Maybe your garden isn't growing because every time a flower blooms, you cut it to prove to someone that you're a gardener.

Some people harvest their progress before it matures. They announce, demonstrate, and perform their growth for an audience before the roots have gone deep enough to hold weight. The need to be seen as someone who is growing can directly undermine the actual process of growing. Real development often requires periods of invisible work, where you resist the urge to perform the progress and simply let it happen.