By: Stella Orange
One of the great things about being human is the celebrating. Birthdays, holidays, milestones, anniversaries, breakups, big wins and tiny victories – all of it!
In my family, we just celebrated my cousin’s high school graduation. While we weren’t able to gather in person to see him walk across the stage for his diploma, we did have a zoom call, with Sweden, Massachusetts, upstate New York, northern Minnesota, and Alaska.
Because we know it’s a big deal to finish high school. We also know that if we didn’t celebrate this moment with him, he wouldn’t know that he’s part of an extended family web of cousins, aunties, and uncles that have been rooting for him since the day he was born and will keep rooting for him for the rest of his life.
I bring this up because here at Las Peregrinas, we have decided that the time is ripe to celebrate. And because we like to do things completely, we’re gonna be doing it all summer long.
What are we celebrating? That’s a great question. Generally, business owners and entrepreneurial types like ourselves tend to be crap at celebrating. Yeah, we love a good party. But when it comes to taking stock and appreciating ourselves and other people…
… well, let’s just say we have a collective tendency to turn our heads and keep looking down the road at what’s yet to come.
Rebecca and I were recently chatting about our summer of celebration. She’s got a pet theory that if we don’t celebrate the wins, they don’t come as often. I find this poetic. I also have been thinking about celebrating ordinary life. There is so much to appreciate and relish.
In fact, I have said to a few friends that now that I’m in my forties, I am the woman I always hoped I would become. Let us be clear. I am far from perfect. I make mistakes and screw things up at least as often I as I nail it. The road that brought me here has been neither direct nor well-marked. I have lost the trail more times than I can count. And both literally and metaphorically, I am consistently awful at reading maps. I say this as someone who used to work as a wilderness guide!
Still, looking back, the route I’ve taken to arrive *here* makes a sort of sense. I can see threads of experiments I was running as a twenty-year-old, still woven into the life and the work I do today. And I find that deeply satisfying.
As a writer who spends her days asking businesspeople to tell me the story of how they got to where they are now (so I can write clear and compelling marketing copy), I’ll say this: I continue to be astonished by how many accomplished people aren’t able to see the magic already all around them.
It’s as though “right here” is not good enough; they always want to be “over there” instead.
Oof. That’s a whole other can of worms. We can talk about that another time.
Back to today. My friend Marcia is a coach who tells her clients, “Anything you practice, you get to keep.” I love that. And perhaps I’d zhuzh that for our collective use now:
Anything you celebrate, you get to take with you on the road ahead. So yeah, like I said: The time is ripe for hallelujah!
Stella is cofounder and copywriter at Las Peregrinas, a creative and consulting agency. As our resident word nerd, she writes copy and points out the stories everyone is living and telling through their work. She is also fun at parties.
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