The REAL Secret to Creating Success

No matter what your body goals are and where you dream of being, do you want to know the real secret to getting there? The real secret of success? It’s not how early you get up or what special routine you follow or which diet you’ve chosen or which exercises you do. Want to know what it is? Lean in and I’ll whisper it to you. 

The secret…is feeling good. 

Not what you expected? Too simple you say?

Sometimes the biggest truths come in the simplest packages.

Success is not built on self judgment or criticism or pointing out what we haven’t done enough of yet. Success is built on celebration!

Why? Because celebration feels GOOD.

Our default brain has a built-in scanner for everything that is wrong or “not good enough”. We subconsciously use it with our kids, our spouse, the world, but MOSTLY with ourselves.

Learning to look at others through the lens of what they are doing well and are trying to do well…and acknowledging and appreciating them for that…is one of the biggest gifts of love we can cultivate and give. 

Learning to look at yourSELF through that same lens of grace…is the biggest gift of love you can learn to give to YOU. Why?

Because what we focus on expands.

Negative or positive, what we focus on grows bigger.

What We Focus On Expands

When we focus on what’s wrong or not good enough in others or in ourselves, our brain looks for more and more evidence to prove it true. 

And it will find it.

When we focus on what is good and right and beautiful in others…we begin to notice and see MORE of it.

When we notice and praise the good in the people we love…they usually feel good and naturally want to do more of the things we appreciated them for. 

When we notice and praise the good and effort within ourselves….WE feel good and naturally want to do more of it!

Judging ourselves by constantly looking at our shortcomings and where we’ve failed that day does NOT motivate us to “do better”. It creates shame and defeat and discouragement.

Looking for what we did WELL each and every day…no matter how small…and CELEBRATING that success…creates love and kindness and feeling proud of ourselves. 

And we want to keep going. 

Like the child who receives a kind word of praise and a hug for their effort (no matter how small) will want to keep trying…when we give ourselves those same kind words…so will we!

We can give ourSELVES a much, much needed hug.

When we choose to notice, acknowledge and celebrate what we’re doing WELL…it will naturally expand inside of us. Day after day we’ll keep taking more of those steps.

And THAT, my friend, is where success is created. Those consistent, little daily steps are what take us there.

Success Is About Being Consistent

One of my favorite sayings I heard years ago and immediately wrote on a 3×5 card and hung on my bathroom wall is, “Success isn’t about being brilliant. It’s about being CONSISTENT.”

It’s not about doing one BIG, giant thing. It’s about being consistent with the little things!

The un-sexy, not always fun, daily things we don’t usually feel like doing but that always move us forward when we decide to be committed and do them anyway!

What keeps us consistent…what keeps us moving forward…is feeling GOOD.

What creates feeling good, is noticing our efforts! Noticing what we DID do today, instead of just feeling discouraged about what we didn’t. Instead of poo-pooing away anything we did “right” with four more things of what we did “wrong”, what if we reversed that? 

What if we spent MORE time noticing how we showed up, what we did do and congratulating ourselves for it than we did noticing where we fell short and condemning ourselves?

What would be different in your life if you did that?

Beating ourselves up can motivate us temporarily…but it will never create lasting change. 

Why?

Because it doesn’t feel good. And over time we are not going to keep doing things that don’t feel good. We just won’t.

Feeling Good Now

The secret is to create feeling good NOW…not waiting until “someday” to feel good when you’ve reached your success! If we don’t feel good along the way, we WON’T reach our success. We’ll decide it sucks and quit.

So how do we create feeling good now?

We make the time to NOTICE and acknowledge what we’re doing well and how we ARE showing up for ourselves. 

When we have a child we love who is learning something new and not great at it yet, we notice anything they’ve done that’s moving them in the right direction and point it out! We offer encouragement and hope. And guess what? We can do the SAME thing for ourselves. Be willing to praise yourself for what you ARE doing and celebrate every little success along the way. 

Celebrating doesn’t mean you need to throw a big party, it just means you take a moment and tell yourself “Well done sweetheart. I’m proud of you for that.” or, “That was tough and I did it anyway. Way to go ME.” 

 Allow yourself to have a little party in your mind and give yourself a pat on the back. We don’t realize how often we DON’T do this! We notice and praise everyone around us but ourselves.

Tell yourself the kind things you would tell your child. Give yourself permission to be proud of you and set an intention to be proud of you!

No matter where you’re at, you deserve that. If you choose to look for reasons to be proud of yourself, you’ll find them. They are there. You just need to open your eyes and be willing to see them. That love is what will carry you to what you want most.

It takes practice to make this kindness to yourself a habit, but it’s worth your effort. The more you celebrate your wins…the more wins you’ll attract to celebrate!