[00:00:00] Welcome. This is Anything and Everything with Kelli Youngman Singh. We are here to live the most expansive experience of your life, guided by intuition and desire and rooted in self trust, authenticity, and love. That's what expands your capacity to receive, allow and fully enjoy what you really want. Nothing is off limits. Nothing needs to be justified. Here for an extraordinary life and to have it all on your terms. Let's begin.
[00:00:44] Hello and welcome back to the podcast. If you notice my voice or my energy seems really calm, it's because almost immediately after waking up today, I came into my office to record this episode. Because as soon as I woke up, it was very clear what I wanted to share today.
[00:01:09] I wanted to talk today about celebration and how you can expand your self acknowledgment and your truly radical self-acceptance. Because when you do, it starts opening up the kind of life you get to have and the kind of growth you get to experience when you are not pushing these things out of the way.
[00:01:44] On a personal note, I've been in a lot of recent celebration. I actually just celebrated with Terry our one year wedding anniversary, our very first wedding anniversary. And so we've been in so much reflection, acknowledgement, celebration for who we've become as a couple, as a family. Together, but also individually.
[00:02:17] So, celebration or really self acknowledgment is something I've gotten very good at. In the beginning, like most people, it was a little uncomfortable or limited. Because I think celebration can sometimes be withheld for the really big moments, for the achievements, for the recognition of others or awards. And we wait until we're externally acknowledged to celebrate rather than expanding that practice.
[00:02:57] So, that's what I wanna talk about today, because I think that when you start celebrating or acknowledging whichever word you wanna use, I really do think they're one and the same. I think it changes how you relate to yourself, your own growth, and the way that you fuel yourself to change. Because when you have moments, when you find moments, when you're actively looking for ways to celebrate self-knowledge, witness your own self in a positive way, even when the growth itself is not necessarily positive. We'll talk about that in a second. I do think it trains your mind to be aware of the differences, no matter how subtle. To be aware of the awareness and the nuances of the growth, even in the smaller moments, that of course always contribute to the bigger celebrations and change.
[00:04:13] So this is something I work with my clients on a lot because in the beginning, especially if you are high achieving and really striving for excellence. I think that we're accustomed to fueling ourself through not enoughness. We're used to sort of criticizing or shaming, you know, you could do better. We're not there yet. Don't celebrate too early. Don't peak too soon. We can be in the mindset of almost avoiding celebration because we think it's going to disconnect us from the drive, from the pursuit of excellence.
[00:05:00] And what I've found is it's actually completely the opposite. And so I work with my clients a lot to expand the definition of celebration and what that means in practice. Because again, if we're only ever waiting for the really big moments to hit, we're withholding that energy, that momentum, that self-generated momentum that we could be experiencing more often.
[00:05:34] So I like to think of celebration as, you've heard me say it already on this episode a million times, but I also like to think of celebration as self acknowledgment, as recognition, as witnessing. And so for me, I'm always looking for how did I handle things differently? How did I handle things better than a previous version of me? And how am I really proud of who I showed up as? Right. So those are some of my questions that I ask myself as I am looking for new things to celebrate.
[00:06:20] Because even when I'm working with clients, in the beginning, I start every call with celebrations. Most of the time because like I said, it can be a little bit uncomfortable if you are not used to giving yourself positive recognition on a regular and consistent basis. So I like supporting my clients into this practice by asking them, what do you wanna celebrate or acknowledge today?
[00:06:48] And so in the celebration, in the acknowledgement, sometimes it's also just willingness to be in the discomfort. Like I actually celebrate when things are really hard and when I don't avoid them. I'm like, Ooh, that was a really challenging moment, and I felt all of it. I gave my body permission to sit in this uncomfortable emotion, whether that's disappointment, sadness, guilt, whatever it is. I gave myself permission to feel something really challenging.
[00:07:28] Or maybe Terry and I had a disagreement and I held a lot of space, right? In terms of not criticizing him or blaming him or making him wrong. Even though my thoughts wanted to point fingers. Even though I could see my brain and the way my thoughts were going, I chose to hold really neutral space for my partner. So I'll celebrate that and I'll even say it out loud. I'm always celebrating myself.
[00:08:00] You know, after a little bit of a disagreement, it's like, wow, baby, I'm so proud of us for how we just navigated that. And then Terry and I will often real time evaluate. Like, that was so interesting. I could see where my brain and my thoughts wanted to go, but instead I really chose loving thoughts about you in a difficult moment. There can be so many ways that you acknowledge and witness the growth, and it doesn't always have to be the super big milestone or the big things; which of course, we want to celebrate and witness too.
[00:08:43] Even when something happens, whether it's in my business, my performing career, I receive a compliment, like of course I'll still take time to witness and hold that and let like a positive feeling be in my body. And I know a lot of times I talk about not needing external validation, not outsourcing our sense of self to external sources, and I think it is also a celebration to be able to witness or receive a compliment without deflecting, right? So if someone acknowledges you or says, you look really beautiful, or, wow, you handled that so well, being in the practice of saying, thank you, I receive that. And actually letting your body receive the acknowledgement, when it's coming from other people.
[00:09:41] So again, if that's uncomfortable for you, then you can practice and celebrate and say, wow, I just received a compliment in a different way. Let me celebrate that. Let me acknowledge it. Let me sit with that and really absorb the positive benefit that that can have on my life. Let me think about and reflect on the ripple effect of how this is going to change everything as I'm willing to do this new thing.
[00:10:17] Because doing new things can be difficult. It can be challenging. Changing can be difficult and challenging. And, people come to me to do this work, to expand, to be excellent, to find new ways of doing things that are more efficient. So when we are giving ourselves permission to acknowledge when we are doing superhuman things, we get to experience the benefit of it. We get to experience the celebration.
[00:10:58] As you are expanding your practice of celebration and self acknowledgment, what I want you to know is that as you are doing that, what's really happening is you're building self-trust. You're building radical self-acceptance. Because again, it's not only attributed to positive things, it doesn't only have to be positive things.
[00:11:24] A lot of times I will stop mid session with clients and say, alright, let's pause for a minute and really celebrate and acknowledge you. Because you just let yourself engage with and become aware of something really big. And that might be really vulnerable too. Like that doesn't necessarily mean it's a happy, lovely thing.
[00:11:53] Sometimes it's clients being willing to say, oh, I'm commiserating. I am really been complaining and making myself a victim. Having the opportunity to see that, being willing to engage with that part of yourself and just observe it as a witness. To me, that is just as celebratory as winning a Tony Award. Because the profound effect, the ripple effect of being able to see all parts of yourself and accept yourself, love yourself, to not abandon yourself in moments where you're like, oh, okay, I can see how my thinking and feeling led me to behave this way. And if I had the chance, I would've done that differently. That is just as celebratory because think about the impact that has on you and every single relationship in your life.
[00:12:52] But most importantly, your relationship with yourself, when you don't feel shame or disgust with yourself, or pressure. You're like, eh, I didn't do that. I could have been better. I wasn't perfect. Like even when we're willing to acknowledge those patterns, it's something to celebrate, right? So that's why I say celebration or acknowledgement because it might feel more like an awareness that expands that is just really profound.
[00:13:24] And I always celebrate my clients when they're willing to see their own shit, because, like I said, working with our brains intentionally changing our perspectives, that's something that our brains are not like biologically designed to do. Our brains are designed to keep us safe, to protect us, to keep us as part of the pack, to stay the same as everyone around us. So when we ask our brains to step into leadership or change or awareness, and to be able to emotionally decelerate and pivot in real time, like that is super human. And I try to remind my clients of that all the time, like that's going against how we were designed to operate. So when we do that successfully, we get to celebrate.
[00:14:13] The other thing I'll say about celebration is finding ways to expand your repertoire of celebration. Because I think in the beginning, because the celebrations are tied to big accomplishments or achievements or moments, we're like, okay, yeah, well if I'm gonna celebrate, I'm gonna go out to dinner, I'll have a glass of champagne, and it kind of becomes redundant. Or it becomes like, okay, well I'm not gonna take myself out to dinner every time I do something, and that's fine. Right? But that's why we want to expand the ways we can celebrate.
[00:14:51] I remember when my coach taught me this, it was like such a profound thing. Because one of the ways I used to celebrate was like I would light a candle. I don't know why I haven't had candles in the apartment lately. And I recently got this beautiful candle right before our anniversary and it's been such a fun and simple way to celebrate. I light the candle and let myself enjoy the sensation of the scent and the ambiance of the light and the flickering and just let that be a ritual, a moment, like presence with the celebration. So that's one way I love celebrating.
[00:15:35] Another way I used to celebrate is just going for a walk and like letting myself enjoy the embodiment of who I'm becoming in this thing that I'm celebrating, right? Like embodying my expanded capacity, embodying and taking a walk as the version of me that can receive love that knows I'm worthy of that. Like I just think there's so many ways you can celebrate, and my clients have come up with different ones on their own. So I wanna give you that exercise of not only expanding what you're celebrating and acknowledging, but expanding how you're celebrating and acknowledging.
[00:16:21] Because again, as you're doing this, what you're really building is presence with your greatness. You're building tolerance for the discomfort of growth as you are finding more milestones and markers to let you know you're making progress.
[00:16:44] I heard this recently. Um. I don't know where, maybe it was like even on an Instagram reel or a video or something, but they were talking about how marathons, there's markers every half mile to let you know where you're at. Because our brain does well with knowing that we're making progress. So especially if you haven't gotten that big thing yet that you've kind of had on the pedestal. You don't have to wait until you book the Broadway show to celebrate yourself as a performer. Maybe it's celebrating the way you carried yourself when you walked into the audition room. Maybe it's celebrating that you took time to evaluate after that audition, what worked, what didn't work, what do I wanna do differently. Maybe it's taking time to celebrate how you set yourself up for the day, or what you thought after you left the audition room. Like all of these moments are opportunities to change, to be different.
[00:17:48] And when you're doing this practice of celebration and acknowledgement on a regular basis, you're gonna find more momentum to move forward. Because you're going to be witnessing the way you're changing, not waiting for external circumstances to prove you're worthy of acknowledging. This is about building your own practice with you, so that there's radical self-acceptance for who you're letting yourself be and how you're getting to experience your own brilliance, your own growth, your own capacity, even in moments that might difficult or challenging.
[00:18:31] Alright, that's what I got for you this week. Celebration of all the things. Especially if you listen to last week's podcast episode and you're starting to realize like, oh wow. It really is me and me. Like I'm not fighting a bunch of people. I'm not fighting a bunch of enemies. It's me and my thoughts. Like even that is a really big thing to acknowledge and to witness in yourself as you are doing this work. Alright, I'll meet you back here soon.
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