On the axe, the robots, and what almost 91 years taught me about permission.
I want to start with something you say to me all the time, usually while I’m spiraling about something that, five years from now, won’t matter at all.
“We are not robots.”
You’ve been saying it my whole life. I used to think it was just a mom thing to say. Now I’m the one saying it — to my team, to my kids, to myself at midnight when I’m still answering emails I could’ve answered tomorrow. And I finally understand it’s not a comfort line. It’s an instruction.
Here’s the other one you gave me. The axe.
Not long ago, I was supposed to go to a conference. Work was slammed, home was slammed, and there was no honest way to fit one more thing onto the plate. So I canceled.
You didn’t say “but you committed.” You didn’t say “people are counting on you.” You said, essentially: good. That’s you taking care of yourself.
That’s the axe. Not permission to add something bold — permission to cut something off the plate and not apologize for the space it leaves behind.
You’ve been doing this to me my whole life, actually. Praising me for the smallest, most unremarkable acts of self-preservation. Eating an actual bite of cake, not the diet-approved sliver. Staying in bed a little longer on a Sunday. Doing a little shopping for absolutely no reason. Buying the food for a dinner party instead of making all of it myself, and not treating that as a failure. Asking for help and skipping the justification speech. Saying yes to myself, just because I wanted to.
Nobody else claps for those moments. You do. Every time.
I built a company on that axe, whether I meant to or not.
Every time I’ve turned down work that wasn’t worth what it cost us. Every time I’ve told someone on my team to take the day, no explanation required. Every time I’ve said no to something I used to think I had to say yes to, just because someone asked. That’s you. That’s the axe, thirty years later, running a company you’ve never once tried to run for me.
We’re still doing this, you and me. Still boarding planes together. Still, somehow, you at almost 91, and me trailing behind you through an airport like I’m the one who needs looking after.
Every trip you and Dad ever took me on taught me this before I had words for it. None of them were fancy. Most were budget, long, and impossibly far — the kind where the flight alone eats a whole day. You never once cared about the hotel. What you cared about was talking to every single person along the way — the cab driver, the stranger at the gate, whoever was running the little shop nobody else bothered to walk into. That’s where the actual trip was. You didn’t just teach me to travel. You taught me to go, and to talk to everyone I met once I got there.
We’re doing it again soon — Sioux Falls, South Dakota. Not glamorous. Not a bucket-list stop. Exactly the kind of trip you’d have signed us up for forty years ago. I can’t wait.
And here’s the thing I didn’t expect: I’m only now, at my age, actually using the axe the way you meant it. Not the big dramatic version. The daily one. Saying no to a client that isn’t worth the cost. Taking a Tuesday off without apologizing for it. Admitting out loud that I love my work — actually love it — without immediately explaining that away.
You gave me permission thirty, forty years ago. It took me this long to open my hand and use it.
So — Mom, thank you. Not for the advice. For the axe.
And for everyone else reading this, I want to know:
What’s the thing someone gave you permission to do, that you didn’t actually use until years later?
Tell me. I read every comment.
With love and zero shortcuts, Wendy
