Don’t rush the season you’re in

There are seasons in life we wish we could fast-forward or skip altogether.

Seasons where nothing seems to move. Where all your plans suddenly disappear. Where you find yourself asking questions you never expected to ask.

I’ve had a few of those.

A marriage breakdown.
Two redundancies.
And eventually stepping into self-employment.

None of those were seasons I planned for. And at the time, none of them felt like progress - which, in fairness, makes sense.

But looking back now, I realise something important.

The biggest mistake we make in difficult seasons is assuming they’re empty - or worse, bad for us. Sometimes we spend so much time thinking about what should be or could be that we miss what is. And what is might be doing far more work in our lives than we realise.

The way we respond to difficult seasons
Over time, I’ve noticed that when life slows us down or throws us into a season we didn’t choose, most of us tend to respond in one of four ways.

Not always neatly, not always in order, but with a familiar pattern. I think of it as FELT: Fight. Endure. Learn. Thrive.

1. Fight – “This shouldn’t be happening.”
The first response is resistance.

We question the situation. We replay events in our minds. We ask the inevitable question: Why me?

We fight the reality of the season we’re in because it doesn’t align with the life we thought we’d be living. Not gonna lie*, I’ve spent time here too.

*my kids made me use this!

The problem with fighting the season you’re in is that it keeps you emotionally anchored to a reality you cannot change. In this phase, energy goes into resistance rather than movement. 

2. Endure – “I just need to get through this.”
Eventually, many of us move into endurance.

We accept the situation — not necessarily happily — but with the understanding that this is where life has placed us for now.

We bide our time. We keep going. We survive the season.
And sometimes, survival is enough. In this phase, we might hear people say: "Just be patient. Ride it out." We might still wonder: How much longer?

But if we stay here too long, the season begins to feel like wasted time. The sad reality is that many people never move beyond this stage, drifting back into cycles of Fight - or worse, Blame.

3. Learn – “What is this teaching me?”
For those who choose to move beyond merely enduring the season, this is where perspective begins to shift.

Instead of asking “When will this end?” we start asking a different question: What can I learn from this?

Difficult seasons often reveal things we would never have noticed otherwise: They expose our assumptions, clarify our values and develop resilience we didn’t know we needed.

Many of the qualities we admire most in leaders — humility, empathy, patience, perspective — are rarely built in easy seasons. They are forged in the ones we didn’t ask for. As the saying goes, the best sailors aren't forged on calm seas.

Then, for a select few, there's a fourth stage.

4. Thrive – “What does this season allow?”
At some point, something changes again.

Instead of merely enduring the season or learning from it, we begin to ask a different question altogether: What does this season allow that other seasons don’t?

Maybe it allows time to reflect.
Time to recalibrate.
Time to rebuild.
Time to pursue something new.
Time to reconnect with our Creator.

Some seasons close doors. But they also quietly open others.

When old seasons prepare you for new ones
When my marriage broke down years ago, I moved through every one of those stages.

I fought it. I endured it. Eventually I began learning from it. And over time, I found ways to rebuild and even thrive through it.

What I didn’t expect was how that season would echo years later. Building a business brings its own seasons of uncertainty.

Moments where progress is slower than you’d like.
Moments where the path forward isn’t always obvious.
Moments where you find yourself questioning things again.

And more than once, I’ve FELT the same emotional patterns I experienced before.

The difference now is that I recognise the process. Let’s be real, experience doesn’t eliminate difficult seasons. What it gives us is perspective on how to move through them.

Sometimes the seasons that once broke us become the ones that prepared us.

Don’t rush the season you’re in
It’s natural to want to move quickly through difficult periods.

To get back to stability. To reach the next milestone. To arrive at the harvest.

But not every season is designed for harvest. Some seasons are designed for preparation, some for learning and others for rebuilding. And some for discovering strengths we didn’t know we had.

The season you’re in right now might not be the one you would choose. But that doesn’t mean it’s meaningless.

Final thought
If you find yourself in a challenging season, it may help to pause and ask:

• Am I fighting this season?

• Am I simply enduring it?

• What might it be trying to teach me?

• And what might this season allow that others never could?

Because every season shapes us. The real question is whether we are willing to grow through it.

And sometimes the most important step forward…
is learning how to fully inhabit the season you’re in.

And when the time comes -
to take the Next Step.