Episode 67: Celebrating Your Failures

Introduction: 

Hey friend, the time has come to finish your dissertation, graduate and become doctor. Welcome to office hours with Dr. Lacy where we talk about how to finally master this time management thing so you can stay on top of it without losing your mind. Every Wednesday you can find a new episode wherever you listen to podcasts, make sure you hit the subscribe button to make sure you never miss an episode. I'm Dr. Marvette Lacy your dissertation writing strategist here to be with you along every step of the way. I would like to thank you for coming to today's office hours. Let's get started on today's episode. Hey, how's writing going? I know you don't like the question, but let me tell you, when you join the finish your dissertation program, you will love that question. Clients often report feeling excited and joyful to go into their process even before they even get to the dissertation process, and that's what I'm inviting you to do. I'm inviting you to come inside the group and join us so that you can get the structure you need and the tools that will help you to show up consistent and disciplined in your process. All you need to do is come on over to Marvette lacy.com/apply and sign up for the wait list and you will be the first notified when doors are open. See you soon.

Celebration 101: 

Welcome back. Welcome back. Sir's ready. I'm ready. You should see how he's looking at me. Okay. So for the month of June in the finish your dissertation program, we are talking about celebration, celebration. So our first cohort of students of the program are finishing. They're finishing. It's amazing. They started with me in January and it's a six month program. So they're finishing in June. Uh, most of them are continuing to stay with me, but I like to do cohorts in six months. Cause it's kinda like a, semester, like a nice feel. Like it helps you before and after the semester. And we're trying to account for the different programs and start dates, you know, but either way, we've made it to the end of the cohort, the January cohort. And I'm so excited for all of their progress, right? Not only in their dissertations and their doctoral programs, as we also have first year students and whatnot, not everyone's doing their dissertation. Like not just about those pieces, but how they show up, like who they were in the beginning and who they are now, night and day in terms of confidence in terms of connection with one another, in terms of like how they feel about this whole process.

Like some people I'm so excited for them to go into their defense. Cause I don't think their committee is going to be ready. I don't know. I'm just, I'm just loving everything about the dissertation program right now. In June, we're talking about celebration because I am constantly like, did you celebrate, are you celebrating? I believe we should celebrate every week. Every week. There's always something to celebrate. And I, you know, I'm a person before who would say, Oh, let's not celebrate. I didn't achieve the goal. But then all that means is that like you end up feeling awful the whole way through. So I was like, we need to talk about this as a group, because I was also finding myself saying, did you celebrate? Why are you not celebrating? And people are like, Oh, Imma get to it. And they don't. And so we're taking a whole 30 days to focus on it and it's fitting. Cause it's the end of this first cohort. So that's going to be awesome. So I know all of you have big goals and know like my assumption is that you want to change the world and you want to do it through your research. You want to speak truth to power. But some of you really question, if you could really do it right. I know I did. I know I do sometimes still, it doesn't really go away. And so you started with what, you know, you create a plan of action. You spend a great deal of time and effort getting a plan, just right. I know you, the people in your head, you're like, I'm gonna do it this way, but you've spent a lot of time on how you're going to achieve the goal. Like once you decide, like I have a goal.

So my goal is to become a doctor. You spend a lot of time on like, how can I do that? So that could look like you're going to plan out all of your courses. Right? People used to have very elaborate. Like when I was in my program, have these very elaborate, like timelines that they made in like Excel. And it was all like colorful and things were moving. And I was just like, I don't like my brain does not have the energy to do that. Right. But people spend a lot of time on the how like am I going to meet my plan if I do all these things? And once you feel like that plan of how this really solid, that there's like, it's guaranteed that you're going to achieve it. You just you're like, okay, now I can go and start. But on a side note, what you probably notice though, is that once you have the plan, you don't follow it and it sits there on your computer and maybe you try to do the first step, but it's like, um, I mean, yeah, I know, there's this plan is solid, but I don't even know how to start the plan.

It's Not About The Plan: 

Have you felt that way? Right. And it starts to take something like that fire that from you because you're like, I just spent all of this time creating this plan, making it color, coded, planning it out on my calendar and I'm not following it. Or I don't know how to follow it. This is how I know it's not about the plan. People come to me all the time. Like I just need a plan or a timeline or outline and I give it to them just like, you know, you may have spent hours on your own plan, give it to them. And they're still like, Nope, I can't do it. I just need to get myself together is what they say. And that in my mind, I am screaming. Like if you could get yourself together, we wouldn't be having this conversation. It is not about the plan. It's not about the plan. It's not about the how. Focusing on then how and I'm going on a tangent and it's not really a tangent. It really is key and crucial to this. When you focus on the, how, you know what you don't focus on the end. You're so busy trying to focus on what you need to do in this moment that you lose sight of why you're even doing it or what the purpose is. You lose sight of it. So what you end up with is a notebook, just filled with plans of how to do something. And it really, it just becomes a notebook filled with all the evidence of why you're not going to become a doctor. Like you start to question your planning ability, or even your ability to like do this whole process because you put all this time and attention into the how and it's not working and it doesn't seem like you could do it. Right. This, is this making sense you feeling me, right?

But what if like those attempts to follow your plan or right and to those different plans that you have, those different versions or said another way, those lists of failures, what are those things were not happening to you or it wasn't about you, but it was happening for you. Right? In the last episode about imposter syndrome, I talked about how imposter syndrome or these failures or these voices, it's just a, it's a indicator light, if you will. Like, it's just telling you where you need to do your work. Doesn't mean that anything is wrong with you or that you're not able to do something it's just highlighting. Here's some areas you need to pay attention to. What if these are just neutral things. It's just information, right? What if you can get to a place where you don't view like these failures as either good or bad, but just neutral. They're just neutral. It's just information. And it's just there. Right. And what if you could reframe that list and just say, this is getting me one step closer to becoming Dr. whoever. So for this month, what I hope that you, along with my clients, cause we'll be doing this is that I hope that you are looking for all the ways that you have tried to achieve your goal. All the ways you have a tried to become doctor for the next 30 days. All the actions that you have taken to finish the next step, wherever step you're on. I hope that you're able to just write that out somewhere or have a list of all the ways that you took action towards your goals. Even if they didn't work out, even if you didn't get to finish them, even if you like killed it. Even if you like yes, more of that, please. I don't know. No action is too small. I would highly encourage you to just keep a running list. Try to aim for writing five things down a week that you did, an action you took towards your goal.

Celebration Must Be A Priority: 

And every week I want you to celebrate that list. I know that celebration isn't something that comes naturally to some, right? But it has to happen on purpose. It has to have some intentionality behind it. And celebration doesn't mean that you have to spend all of this money. I'm not, I'm not saying you need to spend all the money. I'm saying that finding ways to celebrate, right? I feel like I had a list for folks. You can celebrate by taking a longer 30 minute walk than you normally would, by starting a new series on Netflix, reading one of the books you got in the corner for pleasure, maybe celebrating is talking to that friend that you know, you can get carried away on for hours. Maybe it is like ordering something new off of Amazon. Maybe it's ordering one of your favorite meals. Maybe it's a longer bubble bath, like a pampering night. Maybe it's just staying sleeping in for an extra two hours. Maybe it's something that you have, like my program, we do like doctor, we do a letter for each milestone, maybe you get your new letter and you paint that. Celebration is all about feeding yourself, like filling yourself back up. And one of the best ways I like to tell my clients to celebrate is that every day, every day, excuse me, at least one day a week, you take off from all forms of work and you just do something that makes you happy. If it's playing animal crossing for the whole day, it doesn't matter. Cause you're celebrating all of the work and action you took from the week.

Celebrate Doing The Work: 

What would it mean for you to celebrate? What does that look like? And I know I hear you. I hear you and your brain saying, but why would I celebrate something that didn't go right? Because we're reframing how we're viewing it. Right? Remember it's not about something going right or failure when it's evident. It is literal. Every evidence that you took action. Do you know how many people are just sitting there not taking action? You know how many people who are like, they're just thinking in their brains and they feel like they've done a lot of stuff, but they haven't, they haven't taken any action. All I did was a lot of thinking, thinking, doesn't get you the results. Well, it does in a way, but you get what? I mean? Like at some point you're going to have to act like your thoughts, carry you to feel which carry you to act a certain way. But the thinking you just sitting there and thinking, no, that's why I like things like, um, manifestation and positive affirmations, get a bad rep because people think like, Oh, I'm just going to think this way. And everything's going to magically change. No. Along with that thinking has you have to change your beliefs, your feelings, your actions have to go with that.

You know, if you're a religious or Christian, I mean, the Bible says faith without works is what, what is that? Thank you. You have to do the work. So what I'm encouraging you to do is write down a list of five things every week, five actions that you have taken towards your goal and at the end of the week, take a day off. Or whenever you have time to take a full day off and find a way to celebrate that in the way that you celebrate that 's doing something that lights you up that fills you up. Yes. Even in quarantine. Yes. Even when you're in the house, there's ways that you can do things that makes you feel good. So let me know. What are some of your favorite ways to celebrate? I would love to know, come on over Instagram at Marvette Lacy and that's going to be it. I think this is a pretty short episode for this week and I'm excited to talk with you all next week. Bye for now.

Join Finish Your Dissertation: 

Hey, you ready to take this work further? Then it's time for you to join the finish your dissertation program. Finally get the tools, resources, and structure. You need to show up consistent and disciplined in your process. All you need to do is come on over to MarvetteLacy.com/Apply and join the finish your dissertation wait list. I'll see you there. Bye for now. Thank you for joining in for today's office hours. Make sure you come on Instagram and tag me at Marvette Lacy. Let me know what your thoughts were on today's episode until next time. Do something to show yourself some love. I'll talk to you next week. Bye for now.