Celebrate Your Small Victories!

Jenny Marchal said it best when she wrote "...it’s important to acknowledge and celebrate small wins. The problem with not doing this is we end up diminishing our motivation, and motivation is what keeps us on the right path and gives us the strength to soldier on to the top of the mountain." And I couldn't agree more.

When I first started Nxiba-Oku, I was excited and I had grand plans for my business. I set up a timeline of how and when it would grow . What I didn't know then was that I was setting myself up for failure. I had allowed no room for flexibility. Everything was linear and packaged within a time frame. I later learned that this mindset can set you back. When you are flexible and adaptable, you allow yourself to spot opportunities with ease, and grab them as they come.

And as any good entrepreneur worth their salt will tell you, you cannot control everything. You may have this ideal plan for your company or organisation, but variables that are beyond your control can crop up and derail your plans. 

Chris Niarchos, Appco founder and chairman recently wrote in a blog post that no matter how much of a perfectionist you are, it’s impossible to control everything when you’re running a business. And it's taken me almost a year to learn this. In that time I have seen plans I've made fail or (to put it bluntly) blow up in my face. On many of those occasions, I almost gave up, but having like-minded people, a strong support system and great mentors around me, they helped me to re-evaluate my approach to how I ran the business.

You see in all the plan making and ensuring I met the timeline deadline, I had focused on achieving that one goal, and had forgotten to look at the little steps I was taking to get to that goal. Those little steps were my victories because they meant that they were walking me closer to where I needed to be. It was when I started taking note of these little victories that I realised I was actually on my way to achieving the bigger goal, even though there were some setbacks here and there. I stopped focusing on the failures and instead put all my attention on what I was winning or doing well in. Of course, I used my failures as lessons but I never dwelt on them for too long.

I was reminded again this week that small victories are steps to bigger triumphs. You just need to patient. And should you find yourself facing an obstacle, remember what Thomas Edison said, “I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.” And then just keep going.