Perfume of Silence:

“Life is a celebration. Consider everything that makes you happy as a gift from God and say, ‘Thank you.’” — Francis Lucille in The Perfume of Silence

If you need some help getting started with your celebrations, consider looking at the National Day Calendar, where every single day is given several occasions to celebrate? For example today August 6 is National Sisters Day, American Family Day, National Fresh Breath Day, National Root Beer Float Day, National Wiggle Your Toes Day, and National Friendship Day. Restaurants often use these occasions to build their customer base by offering specials.

So go get your sister, and wiggle your toes, eat a breath mint together and then have a root beer float.

You can also just call a friend and go have lunch and celebrate your friendship. Today we can celebrate the fact that we have the full band. YAY Band.

My friends, life is short…..let’s not let the moments pass us by. We always think that the best years and moments are still to come, but at some point we look back and realize that we were so focused on looking forward to the “best” years, that we missed some of them, and they were filled with simple, everyday, beautiful moments.

Let’s savor and celebrate as many moments as we can. Celebrating achievements however big or small sets us up for even greater success as it helps us to make the connection between the achievement we’re celebrating and what we did to get us there. Let’s celebrate everything.

“Celebration has many different outfits, but she always wears the same beautiful dancing shoes.” — Mary Anne Radmacher

Let’s change our mindset and start celebrating many more things, much more often.