There is a quiet truth life has been teaching me in layers, seasons, and sometimes through loss: once the process is compromised, the promise gets undervalued. It sounds simple, almost obvious, but living it is a different story. This realization didn’t come to me in theory, it came through lived experiences, missteps, impatience, and moments where I watched things I deeply desired slip away.
For a long time, I believed that wanting something badly was enough. That passion, intention, and prayer could substitute discipline, patience, and consistency. I thought if my heart was in the right place, the journey would somehow arrange itself. But life has a way of correcting what enthusiasm alone cannot sustain.
There were seasons when I was more in love with the outcome than with who I needed to become to sustain it. I admired the finish line, the title, the stability, the validation, the sense of arrival, without respecting the daily, often boring work that leads there. I wanted results that required roots I had not yet grown.
So I rushed. I skipped steps. I leaned on shortcuts dressed as “opportunities.” I convinced myself that speed meant favor. But when the results came too early or without depth, they felt fragile. They felt undeserved. They felt easy to lose.
Some seasons are meant to stretch us quietly. To build emotional muscle. To teach restraint, wisdom, and discernment. Yet I’ve had moments where I resisted those slow seasons. I pushed myself into spaces I admired without asking whether I was fully formed for them.
When pressure came, I cracked. When responsibility increased, I shrank. Not because I was incapable but because I had bypassed preparation. The process I tried to escape was the very thing meant to stabilize me.
Sometime this year, during one of my hardest moments, I called a very close friend and pastor because I felt overwhelmed and tired of carrying pain that didn’t seem to end. As we spoke, he said something that stayed with me: “Sharon, unless you pass this exam and graduate this class, God will not promote you.” I remember telling him how hard it felt, how confusing it was to understand God in that moment. I cried deeply not because I didn’t believe, but because I was exhausted. I wanted the pain to end. I wanted to move on without another lesson attached to it.
Looking back now, I understand what he meant. Some seasons are not meant to be escaped; they are meant to be completed. What feels like delay is often divine insistence on depth. What feels like repetition is refinement. And what feels like punishment is often preparation in disguise.
Not all shortcuts are visible. Some live inside us.
There were times I avoided doing the deeper emotional work; healing, self-honesty, accountability, boundaries. I told myself I had “moved on” when I had only buried things. I rushed forgiveness without understanding. I embraced new beginnings without closing old chapters properly.
And later, the same patterns returned, just wearing different faces. The promise of peace, clarity, or wholeness felt postponed, not because it wasn’t meant for me, but because I hadn’t yet allowed the process to refine me enough to hold it.
I’ve always known I carry potential, skills, vision, capacity. But potential is only raw material. Without discipline, structure, and consistency, it remains unused or misused.
There were opportunities that came before I had fully cultivated my character or systems. And when they did, I struggled to maintain them. It wasn’t punishment. It was exposure; exposure of areas still under construction.
I’ve learned that gifts can open doors, but only preparation keeps them open.
One of the hardest things to sit with is this: sometimes what feels like loss is actually protection. Sometimes what feels like delay is correction. And sometimes what feels like “God taking something away” is really life revealing that the foundation wasn’t strong enough yet.
A promise mishandled hurts more than a promise delayed.
Because when it slips away, it carries disappointment, self-doubt, and grief. But it also carries a lesson, one that gently whispers: you’re still becoming.
With time, reflection, and grace, I’ve begun to see the process differently. Not as punishment. Not as resistance. But as preparation.
The process teaches patience where impatience once ruled.
It teaches discipline where excitement once led.
It teaches identity before achievement.
It teaches depth before display.
Now, I’m learning to slow down without guilt. To sit with the work. To grow roots before expecting fruit. To let my character catch up with my calling.
Today, I move with more intention. I no longer chase outcomes just to say I’ve arrived. I ask better questions:
Am I ready to sustain this?
Have I honored the becoming?
Am I willing to grow quietly before being seen?
I am learning that the process doesn’t delay the promise, it protects it. And when the time is right, what comes will not feel fragile or borrowed. It will feel earned, stewarded, and deeply aligned.
And so I close this chapter with a steadier heart, choosing to honour the long road instead of rushing to the finish line, trusting that every slow, quiet, disciplined step is shaping me into the woman who can finally hold her promise without fear of losing it again.
Beautiful Scars 