This past weekend, beyond the general pleasure and honor of celebrating Mother's Day (and a happy belated Mother's Day to all those moms out there!), I had the unique joy of getting to visit my own grandmother as she celebrated an uncommon milestone: her 100th birthday.
Meeting Grandma Great on Her 100th Birthday
I brought my nine-year old son with me to visit her in the nursing home. She is unable to do much, but still remembers us both.
When we knocked on the door to her room and stuck our heads in with a “happy birthday Grandma!” greeting, she looked over and gently started tapping her fingers on her chest: her way of saying that seeing us – especially him – makes her heart beat faster with joy.
We call her Grandma Great – a nickname my cousin’s daughter came up with when she was only three or four years old.
She calls her grandparents by their first names, e.g.: Grandpa John, Grandma Karen, etc., as many kids do. So when it was time to go home after their first visit and my cousin said to her, “Say goodbye to your great-grandma,” in perfectly childlike logic and creativity she waved and said, “Bye, Grandma-Great!”
From that day forward, it stuck, and rightfully so.
A Lifetime of Courage, Family, and Firsts
As the oldest of 12 grandchildren, and since I was studying Spanish in school, I had the privilege of being the only one she was ever able to take to Chile to meet her family – our family – on my 16th birthday.
That experience opened up a new world for me. It became a proverbial north star that has guided much of my focus in life, personally and professionally.
I have heard many of Grandma Great’s stories over the years, with topics around
- growing up on a farm in Chile,
- meeting my grandfather (an Italian-American businessman) who was sent with the copper company to Chile during World War II
- immigrating with him to the US when my mother and aunt were toddlers,
- enduring her driving instructor’s hand on her knee when she was taking her road test to get her driver’s license in NJ,
- taking on the township (and winning) to get sidewalks installed so kids could walk to school safely
And so many more.
The Advice: “Take the Bike”
So on Saturday, after singing “Happy Birthday” and having the requisite cupcakes – as far as my is concerned, it's absolutely NOT a birthday unless there are cupcakes – I asked her:
“Okay, Grandma Great, after 100 years, what advice do you have for everyone?”
She was quiet for a moment, and then in her now-barely-audible voice she said:
“When I was a girl back in Chile, it was an hour walk to school. I wanted a bicycle, but we only had a boy's bike. And we couldn’t afford another.
I knew I wasn't supposed to be riding on a boy's bike. I would have to go through the town and past the boys’ high school, and people would talk.
But I didn't want to walk the hour. So I took the bike.
Take the bike.”
YES.
What Does “Take the Bike” Mean for Leaders Today?
While most of us are no longer deciding whether to ride a so-called “boy’s bike” through town, we face our own versions of that moment all the time:
- the room where we hesitate to speak
- the opportunity we don’t apply for
- the boundary we don’t set
- the truth we soften until it disappears.
We hold back because “people will talk.”
They might. In fact, they probably will.
But the question is: so what?
People talked when Grandma Great rode that bike. They talked when she immigrated to a new country. They probably talked when she challenged the township (with her “funny accent”) and pushed until they installed sidewalks so kids could walk to school safely.
And yet, a century later, what remains is not the gossip. It’s the legacy.
That same theme came up recently when I was a guest on The JAM with Dr. James Smith Jr. and Marcus Allen on WWDB 860 AM.
We talked about executive presence, finding your voice, and the excuses we allow to hold us back…and what becomes possible when we stop allowing them to limit who we become and what we achieve.
These are two powerfully successful businessmen – and a former football player and a former basketball player, respectively. As most of you know by now, (as the picture above illustrates) I am, shall we say, at the opposite end of the height spectrum.
But I have always known that being five feet tall is not something I could ever allow to be an excuse for playing small if I wanted to own the room and command the respect I knew I deserved.
What opportunity, conversation, decision, or brave next step have you been avoiding because someone might judge, criticize, gossip, misunderstand, or disapprove?
When the path is long, the rules are outdated, and the only thing standing between you and forward motion is fear of what “they” might say, listen to 100 years of experience from Grandma Great.
Take the bike.
