“Fall in love with the process and the results will follow.” – Bradley Whitford
I keep seeing this quote everywhere. LinkedIn posts, motivational threads, self-help books. Everyone loves to remind you that the journey matters more than the destination, that you should enjoy the process instead of obsessing over outcomes.
And I get it. I really do. But here’s the thing: I’m finding it really hard to believe that right now.
The reality I’m living in
I’m in my mid-thirties. I’ve been in Canada for two years as a permanent resident since late 2023. I discovered project management when I was in my early thirties and living in Morocco. I got my Google PM certificate. I know what I want to do with my career. I’ve been working toward this for five years.
And I still don’t have a single junior, entry-level PM role.
Let me paint the full picture. No PM job. No Canadian university degree (because that’s a serious financial investment when you’re barely making ends meet). No car. No real support network. The few connections I have are from free trainings I’ve taken here and there, online and in-person. They’re surface-level. Not the kind of people who will refer you to jobs or actually help you break through. You know the type of “networking” I’m talking about. It barely counts as relationships.
I had some project coordination experience in my previous job as a content manager in Morocco. Not PM, but close. Apparently, that doesn’t matter here. Entry-level positions want three years of PM experience. Entry-level. Are you kidding me?
And it’s not like I haven’t been trying to build credentials. After that aha moment in my master’s program, I took online courses on Udemy and OpenClassrooms before getting the Google certificate. In 2024, after arriving in Canada, I completed an online micro-credential in Foundations of PM from Schulich ExecEd at York University. One of those free trainings I mentioned. At this point, I’m just collecting certificates and training without any real-world PM work experience to show for it. The collection keeps growing. The job offers don’t.
Meanwhile, I’m surrounded by reminders of what I don’t have. People around me who seem to have it all figured out. Social media highlight reels of people younger than me hitting milestones I’m still working toward. My parents back home, waiting for me to make something of myself, to pull them out of their struggles. They don’t say it, but I can feel it.
I’m an immigrant woman with no support network, fighting my battles alone. CAPM certification? Pursuing a Canadian degree? Those cost money I don’t have. And every day I’m asked to “enjoy the process” while I have nothing to show for years of effort.
It’s not like I had it all in Morocco and gave it up to come here. I was born and raised there, lived my whole life there, but I didn’t have much to leave behind. A bank account with a little money in it. My family. No strong ties beyond that. I came to Canada hoping things would be different.
When I actually did enjoy the process
Here’s the thing that gets me: I know what it feels like to love doing something without caring about the outcome.
When I was younger, I used to draw anime characters for hours. My favorites were L from Death Note and Goku from Dragon Ball Z. I’d sit there carefully sketching them, coloring them in, not counting the hours. It was pure fun. No pressure. No timeline. Just me and the art.
I fell in love with graphic design the same way. I taught myself photo manipulation, combining stock photos to create something beautiful. I did UI/UX designs just because I wanted to. I even had a DeviantART account where I’d share my work. I wasn’t thinking about building a portfolio or landing clients or proving myself. I just loved doing it.
So what changed?
The world that celebrates results, not process
We live in a world that worships early achievement. If you haven’t figured out your life by 25, people act like you’re behind. If you’re not hitting milestones on society’s timeline, you’re failing.
Nobody celebrates the people still grinding through the process with nothing to show for it yet. Nobody talks about the ones who discovered their calling late and are still fighting to break into the field. The narrative is always about the young prodigy, the person who made it early, the success story that happened fast.
What about the rest of us?
I’m in my mid-thirties with gray hair already, still the same person in Canada with nothing tangible to prove I’m making progress. And I’m supposed to enjoy this process?
The impossible balance
I know the advice is right on some level. If you only focus on outcomes, you’ll never be satisfied. There will always be another goal, another milestone, another thing you haven’t achieved yet. The treadmill never stops.
But how do you fall in love with a process when:
- You’re watching money drain while getting nowhere?
- The job market tells you you’re not qualified for entry-level roles?
- Everyone around you seems to be moving forward while you’re stuck?
- Your family is counting on you to succeed?
- You don’t know when (or if) this will actually work out?
I don’t have an answer yet. Maybe that’s the point of writing this. I’m working through it in real time, trying to reconcile what I know intellectually (the process matters) with what I’m living emotionally (I just want to finally get there).
What I’m trying to figure out
Maybe the answer isn’t choosing between enjoying the process and wanting results. Maybe it’s acknowledging that both things can be true at the same time. You can love what you’re doing AND desperately want it to pay off. You can find moments of satisfaction in the work itself AND feel frustrated that it hasn’t led anywhere yet.
I don’t know if I’ll ever fully “fall in love with the process” the way people talk about it. Not while I’m in survival mode, anyway. But maybe that’s okay. Maybe forcing myself to enjoy every second of this grind isn’t realistic, and I should stop feeling guilty about that.
What I do know is this: I haven’t given up. I’m still here. I’m still working toward becoming a project manager, even when it feels impossible. Even when I have nothing to show for it yet. Even when the world celebrates people who got there faster.
That has to count for something.
Featured image courtesy of Unsplash.