It does seem math focuses on the patterns, than the processes generating them. For example, the skeleton is the structure, while the seed is where the process starts.

Operations in math are essentially verbs. You don't have 4, if you don't complete the process of adding the two sets of two.

If you just add stuff together, you have one of something larger. Addition is sets, not contents of the sets. Adding 1+1 = 1. Like adding two piles of sand. Really it's two sets of one become one set of two.

A circle is an efficient container, while a square is an efficient building block. In a void, there is no process to generate either, so neither can exist, without first having the process. Simply assuming them into existence is not a consequence of anything other than proposition. Presumably the first phase is the vacuum fluctuating, then there evolve processes to generate spheres as efficient containers, or grids to define space.

Math is description, while physics is explanation. Map versus territory.

Epicycles were brilliant math, as a description of our view of the cosmos, while the crystalline spheres were lousy physics, as explanation.

The skeleton is not the seed.

Possibly the problem traces to the fact the mind only really perceives patterns, not processes. Our minds process static images and discrete concepts. Otherwise it becomes blurry, like leaving the shutter on a camera open too long.

Emotions and instinct sense processes, like a wave building, or pressure increasing. These actions only become clear when the process is complete, like a wave cresting.

Math is all about the most clear and distinct descriptions, as a way to effectively conceive and communicate information.