She Drove the Jet Ski: What an 84-Year-Old Taught Me About the Ceilings We Build

Mother's Day this year was spent at Lake Marion, South Carolina, at my parents' lake house. It was one of those easy, unhurried days that doesn't ask much of you…time around the table, time on the porch, the kind of visiting that doesn't need an agenda.

But the moment that stayed with me happened out on the water.

My mom and I took the jet ski out together, and she drove. She is 84. We circled a small island, slowing down to look at the eagle and osprey nests tucked into the trees along the shoreline. We practiced surfing the wakes of passing boats, leaning into the waves rather than bracing against them. It was one of those moments that feels almost too good, the kind you want to hold onto a little longer before it becomes a memory.

And then, somewhere out on that lake, it hit me.

Most people her age would never try this. Many would assume they couldn't, or that they shouldn't, or that it simply wasn't for them anymore. And honestly, many of the people around them would assume the same thing without ever saying it out loud. But there she was, hands on the handlebars, completely at ease, navigating the water like it was the most natural thing in the world. Nobody told her she couldn't, and more importantly, she never told herself that either.

I've been thinking about that moment ever since, because it is not really about jet skis. It is about the ceilings we build without ever meaning to.

In organizations, we do this all the time. We make quiet assumptions about who is ready and who is not. Who belongs in certain rooms and who needs a few more years first. We talk about it in reasonable-sounding language: “She's still fairly new.” “He doesn't quite have the experience yet.” “That's not really her area.” And sometimes those assessments are accurate. But sometimes, if we're honest, they are less about what we've observed and more about what we expect. Based on age. Based on tenure. Based on gender. Based on where someone came from or what their title says.

We call it judgment. But a lot of the time it's assumption wearing judgment's clothes.

The tricky part is that the people on the receiving end often can't tell the difference. They just know they weren't chosen, weren't asked, weren't given the chance to show what they could do. And over time, some of them start to believe the ceiling is real. They stop raising their hands and wait to be told they are ready instead of deciding it for themselves.

My mom never did that, and I think about how much would have been lost on that lake if she had. And how my outlook on life would be so different than what it is.

The leaders I most admire are the ones who have learned to notice the gap between what they have actually seen from someone and what they are simply assuming. They ask different questions. Not just "is this person ready?" but "ready according to what standard, and whose standard is that?" Not just "does this person have experience?" but "what kind of experience are we actually requiring here, and why?"

They are also the ones who notice the people who don't wait for permission. Not because those people are reckless, but because they are clear about what they are capable of, clear about what they want to contribute, and clear that the ceiling was never load-bearing in the first place. Those people are worth paying attention to, and so are the ones who are quietly waiting, who have more to offer than anyone has thought to ask about.

On the way back across the lake, I watched my mom steer us toward the dock with the same calm confidence she'd had the whole ride. She wasn't trying to prove anything. She was just doing what she wanted to do, the way she has always done.

There's a lesson in that for all of us who lead. The ceilings we build are often invisible to us and entirely visible to the people standing under them. The work is learning to see them, and then deciding whether they ever needed to be there at all.