Permission to Fly

Have you ever noticed how we can be living our lives fully grown, fully capable, and still, somewhere inside, quietly checking… Is this okay? Am I okay?

I didn’t think of myself as someone waiting for permission. I was 29 years old. Independent. Responsible. Making my own choices… at least mostly.

And then, on the 4th of July, Independence Day, my 5 siblings and I received a letter from my mother. My mom was thoughtful, evolving, doing her own inner work before that was really a “thing.” She had been reflecting on her life, her patterns, and her relationship with her own mother. In that letter, she said something that stopped me.

She wrote that after her mother died, after the loneliness passed, she felt free for the first time in her life. “It was a good, good feeling.”  She realized she had been living in her mother’s shadow, always hoping for her approval. Her letter said, “I don’t want any of you to have to wait until I’m six feet under to feel that independence, to know you are your own person.”

That line got my attention. And if that wasn’t enough, she went on: “I may or may not like the choices you make, but they are your lives, and you are the ones who will live with them.”  She closed the letter with this: “So fly, each of you. I give you your independence and know that as you fly in your freedom, you have my love with you.”

So fly.

There it was. Permission.

And here’s the thing, I didn’t realize I had been waiting for it until she gave it. Because on the outside, I was doing just fine. But on the inside, there was still a quiet question running… Does this meet with your approval? Am I doing this right?

This letter didn’t change my life overnight. But it shifted something. It gave me a taste of freedom. And maybe more importantly, it made something tangible that had been intangible.

Here’s what I’ve come to understand: we don’t just inherit eye color or family traditions. We inherit expectations. Beliefs. Invisible lines we don’t even know we’re coloring inside of. We follow them, not because we have to, but because love and approval are so closely tied together.

Then, every once in a while, someone does something incredibly brave – like my mother did. She looked at her own life, realized she hadn’t felt fully free, and instead of holding on tighter, she opened her hand. She said you don’t have to wait.

That was her gift.

If I’m honest. It’s taken me years to fully receive it. Because being given permission and actually living it aren’t the same thing. There’s the moment the door opens, and then there’s the choice to walk through it. To stop, to look, and to choose. To ask… What’s mine? What’s not? Who do I want to be now?

At 29, I got a glimpse of freedom, allowing me to stop seeing my thinking and choices as right or wrong.

At 68, I’d love to tell you I’ve mastered it. But the truth is, I’m still practicing. Still noticing where I hand my authority away, and gently calling it back. Maybe that’s what freedom really is. Not a one-time declaration but a practice. A remembering. A quiet, ongoing permission we give ourselves.

Today I hold that letter differently. Not just as something my mother gave me, but as something I now get to live… and to offer forward.

So, I’ll leave you with this: Where in your life might you still be waiting for permission— that’s already yours?

So fly.