What Growth Looks Like

When I was a kid, I experienced awful growing pains in my knees. At certain points, they hurt so bad that I could hardly extend my legs fully. My knees remained in a flexed position constantly, and when I attempted to stand upright, pain shot through my legs. One time, I had to ride in a wheelchair through a family vacation because of how badly my knees immobilized me. At that age, I couldn’t understand what was going on. I just knew I hurt, and I dreaded it.

Now, at 30, I’m 5’8” and the growing pains in my legs have stopped, fortunately!

But the growing “pains” still live on, just in a different way. Like every adult that’s trying to get better at life, I’m in the trenches of a new type of growth that comes with learning a new way to live. It’s that type of growth that’s painful and messy, and doesn’t always feel really good.

Hard growth happens when we venture to change things like old habits or generational patterns, confront our addictions, speak against insecurity, doubt our doubts, structure new boundaries, and/or challenge deeply rooted messages woven within the core of our being since childhood.

Change of any kind is temping to dismiss and push aside. It’s often easier just to keep life moving in the direction it’s going, rather than change something foundational to the way we think, live, and behave. But is that really living?

As someone once told me, “If you always do what you’ve always done, you’ll always get what you’ve always gotten…” Meaning, if you want something to look different, you have to be willing to change. And this type of deep change doesn’t come without growing pains…

Lately, I’ve been in a season of growth. I don’t mean the pretty, “all-put-together” kind where everything comes together as it “should,” but the messy kind of growth with all the shaky and confusing feelings attached. Despite what we think it “should” be, growth isn’t always a pretty, uphill slope.

From my experience, here’s what growth really looks like:

What Growth Looks Like:

Uncertainty and Risk

Growth requires risk. It’s stepping out into the unknown and doing that thing that feels really uncomfortable.

After all, we can’t truly change unless we’re living outside of our comfort zones. This requires us to be intentional about putting ourselves in challenging situations, which our anxiety may tell us to run far away from. Whatever is “normal” and “easy” feels safer for us, but that’s not where real growth happens. Growth happens when we’re pushed and challenged beyond our natural limits.

Growth looks learning to ride your bike without safety wheels… so hang on, expect some wobbles, and brace yourself for falls. “Perfection” and growth cannot occur at the same time.

Living in the discomfort

When growth is happening, there’s bound to be some unpleasant feelings close by. But these feelings don’t necessarily mean you’re doing it wrong. It may mean that you’re actually on the right track. Anytime we do brave things, fear, anxiety, and self-doubt can show up. And when we “mess up” after doing the hard or brave things, shame, regret, and self-criticism may also voice their opinions.

Growth looks like living in the discomfort without over-identifying with it. Meaning, we feel our feelings, learn from them, and give ourselves permission to move on. If we let our feelings dictate how we feel about ourselves or our progress, then we’ll never get very far. Growth doesn’t always feel good… at times, it’s painful. But that shouldn’t stop us from persisting and trekking on.

Learning what you didn’t know before

Growth is growth because we’re trying to do what we’ve never done before. There’s no road-map for us, and no manual telling us exactly what step to take next. Growth involves learning a new way to live and be.

And this doesn’t happen overnight. We didn’t become who we are overnight, therefore, we can’t expect ourselves to change overnight. We don’t expect kids to know something they haven’t yet been taught. In a similar way, our life lessons come at different times and we can take them and learn from them as they come.

In order to grow, we must be willing to learn, adapt, and move on – without getting stuck in the past. It requires a whole lot of compassion, empathy, and self-respect. Growth actually flourishes when we’re willing to fail and mess up, because when we do, we’re living outside of our comfort zone, and worth celebrating.