Penny Casselman [00:00:00]:
Director, you know, I know, and we certainly don't talk about this enough, but life is short. And the older you get, the quicker it seems to come at you. So do not delay your efforts in celebration because I guarantee you do something every single day that you can celebrate, multiple things every single day that you can celebrate. Why not start embracing them now? You will accomplish so much more. You will be more joyful, more energetic, more you as you move forward. Welcome to the Pivot with Passion podcast. Hi. I'm Penny Casselman.
Penny Casselman [00:00:55]:
I believe everyone is deserving of a phenomenal life. Regardless of where you came from, life is what you make of it. And when you learn to pivot with passion, your world explodes with opportunities. Go grab your favorite beverage, and let's shake things up as we explore how to pivot with passion. Hello, director. Welcome to this week of your life. When is the last time you celebrated something? And here's the caveat. The following don't count, birthdays, major holidays, graduations, homecomings, baby showers, wedding showers, promotions, baby taking its first step, achieving a big goal, remove all of those from your list.
Penny Casselman [00:01:50]:
What are you left with? Where are you celebrating in your life? I realized as I started to reflect on all of the episodes that I have done over the course of, dare I say, almost a year, the focus is often how we can pivot, how we can evolve and do tactical things, focusing on improving communication, improving planning. And I realized that all of those things are fueled by how we celebrate. Although I talked about celebrating the little things in life back in episode 13, the focus there was really on the outcomes, but often, reaching those outcomes, it's a process. It's not quick, and it's usually not glamorous. And if you wait to celebrate until something reaches a conclusion, it can feel like a long slog to get to that outcome that you're looking for, that you're hoping for. And even then, you have the nuance of, well, what happens if the outcome isn't what I wanted or expected? I guarantee there are times even in those instances where you fail or something doesn't work out as you anticipated, there are so many opportunities for you to celebrate along the path. And I wanna help us learn how to do that. I wanna add some perspective, so that we start to appreciate where we've come from, what we've done, and where we're headed.
Penny Casselman [00:03:48]:
My goal in this episode is to help us stop delaying our celebration. And I want us to start to find fun along the way, because there is so much magic and gold and opportunity for us to seize moments of celebration as we go after what we want. It's time for a clarity cocktail. Today's clarity cocktail comes from Betsey Johnson. Celebrate the idea that you don't fit in. Find your own fit. Stay unique. If you're familiar with Betsey's work, you know how true that phrase rings for her.
Penny Casselman [00:04:40]:
And if you're not familiar with Betsey, she is extremely eclectic, she is flamboyant, she loves color, and by all stretch of standard beauty, she does not fit. But she fits in being Betsey Johnson. She certainly has a cult following. And if you like her stuff, you love her stuff. You are devoted to what she does. But what a force of creativity that she brings to the fashion scene. I thought this was so appropriate because too often, we have this ideal of what we should be, what we should accomplish, where we should be in our lives. But Betsy's quote, celebrate the idea that you don't fit in, find your own fit, Stay unique.
Penny Casselman [00:05:41]:
We should all be so blessed to embrace that idea, because in doing that, we bring our full selves to the conversation. I remember once, oh, this is a good one, especially this is pretty timely too, so hang on. When I was in corporate America, one of the companies that I worked for had a costume contest, and it was a big deal. There was a woman in my department, but our personal fashion styles were complete opposites. So for fun, we dressed as each other. Now we both took it to the extremes. I wore this Winnie the Pooh sweatshirt and felt like I was 5 all day. I think I put pink lipstick on and put a bow in my hair, and she, conversely, wore black lipstick, brushed her hair straight, wore a black shirt and black pants again.
Penny Casselman [00:06:44]:
I never showed up like that to work. However, we absolutely took it to the extremes, and it was fun. When we showed up every other day of the year at work, we stood in our own fit. We felt like ourselves. We were able to express who we were and brought our full persona to every conversation. I mean, can you imagine if we all tried to be or look the same? Boring. Even M and M's, when they first came out, knew they could not sell a bag of brown chocolate candies. Even they knew to have a little variety with red, orange, yellow, green, and violet colors in the mix.
Penny Casselman [00:07:36]:
So embrace and celebrate your differences. Celebrate the idea that you don't fit in. Find your own fit and stay unique, because only then can we move forward and bring our perspective, our unique conversation to the world. And Betsy Johnson gives us that permission in her quote. Celebrate the idea that you don't fit in. Find your own fit. Stay unique. And now back to the episode.
Penny Casselman [00:08:10]:
Cheers. Circling back to expanding our reasons to celebrate, to include the actions and steps that we take that move us in our life. So let's baseline this conversation. Failure and success, those are events. They are not a state of being and they are not defined by your efforts. So let me say that again. Failure and success are events, and they are not defined by your efforts. Here's an example.
Penny Casselman [00:08:47]:
I have a ring toss game in my garage. It's a string from the rafters that holds a single silver ring. And the whole concept of this game is to release the ring on the string and try to get it hooked on a hook. I mean, this is probably a caveman game, but if I only celebrated when I hooked the ring, that time that I spent throwing it 20 times, I would have just walked away because I felt like a failure. Although failure is an event, not an action. And putting it in perspective, all I did was practice 24 times. I got used to the movement of the ring, my arm, my aim, all of those things. I can still celebrate the throws in that game, even if I didn't hook it.
Penny Casselman [00:09:41]:
Now thinking about celebration, here's why we should celebrate more. And this is science backed. When you celebrate, your body releases dopamine, which is a chemical found in your body that when released has you feeling happy and satisfied. A secondary thing that happens because celebration is usually done with more than one person, it can often be a social event. Our body also releases serotonin, which again, makes us happy and increases our well-being. So those are two benefits on the science backside of why we should celebrate more. On the personal side, celebration allows us to increase our motivation. When we celebrate things, our brain is helping us become happier, have a feeling of well-being.
Penny Casselman [00:10:38]:
Of course, we're going to want to continue to do something if we have those feelings. It also increases our confidence competence loop. As we try something new, we often aren't that confident in what we are doing. However, as we practice, as we move through the cycle, we become more competent at it, which when we celebrate, increases motivation to increase our confidence in trying it again. It's this beautiful loop that we go through that can be supported by our commitment to celebrating the smaller actions, not the final outcomes. The other thing on the personal side that celebration does is it helps reduce stress as evident by the release of dopamine and serotonin. Why not celebrate more? So far, I haven't provided one piece of evidence to the contrary. You might be saying, Penny, that sounds great, but, yeah, I'm not celebrating the fact that I put my shoes on in the morning or I made coffee.
Penny Casselman [00:11:52]:
Okay. Director? Why not? Yes. It might seem silly in the moment, but you can celebrate everything because I guarantee there are people who are unable to do some of the things that you do, who haven't embraced the idea of celebration and everything feels like a slog. Let's think about some physical things that we go after. Maybe you're building a house, maybe you're writing a book. If you waited to celebrate until the house was completely built or the book was completely written, wow, Would you even finish either one of those two things? Now maybe you could say, yes, the house would get finished because I'm not solely the one building it, but by celebrating small milestones along the way, heck, yeah, you celebrate after the foundation is poured. Heck, yes, you celebrate when the framing goes up, when the electrical work finally goes in, when the plumbing goes in, when the siding goes on, when the windows are installed, when the painting is done, all those small actions deserve celebration because it helps you have momentum in continuing towards the final outcome. Same with writing a book.
Penny Casselman [00:13:16]:
When I was writing my memoir, you better believe I was celebrating after I finished every chapter. It was more than a year for me to write the book from start to finish, and that doesn't include editing and production. If I did not celebrate along the way, I'm not sure I would have crossed the finish line. Because after every small action I took, I knew there was always more actions waiting for me on the other side. And it wouldn't be for quite some time until I was able to celebrate the completion, the outcome. And even then, I was just hoping that it would be a success. The fact that I was taking action to move the project forward made all the difference. Now those are physical things, building a house, writing a book, but you can also celebrate intangible things like learning a new language, or learning a new sport.
Penny Casselman [00:14:19]:
Because I will tell you one of my goals is to learn how to play golf better. Yes, I can hack it up. My short game's pretty good, because I grew up playing putt putt golf, but there is so much opportunity for me to get better. And I guarantee I will not stick with training unless I celebrate every small little action that I take towards getting better. My swing, my stance, heck, even celebrating getting a new glove, because why not? Director, you know. I know. And we certainly don't talk about this enough, but life is short. And the older you get, the quicker it seems to come at you.
Penny Casselman [00:15:07]:
So do not delay your efforts in celebration because I guarantee you do something every single day that you can celebrate. Multiple things every single day that you can celebrate. Why not start embracing them now? Because you deserve that dopamine, that serotonin hit that brings happiness and well-being and leaves you feeling satisfied. You deserve increased motivation, increased confidence, and a way to lower stress. And don't we all know we could all use that regardless of what time of year it is. It's often said that we overestimate what we can do in a day, yet we underestimate how much we can do in a year. I guarantee if you find ways to celebrate your actions instead of withholding them until the outcome, you will accomplish so much more. You will be more joyful, more energetic, more you as you move forward.
Penny Casselman [00:16:23]:
Director, lean in. I want you to know that you are capable and deserving of anything and everything you want in life. I want you to feel empowered to make new choices and take risks. And I certainly want you to celebrate at every step of the way. Because through celebration, you will grow, you will learn, you will exude the essence that is you, and you will be amazed at what you go forward and accomplish. Until next week, go out and find something to celebrate every single day. Friend, thanks for listening to this episode of Pivot with Passion. If you've been feeling stuck, exhausted, or frustrated, this is your permission slip to go grab a red marker and claim the life you desire and deserve.
Penny Casselman [00:17:30]:
If you enjoyed this episode, share it with a friend, and then hop over to rate and review the show on Apple Podcasts. Because my goal is to put a red marker in everyone's hand, and I need your help to spread the word and make that happen. Until the next episode, go grab a red marker, get excited for your future, and make your first move to pivot with passion.
