Identifying success is easier if we know what we are aiming for in the first place. Having a direction, a goal, an idea of how we would like something to be is important within coaching. Having a destination will help us to evaluate when we are making progress and to know if and when we have arrived. Coaching is future focused; what next, what is desired, what would be the ideal outcome in a situation or scenario. Celebrating progress towards how we would like things to be is equally as important as celebrating an outcome. Coaching is an active process and as such a coachee may work towards a goal which through time and space may change and develop as fresh thinking is located. Marking steps along a pathway is one way to heighten our awareness of the headway we are making.
Celebrating may be public or private or a combination of the two. Congruent with coaching, the coachee will know best how they would like to celebrate, it may be a short acknowledgement to themselves, a meeting up with friends, or a flamboyant extended event or series of events. For some, getting round to celebrating successes can be difficult, delayed gratification turns into a postponement which evolves into an event which is permanent shelved. Unfortunately there are some negative associations around celebrating one’s own successes, a perception that you may be ‘blowing your own trumpet’, be viewed as a ‘bighead’ or as a ‘somebody’, when in fact you are just being you. In celebrating successes what ever they may be charges up our psychological batteries, fills us up with positive feelings which help us to acknowledge the progress we have made, contributing to a memory bank on which to draw upon in the future. Celebrating boosts our confidence and helps us hold ourselves in positive self regard, to value ourselves, enabling us to develop agency in our lives, work, families, communities and beyond.
celebrate
verb
1 commemorate, observe, honour, mark, salute, recognize, acknowledge, remember, memorialize, keep, drink to, toast, drink a toast to.
2 enjoy oneself, make merry, have fun, have a good/wild time, rave, party, have a party, {eat, drink, and be merry}, revel, roister, carouse, kill the fatted calf, put the flag(s) out; N. Amer. step out; informal go out on the town, paint the town red, whoop it up, make whoopee, junket, have a night on the tiles, live it up, have a ball; Brit. informal push the boat out; S. African informal jol; dated spree, go on a spree; rare rollick.
3 perform, observe, officiate at, preside at, solemnize, ceremonialize.
4 praise, laud, extol, glorify, eulogize, reverence, honour, pay tribute to, pay homage to, salute, hymn, sing; archaic emblazon.
This blog post is dedicated with grateful appreciation to the RD1st participants and Deb Barnard and Rivca Rubin for such skillful and artful facilitation.
