STITCH COLLECTIVE

SLOW PROGRESS IS PROGRESS // If you ever feel like you’re making baby steps when you want to be building your skills in leaps and bounds, or have a series of failed projects, just remember that you’re still making progress.

Slow progress is still progress.

Failures are progress. They might not feel like it  - but you know what NOT to do next time. That can be just as critical as knowing what to do.

When my now - 11 yo son was an infant and toddler, I was a single mom who was barely scraping by - both emotionally and financially. Sewing was my literally one of the only things keeping me sane. So when I had a project fail, or I was trying to learn new techniques and things were going slowly, I would get so angry and frustrated with myself. Sewing was supposed to be fun, and I was making it NOT. FUN. by focusing on my slowness or my mistakes versus my PROGRESS.

So - I decided to shift my mindset. I started looking for ANY progress and counting it as a win. I would specifically ask myself - “Is this even 1% better? Do I know 1% more than I did before I started?” If there was even the *tiniest* change or learning, I considered it progress. I was getting better. And I knew that if I kept making tiny, sometimes almost undetectable changes - in time - I would be 100% farther than I had been when I started. Have 100% higher level mastery of that skill. That kept me going, and pushing through failed projects and frustrating learning curves.

No matter where you’re at in your journey, sewing or otherwise - don’t focus on your failures, focus on your progress.