Celebration!

I’m writing this on Ash Wednesday, after so many people across Trinidad and Tobago have experienced joy, celebration and revelry over the past few days. This morning was quiet and calm as I drove to swimming, as if nothing had happened.

My Carnival was spent at home, but it was good to see the pictures of everyone on my timeline in pure celebration mode, true happiness. That’s what I love about Carnival - it’s a time where all the usual stresses can disappear for a bit and we get to free up (and wine down!)

I celebrate a lot of things, and I always encourage parents to celebrate the small wins: their child waving for the first time at three years old, trying to climb out of the crib at two, going to the toilet on their own at six years old. Timelines are irrelevant when progress is being made.

Just before Carnival, a parent was lamenting that at every doctor’s visit when they ask about milestones, it’s so discouraging when every question they ask, the child is question is not yet at that point. Yet, WE know that there has been immense progress and hope over the last few months. Sometimes it’s easy and quite normal to feel down about not being where you’d like to be, but it’s SO important to take note of the small wins along the way that have gotten you to where you are now.

This morning I decided to do a long continuous swim. It was only towards the end of the swim that I realised I had been swimming in freestyle for the entire thing and didn’t realise, nor did I feel tired or feel to switch it up! It made me really happy because for years, freestyle has been a pain for me, and I would easily revert to breaststroke (which is very comfortable for me, and is the same pace as my freestyle). Yet today, it wasn’t even a thought! I could have felt discouraged that the pace was much slower that I was supposed to go - not that I was looking at my pace at any point - or that my swim is generally pretty slow compared to others, but no! Instead I was internally celebrating that I swam so comfortably and easily!

So take some time to truly celebrate all the small wins because in a world plagued by negativity, we need to have our happy moments to hold on to!