Shocked When I Succeed

I am not always my own biggest cheerleader.

Friends, this is a weird thing to admit like this, but I have this thing where I'm floored when I actually succeed at something.  Stunned.  Shocked.  

And I'm not sure why this is.  Looking back over my own personal history, for the sake of this post, I realize that I've had a lot of success that I can claim for my own, both big and small.  

Yet, in those leap and fly or curl up in the bottom of the nest and stay there moments, I forget that I've been successful at things before and that right now, I hadn't oughtta better try at all. And I don't.  

That doesn't feel very great, either, though.  

So lately I've been pushing myself to succeed at something every day.  That can mean doing really great during a workout, or some days, just doing a workout at all. It can mean keeping up with this blog every day, knowing that anybody who wants to read it can.  It can mean just keeping dirty dishes from piling in the sink by keeping up with putting them in the dishwasher.  

This week, I got to a point in my health coaching training that I needed to start reaching for help from people who are not in the program, and it had my Critter Brain going berserk, especially as I wrote a Facebook post asking for some help. I had myself convinced that I'd be re-posting that post and begging my family to practice with me because nobody would want to participate.  As it turns out, my friends on Facebook came through for me, BIG, within ten minutes of that post going up.  And it's all working out pretty much like it should.

Success.

It shocks me.  I wonder how in the heck it happened.  I wonder what on earth is going to change now, now that I've gone and set out to do something and followed through, and it appears to be working out. I feel like my response to success is more appropriate to how someone would react if they failed.  It has made me feel like a weirdo, but I wonder if it's more than just me that gets a little gobsmacked at their own success.  

I'm not always my own biggest cheerleader, and that needs to change, Friends.  I'd dare to bet that you aren't always your biggest cheerleader.  That also needs to change.  And maybe that can start by not being surprised when we succeed at something, and noticing that success, and filing it away for later, so we can show ourselves that we actually have a track record of succeeding.   

Then it'll be something we expect, not something that shocks the daylights out of us when it happens!