Making celebration feel ‘real’ – part 2

Hey!
Thank you for the coaching on this – it was super helpful. Since this submission, I am proud to say that I’ve leaned into the celebration in multiple ways (and it was useful to think about how I celebrated getting voluntary redundancy earlier this year as an example – a spa celebration with my sister, a solo minibreak, a dinner with friends).
Initially, I took on two more freelance commissions straight after finishing the submission and I can see that this delayed things and pushed me more towards burnout because I had no time to recover in between. I sort of knew this when I did it, but made an intentional choice to push through and tone it up because they were great opportunities – and although I don’t regret doing it, i can see that it wasn’t ideal!
However once these were in, I did go on a solo spa trip midweek which was perfect! I also saw my sister for a day and celebrated it with her. And, I did your suggestion of writing a letter celebrating myself on paper with nice pens in a cafe I love – which was actually such a beautiful ritual and helped it to sink in.
I think this has showed me what works for me moving forward in terms of big and small types of celebration!
One thing I did notice was that I haven’t done this with friends – in fact, the opposite: I’ve completely downplayed my wins since seeing them. I notice this as a bit of a habit of mine. Although I have got much better at internal celebrations, I sometimes find that when it comes to sharing it with others I go into downplaying mode. And not just that, but apologising for my success almost – in this case, for not being so avaliable to them since working on the project and being more disconnected. Rather than owning prioritising myself and this achievement.
Do you have any tips on speaking about myself externally in a celebratory way too?
Also love the idea of a collective celebration dinner with friends and the concept that you can celebrate belately – I think I might suggest this to some close friends in january!
I also wanted to note that I’ve since had my first rejection from an agent, which has been challenging [I will do a separate as a coach on this] – but I’m glad I’d made moves to celebrate before this, as I can honestly see all of the ways that working on this project has levelled me up, no matter if I get an agent or book deal out of it.
Thank you!

 

 

Answer:

Do you want to speak about yourself externally in a celebratory way? Why? There are no right answers here, it is just good to understand our motivations and make a conscious decision.  What is your brain most afraid will happen if you do share your wins with others?