149: The Neuroscience of Success: why entrepreneurs need to celebrate more
How often do you stop to truly celebrate your wins—big and small? In this episode, I dive deep into why celebrating successes matters more than you think, both in your business and in your personal life. From sharing personal stories of family milestones to reflecting on how I often skip over acknowledging wins in business, this episode is all about the power of creating a positive feedback loop that keeps you motivated and builds momentum.
We’ll explore the psychological reasons behind why humans—especially women—struggle to celebrate themselves, and I’ll reveal science-backed strategies to rewire your brain for positivity. Plus, I’ll share some creative, real-life ways to celebrate your wins, straight from listeners like you. By the end of this episode, you’ll be inspired to create your own celebration rituals that fuel your success rather than letting those milestones slip by unnoticed.
Topics We Cover in This Episode:
The truth about why your brain is wired to focus on the negative
The “male hubris, female humility” effect—and how it shapes how we (don’t) celebrate
Why acknowledging small wins creates a powerful “virtuous cycle” in your business
Simple, science-backed ways to override negativity bias and build confidence
How everyday actions—like writing a sticky note—can shift your mindset
Celebration ideas from fellow entrepreneurs (and a few of my own favorites)
Why skipping celebrations could be hurting your business growth
A challenge that will help you start celebrating wins today
If this episode resonated with you, I’d love to hear how you plan to celebrate your next win! Share your celebration ideas with me on Instagram or tag me in your stories so I can cheer you on.
Resources Mentioned:
Find out more about the neuroscience of celebration in these articles:
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Hey there. Welcome back to the Ill Communication Podcast. Over the last couple of weeks, we've had a lot to celebrate in [00:01:00] our family. My mom and my mother-in-law both celebrated some pretty big milestone birthdays. My youngest son made it onto a double 18, and my eldest son graduated from high school.
With the high school graduation, there's a commencement ceremony and a grad banquet, which is kind of like prom, but here in Canada, or at least in Western Canada, we don't call it a prom. When I was in grade 12, 32 years ago, graduation was a family affair.
Everyone's parents and siblings came to the commencement and to the banquet. But today, in a post COVID world. Things have kinda changed along with the massive class sizes. It's not always a given that families will attend the banquet dinner, and while it was an option for families to attend the banquet at my son's high school, a few of our friends were not planning on attending.
They were questioning whether they'd even go, which I found kind of surprising, I guess, because [00:02:00] my family came to mind and I'd always assumed I'd attend my kids' grad banquet. I also think there's so few occasions in life to celebrate. Yes, there's the annual birthdays, but aside from weddings and baby showers, which not everyone will experience, graduation is one of the few times I.
We can really celebrate our children and our families. So it was kind of a no brainer for my husband and I that we would go. Unfortunately, siblings weren't really attending, so my youngest son didn't attend the banquet, but we did make him sit through the four hour commencement ceremony, kind of a rite of passage.
Anyway, it really made me think about the things we celebrate in life and in business. And while I'm pretty good at celebrating things. And people in my personal life, I'm actually pretty terrible at celebrating things in my business. Milestones will come and go. Sales will happen. I'll launch something new, and I will barely register these wins, [00:03:00] let alone celebrate them.
I mean, sure, I've acknowledged some of the bigger celebrations and wins like how many years in business. Some revenue goals, but on a day-to-day, week-to-week basis, I really don't acknowledge it or celebrate any wins, and I'm not alone. Humans and especially women, are not wired for positivity. Or celebration.
Psychologist Dr. Rick Hanson talks about how the brain is wired to pay attention to the bad and ignore the good. It's a phenomenon called negativity bias, and it's grounded in the evolutionary need to avoid dangers because something dangerous is more likely gonna kill you, whereas the winds like finding a juicy new berry patch will sustain your life, but it's not gonna have an immediate impact on you.
He says the brain is Velcro for the bad and Teflon for the good. At the same time, studies show that women are [00:04:00] less likely to attribute wins to our own genius and talent than men are. Men are more likely to believe that their success is because of their own doing, and failure is due to someone else's fault or a fault outside of their control.
It's called the male hubris female humility effect. The humility women feel means we are less likely to attribute success to ourselves and our actions, and we're less likely to take advantage of our successes. The way you overcome the humility effect or to balance negativity bias is. By looking at data like, is my fear or this challenge grounded in data?
Is there proof that this fear will be realized? You can counterbalance it by having a daily gratitude practice and. You balance it by noticing and celebrating your wins. The more you celebrate your wins, the more your brain will rewire itself [00:05:00] to create positive neural pathways instead of negative ones.
When you take time to notice, appreciate and celebrate your wins and accomplishments. Big and small, you create a positive feedback loop called the virtuous cycle. It's where one good decision or action leads to another, which creates a circular loop of momentum that builds over time. It's the opposite of a vicious cycle.
It's a virtuous cycle. When you see and celebrate your wins, it motivates you to keep going, to stay on track, to keep making progress, and therefore you have more wins to celebrate, more momentum and motivation to propel you forward. Behavioral scientist, BJ Fog explains that celebrating small wins stimulates dopamine release in the brain.
It's a feelgood chemical that reinforces the learning experience and strengthens our sense of connection to those we work with and with ourselves. And there are plenty of articles and studies that talk about the importance of celebration on teens. According to a [00:06:00] study by the app Socialcast, 69% of employees would work harder if they felt their efforts were better appreciated.
And this can be even celebrating some of the small wins to keep people motivated. According to Forbes, it's essential for business leaders to recognize and celebrate our wins. It reinforces our self-belief and confidence, which are super important for women in business. Celebrating success creates a culture of gratitude and fulfillment and fuels a spirit of achievement.
And finally, celebrating our wins allows us to balance and enjoy the entrepreneurial journey, which can help prevent burnout and promote overall wellbeing. I'm gonna drop links to several of those studies that I featured here into the show notes, all of which is to say. Let's do what we can to celebrate more of our wins.
You can celebrate some of the big wins, like signing a new client, [00:07:00] completing a major task, launching a new offer or product, hitting a revenue milestone, a business milestone, or even marketing milestones. But I also wanna encourage you to think about some of those micro wins that you might have on a day to day or week to week frequency.
Count the number of sales touch points or follow up. You have celebrate getting a testimonial, getting a referral. If you sent a weekly email, celebrate the shit out of that. Uh, publishing on social media, completing a major client project. Heck celebrate taking a midday walk, go into the gym or a fitness class, or making a healthy choice at meal times.
It's so important to celebrate these micro wins because they are the. Pathway to hit those bigger milestones. So maybe you wanna know how to celebrate. I put out a call on social media to ask people how they celebrate their wins in their business. I'll share with you what I heard, and in fact, I heard a couple people reply to me saying, I [00:08:00] don't celebrate my wins, I just move on to the next thing.
So please share the results. So, hello, this episode is for you. Okay, so Anne-Marie said she enjoys ordering takeout from her favorite poke restaurant. Gazi loves getting foot massages with her bestie, and Mina said she also books a long massage. Whitney celebrates with popping a bottle of champagne.
Charlie shared a neat idea after completing a big project or launch. She schedules a sleep vacation. She actually books time for herself to rest, nap, sleep, and reset her nervous system. I loved that Jessica said she'll buy something bigger for her house or her family that she's been putting off. She also said just being conscious of the win and acknowledging it is super important, which is kind of the point of this whole podcast episode.
For me personally, when I am cognizant of my wins, I will make a point of bringing them up at the dinner table with my kids. More for me to [00:09:00] voice the win than for them to get any benefit from it, but they're always quick to offer a heartfelt congratulations so that. It's a little dopamine hit for me.
I've shared coffee cards with my clients to celebrate. I've taken my wing woman, Hannah, out for lunch or dinner. Sometimes I'll treat myself to, uh, ordering in some lunch. I have a home-based business. I rarely leave, but, you know, just ordering that lunch in for myself, which doesn't cost a lot of money, but it makes it feel like a treat is.
Great for me. Other times I've used my business credit card points to pay for hotels, for family trips, and I make sure that I tell my family that the business is providing that trip because that's a win in of itself. The most favorite thing I have ever done to celebrate a win was when I splurged and bought a set of four fine China espresso cups from Tiffany's.
It was a couple hundred dollars for the set, which is a lump for four tiny espresso cups. I love [00:10:00] them. I think they are beautiful. I use them now. Whenever I wanna toast myself or celebrate something, or if I want to put myself into a high vibe, I always pull myself in espresso and serve it out of these boujee Tiffany cups.
Sometimes I just simply reward myself with a midday walk or take myself out for coffee or a Starbucks refresher. Now, I say all this, making it sound like I'm really good at celebrating my wins, but I'm not. By making this list, I'm just reminding myself of the things I have done in the past and should do more frequently.
Celebrating doesn't have to be something elaborate or expensive. It can be as simple as creating a win wall and putting up sticky notes for each win you have throughout the day, the week or the month. So I'm gonna leave today's episode with a challenge to you and to me to take more time each day and each week noticing and celebrating the micro wins as well as [00:11:00] the bigger milestones.
At the end of each day, let's take five minutes to notice and celebrate our micro wins. Maybe by writing the wins on a sticky note or a wind wall. At the end of each week, take note of some of the bigger rocks you've moved in your business, and at the end of each month, review and celebrate your milestones and results.
Maybe together we can rewire our brains for positivity instead of negativity, and create a virtuous circle that creates more momentum and success in our business. So until next week, please know that I am here cheering you on and celebrating all of your success. Bye for now. [00:12:00]
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