I remember learning how to ride my bike. I was in love with my bike when I got it. Lime green, it had a basket on the front with beautiful flowers and colored tassels that flew off the handle bars. I so wanted to learn how to ride.
Of course like most children I started with training wheels on the bike and I could ride. But it wasn’t the same, I wanted to go faster I wanted my ponytail to fly in the wind! So I knew it was time to take those training wheels off.
Suddenly I couldn’t ride my bike anymore. Every time I got on it I lost balance and fell down. I had skinned elbows and knees and it was a mess. So then I had to have my dad’s help. Which meant waiting for him to get home from work so that he could hold the back of the banana seat and help me stay on the bike because being successful mattered in our house. He would push me I would peddle… it would feel great, and then he let go.
And I’d fall off the bike.
This went on for days, seemingly for weeks. I was in tears every day. My dad was frustrated because I was in tears every day. He told me we might have to give it a break. But I did not give up. I was determined to learn to ride that bike.
With all of my frustration I felt a sense of giving up though and one day I thought: “I need to go and give it everything I can and learn how to do this.” I went out there without my dad one afternoon and got on that bike, and fell off that bike. And got back on that bike, and fell off that bike.
And then I got on that bike and I peddled and I rode up the street, and down the street. And up the street, and down the street. And I cried tears of joy. I didn’t want to get off. I was so afraid that if I stopped, the next time I got on I would not be a little ride it again!
It’s funny, because life can be like this. There are so many times when we NEED to push through, and not give up. When we need to keep peddling through tears of sadness or even joy. Right now I am going through times when I could give up…but I am getting on that bike…I will ride to success again. This story reminds me that being successful is hard work.
