Successive births

"We are not born all at once, but by bits.
The body first, and the spirit later;
and the birth and growth of the spirit,
in those who are attentive to their inner life,
are slow and exceedingly painful.

Our mothers are racked with the pains of our physical birth;
we ourselves suffer the longer pain of our spiritual growth.

Our souls are scarred with the struggles of successive births,
and the process is recorded also by the wrinkles in our brains,
by the lines in our faces."

-The Promised Land  P. 72, Mary Antin

Reading on Google books.