Writers 
I used to think trying was the space between where I was and where I wanted to be. A temporary place. Something I had to pass through before I could finally say, “I’ve become.”
But maybe I was looking at it from the wrong direction.
We talk about becoming as if it happens somewhere in the distance. Becoming a writer. Becoming confident. Becoming successful. Becoming the person we imagine ourselves to be. We picture the finished version so clearly that the unfinished version starts to feel like a disappointment.
So we call what we're doing “trying.”
As if trying is what happens when becoming hasn't started yet.
But what if it has?
Maybe every time you sit down and try again, something in you is already changing. Maybe the person who keeps returning to something after failing is not the same person who started. Maybe the attempt itself is leaving something behind in you—patience, courage, discipline, understanding, even a different idea of what you actually want.
You might think you're trying to become a writer when you're already becoming one every time you choose to write. You might think you're trying to become brave when courage is already being built in every uncomfortable thing you refuse to run away from. You might think you're trying to figure out your life when, somewhere inside all that uncertainty, you're becoming someone who understands themselves a little better.
And perhaps that's why becoming can feel so invisible.
We keep looking for proof at the destination.
We want the finished book, the achievement, the acceptance, the opportunity, the version of ourselves who finally has everything figured out. We rarely stop to consider the person being formed while we wait for those things.
There are versions of me I only met because I tried something and failed at it.
There are things I understand now because I once didn't.
There are things I can do now because, at some point, I was terrible at them and kept going anyway.
Maybe becoming isn't a dramatic moment when you suddenly wake up as the person you've always wanted to be.
Maybe it is quieter than that.
Maybe it happens in all the ordinary attempts we don't think count.
The unfinished draft. The second attempt. The decision to start again. The thing you almost gave up on. The skill you're still learning. The dream you're embarrassed to admit you still want.
We are so quick to ask, “When will I become?”
Maybe we should sometimes ask, “Who am I becoming while I try?”
Because trying leaves evidence.
It changes the way you think. It changes what you can tolerate. It changes what you believe you're capable of. It introduces you to parts of yourself that would have remained strangers if you had never begun.
And maybe that's the part we miss.
You don't always become after trying
I've spent time thinking I was simply trying to get somewhere, without realizing that the journey was quietly changing what I wanted, what I understood, and even how I saw myself. Perhaps some of the things I call “trying” are actually pieces of an identity I haven't learned to recognize yet.
Maybe that's why we shouldn't be so quick to dismiss our unfinished selves.
We keep waiting to become, while becoming is already happening.
Maybe trying isn't proof that you haven't arrived.
Maybe it is proof that you're already on your way to someone you haven't met yet.
