Why High-Achieving Women Miss Their Own Growth | Dr. Erin Wilson
- Dr. Erin Wilson
- Jun 14
- 4 min read
You’re Praying for Evidence While Ignoring the Receipts
This week, QuickBooks unexpectedly humbled me.
I got a notification saying they had increased my payment processing limit to $400,000.
My first reaction?
“Girl… for what?”
QuickBooks, respectfully, what exactly do you think I’m processing over here?
I laughed because, in my mind, that felt excessive. Almost ridiculous.
But then something unexpected happened.
I stopped.
Because while I was laughing, I realized something important:
QuickBooks wasn’t guessing.
They weren’t trying to motivate me or hype me up. They were looking at patterns.
Consistency.
Processing history.
Growth.
Something in the data suggested:
“She may need room for more.”
And whew.
That thing sat me down.
Because it made me wonder:
How many of us are praying for evidence while completely ignoring the receipts?
High-Achieving Women Are Terrible at Seeing Their Own Growth
Can we tell the truth for a second?
High-achieving women are often terrible at acknowledging growth.
Not because we’re ungrateful.
Not because we aren’t accomplishing things.
But because the moment something hard becomes normal, we stop counting it.
You prayed for the leadership role. Now you’re overwhelmed trying to lead well.
You prayed for the business. Now you’re focused on who hasn’t booked yet instead of celebrating the people who already trusted you enough to say yes.
You prayed for confidence. Now you speak up in rooms that once intimidated you, but instead of celebrating your growth, you’ve normalized it.
You prayed for healing. Now you’re frustrated you still have hard days instead of recognizing how differently you move through them.
We move the goalpost so quickly that we rarely stop long enough to notice how much has changed.
And because we live inside our own lives every day, growth often becomes invisible.
Growth Rarely Feels Dramatic
I think one of the biggest lies we believe is that growth should feel obvious.
We imagine transformation arriving with fireworks. A huge breakthrough. A dramatic moment that suddenly makes us feel accomplished.
And sometimes that happens.
But more often?
Growth looks surprisingly ordinary.
It looks like:
Having hard conversations you once avoided
Setting boundaries without apologizing for them
Recovering faster after disappointment
Speaking up when you once stayed quiet
Resting without guilt
Choosing yourself in situations where you once abandoned yourself
Trying again after disappointment
Staying consistent when no one is clapping yet
Growth often looks like consistency.
Healing.
Wisdom.
Trying again.
And because it feels ordinary, we dismiss it.
But hear me when I say this:
Just because it feels normal now does not mean it wasn’t growth.
That boundary? Growth.
That healing? Growth.
The hard season you survived? Growth.
The way you stopped tolerating things that once drained you? Growth.
Learning not to abandon yourself?
That is growth.
Some of Us Are Asking God for Signs While Stepping Over Evidence
I want to gently call us out for a minute.
Because I think some of us are asking God for signs while stepping over evidence.
We ask:
Am I growing?
Am I making progress?
Is any of this even working?
Meanwhile, the receipts are everywhere.
Look at how differently you handled that hard situation.
Look at the opportunities that didn’t exist before.
Look at the courage you’ve built.
Look at the boundaries you finally keep.
Look at the conversations you can have now.
Look at the peace you fought for.
Look at the resilience you earned the hard way.
Look at the standards you finally developed.
Sometimes we are so focused on where we still want to go that we completely overlook the evidence of who we’re already becoming.
And maybe that’s what got me about that QuickBooks notification.
Because whether I felt like I was growing or not…
the data told another story.
And maybe somebody needs to hear this today:
Sometimes your feelings are behind your reality.
Whew.
That one sat with me.
Because maybe success hasn’t stopped happening.
Maybe you’ve just become accustomed to carrying it.
What Receipts Are You Ignoring?
Let me ask you something:
What in your life feels normal now that would have overwhelmed the version of you from five years ago?
Seriously.
Think about it.
The conversations.
The responsibilities.
The resilience.
The confidence.
The healing.
The boundaries.
The things you survived.
The version of you from years ago would probably look at your life right now and say:
“Wow. We made it further than I thought.”
Maybe not all the way.
But further.
And that matters.
So if you’ve been feeling discouraged…
If you’ve been wondering whether you’re growing…
If you’ve been praying for evidence…
Maybe it’s time to stop and look at the receipts.
They might already be sitting in your life.
Want the Full Conversation?
I unpack this idea more deeply in this week’s episode of Power NAP Live, where we talk about why high-achieving women struggle to see their own growth and how to stop overlooking the evidence of who they’re becoming.
🎥 Watch the full episode here:
And I’d love to hear from you:
What receipt of growth have you been overlooking lately?
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