Growth is weird because you never see it happening in real time. When you are struggling the most it is elusive. And when you are craving a concrete sign that progress is being made, you will never find it. At some point, when you have finally reached your stride, that is when signs of progress will likely appear. And they never quite hit like you thought they would, do they?

I’ve been living through a version of that in my life over the last couple of weeks. I moved to a new city a little over two years ago now. When I moved, I did so alone with no job or social prospects lined up in my new locale. I had spent the previous year doing a lot of thinking. In the process, I felt that I had discovered some truths about my inner life. These inner shifts cast my past in a new light and I no longer felt like the life I had been living previously suited me. The move then would be a fresh start. It was a chance for me to start my life anew with the hard-won self-knowledge that I had gained.

In my head, it was the perfect plan. But reality moves slower than fantasy. When I first arrived, it took me longer than I thought it would to find a job. And then when I did find work, it took me longer than I thought it would to acclimate myself to my new work schedule. The whole time I was grinding on becoming more employable, I was surfing massive waves of loneliness. There were many days when I questioned my decision to move. I would lay in bed, looking at the sun set outside of my apartment window, and wonder if I would ever truly feel apart of my new city.

But I kept showing up. This didn’t happen everyday of course. There were some days when I only had the energy to come back home from work and flop into bed and turn the lights down low and maybe shed a tear or two. But I showed up when I could.

At first this looked like taking myself out for long, solitary walks. I did that consistently enough that I found myself with slightly more energy, which I then used to do and sign up for more things. I kept repeating that process, over and over again, for about a year. And finally, just recently, I have felt my work beginning to pay dividends. Suddenly, the new city I inhabit no longer feels like a foreign space. I have pockets of it that feel familiar and like home. There are places I can visit now that hold memories.

I recently had an encounter with another young woman who just moved to the city. She commented on my stories, saying that she wanted to know how I knew of things to do and places to go in the area. There was a slight yearning desperation in her tone, like she wanted to fast-forward to the part where she was comfortable and settled in her new home. What I wanted to tell her is that there is no rushing the process. The journey is essential and can’t be skipped. There is no magic moment when you arrive, merely a moment where something external prompts reflection and you look back and realize how far you’ve come.

I hope that a year from now she is in the position where she is speaking to another newcomer in the city, and is prompted to look back at her own growth and progress in community and home building. If that moment comes for her, I hope that she feels as grateful in that moment as I did upon my own reflection.