Why I Need to Celebrate the Little Things

My boy doesn’t really talk.

Don’t get me wrong. He knows tons of words, and he jabbers A LOT!

But intelligible words? Nah. He’s just not interested right now.

He’s of the mindset that if he’s said a word once, he never needs to say it again. . . . at least that’s how he is with most words. 

He uses the important words regularly (or some variation of them): mama, dada, bottle, sissy, cookie, cars, bye bye, mine, and no.

And he only ever uses 1 sentence, and it is by far one of my most favorite things that he says.

He’ll throw his hands up in the air in a touchdown pose and scream at the top of his lungs, “I did it!”

Clicked a buckle in his carseat? “I did it!”

Helped himself to an Oreo after climbing on the counter by himself? “I did it!”

Took off his pants and his diaper? (Yeah, that’s a super fun one.) “I did it!”

None of those things are new skills for him, and they’re not even that difficult. But he celebrates his successes EVERY. TIME.

How often do we celebrate our accomplishments?

Made dinner? “I did it!” 

Successfully bathed the babies without bathing the floor at the same time? “I did it!”

The babies are fed, have clean diapers, and survived the day? “I did it!”

Sometimes I get in my brain that those kinds of activities are what’s expected of me and that’s just what I do. No celebration necessary.

Until I have a day, where those simple tasks become really hard. 

We had Chick-fil-a for dinner for the 2nd time this week. The babies didn’t even have a bath, but they are surely alive, have eaten, and have a clean diaper.

When those days happn, instead of compassion, I beat myself up. I didn’t do what was expected of me . . . . or what I thought was expected of me.

But what if my default reaction was the opposite?

What if I were to celebrate the little things and have compassion on myself when even those don’t work out so well?

I know for me when I can take the time to celebrate the “little” things that I do, the “big” accomplishments are that much sweeter, and my failures aren’t nearly as tragic.

Let’s celebrate a little more today.

Originally Published 2/26/20