Gradual Growth

When D&D characters gain experience, nothing changes for a long time. Often, many sessions can go by, with the characters gradually growing in experience, but that doesn't make them any stronger, until suddenly, it does. When the characters gain enough experience to level up, they suddenly experience a significant increase in power, gaining more hit points, spell slots, and abilities. When characters level up, the change is sudden and drastic.

We don't work like that. For us, change and growth are gradual, almost imperceptible, like the growth of a tree. A growing tree may hit a few obvious milestones, like growing or dropping leaves, flowers, or fruit, but its height grows so slowly and gradually, one can hardly observe its growth at all. Similarly, most of our growth comes slowly and gradually, and we often don't even notice it's happening. I consider this unfortunate, because obvious advancement can be encouraging, but it is what it is.

We don't "level up," like D&D characters do. We grow slowly toward the light, inch by inch, year by year, like trees do. So, we should be patient with ourselves and our growth and try not to be discouraged by any lack of obvious milestones. Our growth happens gradually, and daily, as long as we remain diligent enough to maintain it.