Suffering and sacrifice

I have thought, since ever I thought, that sacrifice must only exist in the notions of those who sacrifice. because, it seemed that every sacrifice, included giving up a thing and almost instantly being rewarded with something greater. So, what people call sacrifice is actually what we call growth, Growth of any sort requires change and potential, very temporary hardship or sadness. Isn't that simply part of any change?

I was thinking about this all in microcosm as I played a Role-playing Game. In the game a "quest" which carries a reward on financial compensation is to purchase this item which is equal to what is instantly compensated. It seemed pointless, expect that there is a further reward to be earned in completing a number of these "quests". So of the quests are challenging and I do not see the compensation those it probably exceeds the sacrifice. the one in particular merely costs the same price as the task pays, if I did not see a larger picture I would not be able to see the sese of it at all.

In the game, I see how particular sacrifices seem meaningless, but ought to be performed anyhow and this is like things we are asked to do that seem to make sense, like eating vegtables or doing math homework. further I see how the game moderator/creator would encourage to do tasks by assigning value to them as a means to sort of create stronger players... Is that making sense or do I need to extrapolate further?

I originally sought to make a record of this because  I hoped to share an insight I keep having about doing hard things. I almost think it is an incentive because it is through hardship that we become more like Christ.