The 30-Second Rule: Astronaut Techniques for Overcoming Regret and Performing Under Pressure | Dr. Mike Massimino

28:04Get your wardrobe sorting and your gift list handle with Quince. Go to quince.com slash charm for free shipping on your order and 365 day returns. Now available in Canada too. That's q-u-i-n-c-e dot com slash charm free shipping and 365 day returns quince.com slash charm mike during that story i couldn't help but thinking about all the times that that i have been in that position where i should have have spoken up and usually for myself what happens in that moment is i the other person they make their move and then i start second guessing myself like oh well they've done this before, so maybe I'm wrong, and how could I be wrong?

28:46And going back and making sure that I have everything together. And it comes up in the book, in the chapter about trust, where trust begins with trusting the people who trained you so that you understand and know these things, so that then you can now trust yourself to begin to speak up. Yeah, well said, John. Thank you for reading the book that's it's pretty good synopsis of that whole thing that's i don't know i don't think i could do it better thank you um yeah that's what you have to like in your in having confidence it's hard for me it was like am i ready i don't know if i'm ready to go to space my first flight is special it's like i don't know what i'm doing i've never been in space before and uh i felt like flying in space was for me it was like playing in the super bowl or the world series or whatever event you can think of is a big deal you know a rock star playing in madison square garden or something like that.

29:42But I had never even been on a field before or on a state. I had to go out there and perform right away. I never been to space. So I trained for hours in the water tank and I didn't know how I was doing. I was doing okay in the training, but how am I going to be in space? And I was told, hey, you're doing fine. We have full confidence as well. I think the leadership and some of the people around me were kind of detecting because some of the astronauts, I think have felt the same way. It's kind of normal to feel that on your first time in space and you're given a lot of responsibility. You don't want to mess it up.

30:14But the truth of it is you wouldn't be allowed to, I wouldn't, they wouldn't let me go if I wasn't ready. They're not going to roll the dice with the Hubble space telescope. They were going to, they had confidence in me. I just need to have confidence in myself. So sometimes it might be hard to have that confidence in yourself. You have to realize, Hey, I'm being trained by people who know what they're doing. And that training could be lots of different things. It could be a formal training or it could just be your life experiences or whatever it is that got you to that moment um that that allows that you've earned the right to be there so trust that training trust the tools the equipment that you're going to be using that you know you understand how it's going to help you whatever that means and then um whatever the equipment might be in our case it was like parachutes and spaceships and so and then and then the the other one is trust your team we rarely go into things alone and related to what we had said before it's a you know a space flight was an open book test my friend steve smith told me that you know right before my flight remember if you need help you ask for it and that's that's the way it is a lot of times on earth and like as we were saying earlier it's important to know they'll be there for you and then those things allowed me to trust myself because everyone's like what do i know well as you said john the experts are saying i'm okay and they're not setting me up for failure and i think that that was certainly the case with the Hubble Space Telescope.

31:31They were not going to take risks with that important world asset, just not to hurt my feelings. But I think that's the way it is, even in little things that we might think aren't as big deals on Earth. But they could be big deals for us, right? Because it may not be the Hubble Space Telescope, but it might be a pitch you're going to give as an entrepreneur or a big meeting or a proposal or whatever it might be. and you're like, well, what's going on here? Am I okay to do this? Just remember those trusts. Trust your gear, trust your training, trust your team, and that leads you to the big one, which is trust yourself.

32:07Well, that brings up a very big point, which is it takes a lot to build trust, and when trust is there, you are capable of wonderful, amazing things, such as going into space and coming back in one piece. However, as powerful as trust can be when it has been built, it's also delicate and can easily fall apart. And in the story about Columbia, it took years for everyone on that team to gain the trust back due to that accident. So with that, do you have any pointers of what to look out for so that the trust that you work so hard to build is not subverted or undermined? I think the trust is there in our case with the, you mentioned the space shuttle accident.

32:54As I said, trust your equipment, you know, so I remember walking onto space shuttle Columbia thinking, okay, I know all the workers are really diligent and I know they worked really hard and this is going to be okay. Well, on the next flight at Columbia, it didn't work out that well. They took some debris on the way up from the external tank foam that came off and they didn't, And it put a hole in the wing that no one knew about. And we ended up losing the crew and the vehicle. That was a bad day when that happened. It was a horrible worst day of my life. I think that, you know, things are going to happen.

33:29I don't know if I fully appreciated it at the time when it first happened. But I started to learn of how much people were affected by that who were not astronauts. astronauts people who were not in the line of duty I think took the accident as bad or possibly even worse they really felt responsible for what happened compared to the way the astronauts might have felt about I mean we lost our friends and this was not a good could have been any of us but but I but the impression I got from the folks who were in the control center and in the space shuttle program they felt directly responsible and they felt horrible about it so they knew that things had to change.

34:09And when that happens, it could have affected our trust in them with the team and the system. But there was no sugarcoating anything. And a full investigation was done. And everyone admitted, hey, a lot of things were wrong. When you have a major disaster like that, it's never one thing. It's a series of things, both technical and non-technical. And there's going to be plenty of blame to go around. And everyone has to be open to hearing what happened. Everyone bore some responsibility in this. And we are going to stick together as a team to get through this and fly again safely and finish out the things we wanted to do with the space shuttle program.

34:50And the way we reacted, it's not that you can't prevent accidents, but even with your best efforts, bad stuff is going to happen. No one wanted a shuttle accident to happen, but stuff happens, right? I mean, you never know. It could be a pandemic hits and And, you know, what are you going to do about that? You know, or whatever else happens. Things can happen, but it's how you react to it. And so I think the way we reacted to it with diligence to make sure that we understood what happened, put things in place to make sure it never happened again. And everyone came together without pointing fingers, throwing people under the bus.

35:26And I think that's the way the team should react when it hits adversity. You know, it's easy to be a good team member when everyone's winning and high-fiving and, oh, this is great. What happens when you have a bad issue? Something happens with the product you're trying to sell or the sales pitch doesn't go well or a pandemic hits or something happens that there's nothing you can control about it and it just happens. What do you do then? Do you start pointing fingers and calling people names or do you come together? And I'm really proud of the way the team came together. And so it tested, I think, the trust we talked about.

36:02But the way we dealt with that problem, I think, built the team in such a way to make it even stronger, built up the team to make it even stronger than it was before. I think the powerful takeaway in that is understanding that finger pointing is not only building distrust, but it doesn't serve the greater mission. You know, everyone involved in that mission was looking for success, was working hard for success. No one went in purposely making any mistake, whether it was technical or human error was involved. And so often finger pointing might absolve us from the blame and the guilt, but it certainly doesn't foster a great team environment.

36:40Yeah, I agree. I am amazed sometimes that sports teams where something happens at the last minute and they blame the person who made the mistake. But if the game is that close at the end, if the event is that close at the end, there were a bunch of other things that happened well before that that put that, you know. And I've seen some I've seen sports teams stick together and not blame the kicker for missing a field goal. And I've seen other stuff where they just say it was this guy's fault and blah, blah, blah. And the guy who's saying that is the guy that two minutes earlier did something really bad that caused that set his buddy up where that mistake wouldn't have mattered if this guy was doing his job earlier.

37:19So, yeah, I'm amazed. But I don't think that's a good way for – that's not a good way for a team to behave. You can't do that. You have to stick together, not only in the good times, but more importantly in the bad times. I think that's the mark of it. You find out who you are in the bad times, not in the good times. I think that brings a good segue into another part of the book where it's titled, Well, Things Can Get Worse, and you talk about Hoot's Law. and could you tell our audience a little bit about Hoots Law please as a as a rookie spacewalker I was training in the pool one day and um and I wanted to show everybody how great I was you know I'm the greatest spacewalker and I was the first rookie to get a chance to be a spacewalker on Hubble there were three previous Hubble missions and he always had an experienced astronaut who had flown in space before at first it was you had to have spacewalk experience and then he loosened it up a little bit at least you had been in space before so i was the first pure rookie that was going to get a chance to spacewalk on hubble so i'm trying to alleviate everyone's concerns and show how good i am and moving really quickly in the water and we're practicing like we would in space you know in big giant pool and uh we have a tether that we're that we that always is attached to us it's a safety tether in case we come off of structure you start floating around this thing is like a fishing it's got a tension on it's a big reel that's on your side it's going to pull you back to safety but you don't want to rely on that you know as you're flying you know flipping around and this thing is willing in like you're a fish so you don't it's not but it's there it's a last resort kind of thing anyway so it also is an obstacle you know if you don't keep track of it and i got this thing between my legs somehow and i'm like ah crap because it's right and i'm floating around in the water and i'm like this is like really a silly bad mistake let me try to fix it so I tried like kicking it and going on my side to get it out from between my legs and it ended up going like around my helmet like down my back around my helmet and then I see it in front of me somehow and it's going around and like moving and like so you know I was like tangled in this web and I still didn't really say anything until someone one of the instructors who's watching this because there's cameras everywhere like hey mash need some help I was like yeah I guess I do and then my buddy Jim Newman came over and was really impressed with what I was if I was trying to do it, I couldn't have entangled myself.

39:40So he kind of moved me around like a giant balloon in the water and got me untangled. And then afterwards, he says, how the heck did this happen? I go, well, you know, I had one snarl and then I made it a lot worse because I was trying to hide it. And he said, you got to remember Hoot's law. I go, what's that? And he said, no matter how bad things are, you can make it worse. You know, you don't want to make a bad situation worse. He also said, Hoot Gibson also said, nothing is often a good thing to do. And always a good thing to say. I don't think of that one. So anyway, but Hoop Gibson was a very wise person.

40:15And chief of the astronaut office for a while and beloved by everyone. That was a pretty good thing to remember. When you make a mistake, it can get worse, no matter how bad it is. And that happens. And usually strike one could be really bad. But it's not strike three yet. But when you make a mistake, I mentioned when I stripped a screw on the telescope, I actually like thought of Hoot's law, like, okay, this is really bad. But if I start losing tools, if I puncture my space suit, if I break something else, there's no chance. I mean, there's no chance anyway with the mistake I made. But it can, even though you think it's really bad, it can get worse.

40:51It could always get worse. And usually that first thing that happens, it's time to slow down and recruit help and not make it worse. And I think that was something dealing. Mistakes are going to be made all the time. In space, I made them all the time. On Earth, I make them even more often. Because there's more free time to make mistakes, I think. But I make more mistakes. But we had to learn to deal with them in space. On Earth, you think you might. But you have to learn to deal with them on Earth, too. That's the point, right? Is that we're going to mess up and make mistakes here on Earth. The consequences of another mistake might not be life-threatening like they could be in space.

41:28But still, it could be threatening to your business or your work or your family situation, too. You know, we're having conflict in our families, even. So, yeah, not hoot's law, no matter how bad it is, it could always, you can make it worse. It could always get worse. Well, in reading that chapter, the thing that came to my mind was how we chase perfection. And we also have this idea of mimetic desire, where we're trying to recreate these pictures that are in our minds. And for our clients, they have a lot of very high expectations. It's whether inner expectations that they have for themselves or the expectations from other people that they put on themselves.

42:11And when it comes to Hootslaw, if things aren't perfect, they get frazzled. And then when they get frazzled, they start to beat themselves up and then they get frustrated. And that begins a spiral that can put them into a bit of a depression over the progress that they had made. And I think it's very important to understand that a lot of these picture-perfect ideas in our mind, they're fiction. They're made up. And to not hold ourselves to these ideas. ideas. And when I was reading the chapter, it stuck, at least it came to me that your ego had gotten in the way of, I don't want the other members to see that I got this tangled, which then put you in a rush, which made the situation worse.

43:06And all because there was something there that you were trying to protect, either the picture perfect for your teammates. right and the uh the result was not good it's slow down not to make you know don't make it worse but also when you're going back to when you need help you need to speak up mistakes are going to be made some are small some you know little things you forgot to do or messed up the tether snarl space shuttle accident something huge you know yeah but uh so some are big some are small they but they're going to happen and you have to be able to deal with them. And so it wasn't that you're trying, we were never, I don't think ever, John, I don't think we're ever trying to reach perfection.

43:52I think what we were trying to realize is being able to handle mistakes well. And cause you're going to make them. And so another thing I write about is the 30 second rule. You're going to make a mistake, give yourself 30 seconds for a regret, beat yourself up and then move on. You know, it's okay to be really pissed off at yourself for making a mistake. But take 30 seconds and that's all the time you're going to give yourself to be to be miserable because you don't have hours or days to be miserable because that takes you out of the game. And we couldn't do that in space. And I would say the same thing on Earth and your business.

44:22You can't you don't have time with your family or your business to take a couple of days off to be miserable. But I used to do stuff like that. I would be so pissed off at myself when something bad would happen that I would be on my mind and it would kind of check out. And that's not a good way to to operate. So I think what we what we learned and still. in the astronaut office, the same thing. It was Woody Holbergs, a friend of mine who was selected 20 years after, actually 21 years after me, he became an astronaut in 2017. And he was just in town. We had a downlink with him, with my students when he was in space.

44:56And he came back to Columbia and we did an event together. And the students asked him, what was the most important lesson you learned as an astronaut? And I just let him answer. And he said, I learned how to deal with my mistakes. You don't have to learn how to make mistakes because we all can do that on our own. But it's how to deal with them, you know, and part of it is fessing up. I made a dumb move, but I need help here or else it's going to affect the mission. You cannot keep it to yourself. You have to fess up. So fess up, don't make it worse, 30 seconds of regret, and let's try to become part of the solution.

45:26Well, yeah, I'd like to dive into the protocol that you have there for the 30-second rule because accidents happen, mistakes are made, things don't go as planned. You have high expectations that you fall short of. And I have seen people ruminate on these for days to weeks, sometimes months or years. And in the book, I was so happy to see it's like, hey, we got 30 seconds of regret and we're moving forward. Now, for a lot of people, they're like, well, 30 seconds, that would be great if I can get through that. But what does it entail to move through that 30 seconds? so could you go through that for our audience please it's okay to be disappointed with with your mess up the thing you mess you're going to mess things up and it's okay to be mad at yourself but you you to wallow in that misery it's not going to be helpful and we did not have even a minute we did not have seconds to spare a minute to spare but i would argue it's not just in space it's on the ground too i mean life is too precious for you to be going through it miserable because of a mistake you made.

46:30But I would hear, leave mistakes in the past, let it go, flush it, all these things. But how do you do that? And the way that I was able to be able to do that, to move on, was this 30-second rule I learned. My crewmate, Megan McArthur, told me about it, that she learned it from CJ Sterkow, who was a Marine pilot in our office. He called it 30 seconds of remorse, where you beat the crap out of you. You made a mistake. It's really embarrassing. So you take it and you just really let yourself have it. I'm the worst astronaut ever. I'm going to be known for setting back astronomy for years. The textbooks will say we wouldn't know the age of the universe, except Mike broke the Hubble Space Telescope.

47:09Why didn't I think of a different way to do this task? Why was I cavalier about the way I did it? They should have never assigned me to do this. I should have just done simple things. They should have never selected me. Don't vocalize any of this, folks. Just keep it to yourself because you'll scare people. It's an internal rant and set a timer for 30 seconds. And then when you get down to like four seconds left, just say, I'm never letting that happen again. It's in the past and we're going to move. We're going to leave it in the past and we're going to move on. And that's what I did when I stripped that screw.

47:44I used that and I was on the Hubble and I was like, if I ever get a chance to do this, to continue with the spacewalk somehow, if we get around this problem. Because I still had a lot of work ahead of me. I had 111 little small screws. Those are the ones we were worried about. And we had backups for those, backup procedures for those. These were big screws that I'd messed up with. So I was like, all right, the hard part is still to come. So if I can get by this, I am not going to be Cavalier. I'm going to make sure I'm seated with the right tool. I'm going to take my time. You know, I just need redemption.

48:15I need a chance. And I didn't make it worse. Got over it and became an active participant in the solution. And, you know, it worked. We were able to get around it and be successful that day. I'm really curious to hear with all this training from a young boy, having that vision of being an astronaut to then in college to that night before your first launch, first mission, what's going through your head? And then also, what is that moment like when you actually achieve this goal that you had set out and pass through failures, rejections, worked on your eyesight, became a swimmer, everything that you put yourself through to that moment to be up there in space?

48:57and how did it line up with what you thought it would with the movies and what we see in media and what you imagined it to be? The being accepted into NASA, getting a chance, getting that opportunity, that's chapter one, right? And the rest of it is what I learned at NASA. So it was great to get the phone call to be accepted, but then we showed up there. And I remember Bob Cabana was the chief of the astronaut office, a Marine colonel, flown shuttle commander, and he was our boss. And he welcomed us. And he said something like, we're very happy to have you here. You know, we were all dressed up.

49:35You know, our first day of work, we wore a coat and tie and everyone's dressed up. We're happy to have all of you here. We're thrilled that you're all here. But I want each of you to remember, this is our first day of work from the boss. I want each of you to remember that for every one of you, there are thousands of people who would exchange places with you this morning in a heartbeat. And the only difference between you and them is that you are more fortunate than they are and that you owe it to them and to everyone else around the country or the world to do the best you can with this opportunity.

50:10And so that was it. It was like really great to become an astronaut, but we hadn't done anything yet. And we had to put all these principles to work and these things I learned to get that flight opportunity like you're describing. So it was kind of like just heads down at that point trying to get there. And the night before, I was very, very excited about the whole thing and looking forward to it. Got a little worried on the launch pad when I actually saw the shuttle was ready to go. It was kind of frightening. It was a night launch, and the place is deserted because there's fuel in the tank. And usually there's a lot of bustling activity, but it's deserted, and the space shuttle's brightly lit up with all the support structure.

50:48a little bit. It looks like a real, no kidding. It's going somewhere. It's going to space. Smoke is coming off of it. It's just water vapor. It's making these hideous noises, like screeches. I think it was the cold fuel going through the pumps. And I looked up and I thought, after all these years of dreaming, maybe this wasn't such a good idea looking at that. But that's where the trust came in to know you got to go inside of this thing. And once I'm thinking about stuff, it's thinking about stuff is always worse than doing it, right? That's the other thing. You can really psych yourself out. So build up the trust, remind yourself, get in there, and everything was fine.

51:18But it really hit me. I think, AJ, it was on my second spacewalk where I had a chance to, I think, kind of soak in a moment. And it was a kind of a lull in the activity that was going on. And I was able to look off to the side and just look at the planet. And it was so magnificent. The thought that went through my mind is, you know, this is a view from heaven. What a view this is. And then I thought, no, no, it's more beautiful than that. This is what heaven must look like. And I felt that like I was looking into absolute paradise. I cannot believe, I don't think any place could be more beautiful than our planet.

51:56And we get to be here every day. What a great place. But just admiring the beauty of the planet, you know, zipping around our earth at 17 ,500 miles an hour in my, my NASA space suit with the American flag on my arm. And it was like, holy crap, how did this happen? I think that was my moment that you talked about. I realized that, well, I'm really glad I didn't give up. So that I think was the moment where it all kind of came together. And I was so grateful that it all happened. Because once you get in, you still haven't flown yet. And you've got to get on a mission, hopefully, and get something to do that you think is important.

52:32And it never really lets up. But that was where it kind of hit home that, all right, this is pretty cool. It was worth it. Mike, is there anything you want to tell the Flat Earth Society? not yet find something else to be worried about I mean I got a feeling there's not many in your viewers are there that are flat earthers I don't think so but I've seen them argue online I'm like I can't believe this is I mean there's a million things to worry about I mean really why are we worrying about that you know no it's the place is round our home is we have a living around home not flat fall off the edge I was not even getting into it.

53:12I mean, you know, it's just, yeah, nah. Now, was there anything that surprised you about that experience of being up in the shuttle and on the mission? I think one reason, one thing was I felt I was surprised at how well prepared I was. I don't know if that happens to people, too. You know, we think something's going to be really, oh, am I ready for this? And then, you know, the work went, you know, kind of went, it felt, even making the mistakes. I mean, because we had worked with the control center. And even though we didn't have that problem before, because no one thought it could, that I could do that to strip that screw, for example, and other things that happened, we had worked through so many other problems in practice that we just were able to engage it.

53:53It's like, you know, going down and taking an exam in college or high school, something like, oh, this, I didn't know this was going to be on a test, but hopefully you're prepared doing other problems and you can kind of apply that same technique. So that's what we did. So I was amazed at how comfortable I felt and just how beautiful it was up there. And even though I've been prepared for that, there's nothing that can really prepare you for the beauty of the earth. They can prepare us to do our work. And that's what I try to, you know, there's a chapter in a book about being amazed of how beautiful our planet is from up there, but we can engage it on the ground too, you know, wherever we are.

54:28You know, you're out there in a beautiful place in California. John's in a beautiful place down in South America now. But, you know, and I'm in New York City, and there's a beauty to all of it. And sometimes it's natural beauty. Sometimes it's the buildings around us or the people or whatever it might be. And I think that it's important to take that little time out. And so I was surprised by the beauty of the planet that I saw, but it stayed with me. And we are living in a paradise. I didn't know I would react that way, but that's the way I felt, that we are so lucky to be here. And you're now a member of a very unique club, extraordinary club of astronauts.

55:05Tell us a little bit about the camaraderie after the missions are over. And now at this stage of your career, it sounds like you're interacting with young astronauts and there's training. So what is life after being in space like? It's actually pretty good. I enjoy what I'm doing now. I like telling the story of space and NASA gave me opportunities. I think a lot of my fellow astronauts weren't that inclined to talk to people about what was going on. I mean, it was part of our job, but I really liked it. I thought it was a very important job part of it. And I like interacting with people. And now I had something that they were interested in finding out about.

55:43I mean, you guys are having me on your podcast for heaven's sakes, right? Because I got to do this cool space stuff, right? So it's given me the excuse to be able to do things like this, to share these things. That's why I wanted to write the book, is I'd learned so much. in leadership and perseverance and teamwork. And I was kind of shocked after I left NASA of how much of those rules that we had, these rules of engagement, more or less, the way we operate and the way we took care of each other, how much of it applies to everyday life and especially to business. And I do a lot of relatively a lot of keynote speaking to various businesses and they're having concerns about mergers and teamwork and people working together and perseverance and dealing with bad news and change and AI and all these things, which we had a certain way of engaging the world when problems occurred and when new things came up and programs changed and bad news happened and whatever.

56:39Those rules that we had that work for us in space because we had to be safe and successful also apply to business. So now I enjoy doing that. The book is part of that, of course, and getting a chance to talk to you guys. I really appreciate it. you know i really like doing that and i teach at columbia so it's been it's it's been it's been fun in that in that regard i do some tv here and i got so nasa like gave me some opportunities of being like the big bang theory tv show yeah i got to be on that a few times which was cool and uh it it just it to me it was another way of of being involved with the space program and uh you mentioned like the getting to know the the guys who had left what was i didn't there was a lot i I met Neil Armstrong and got to know him when I was an astronaut and Alan Bean and John Young, some of those old timers, but I've gotten to meet a lot more since I, since I left.

57:28I think what it is is now being like outside, you're kind of jealous of the people that are still doing it. So it's like, it's almost like a different club. You know, it's like, ah, those guys, what do they know? You know, they're spoiled now. They don't have to fly a space shuttle. They can go to sleep during a launch. There's not nothing. It's all up. That's not true. But you know, I think a lot of it is that I still like to hear from them. Like I mentioned, Woody and some of the other folks out of Steel that I've gotten to know that are friends of mine. I'm thrilled for them. So it's kind of fun to be cheering them on.

57:55It really is. And be happy for what they're doing. And also kind of being this kind of an offshoot of the... Because a lot of us are doing stuff like this. A lot of us are writing books and a lot of us are teaching classes. We share... Don't tell my students. But we share information on classes. We teach around the country. We all try to help each other. it's, it's a, the reason it's a great club is because there's really nothing we wouldn't do for each other. And that goes even for some of the new folks who I don't know if they're coming to New York and I get a chance to meet them, you know, they're my brother or sister.

58:28It doesn't, it is no questions asked. And, uh, that is, that is what makes it nice. And I think again, that those are, those are things that don't have to be unique to being an astronaut. It can be that for any, for any organization that you have, you have this bond between each other and a respect for each other and a love for each other really that you know i'm gonna this person is you know is one of my people i'm gonna try to help them and so it was there i used to get advice on how to fly the airplane or the spaceship or do a spacewalk when i was at nasa now that stuff doesn't really i'm kind of curious what a way to doing it now but uh now we have different conversations about maybe how to teach or you know different uh different things to write about whatever it might be story you know, speaking or whatever.

59:10So it's a different, it's a whole different thing, but it's, it's still pretty cool. It's just different. I wouldn't say it's better or worse. It's not as cool. But I knew that was up, you know, that wasn't ever going to happen again. I don't really know you can get anything cooler than being an astronaut, but, but it's not, it's not bad being a former astronaut. So. Thank you again for stopping by. We love the book. And our last question for each and every one of our guests is what is your X factor? What do you think makes you unique and extraordinary, Mike? What made me successful, I think, really look at the core values.

59:43I would say I have a pretty good work ethic. And I learned that most likely from my parents who worked really hard. My dad worked for New York City Fire Department. My mom was a stay-at-home mom, but very smart and was doing something all the time. And how important it was to do work in service of others. My mom ended up, once we were grown, she ended up working in a in a senior center helping out there was always doing something that's in service of others and that work ethic of doing something that's bigger than you, whatever that working for an organization, working with other people to do something together.

1:00:16Um, like for example, in the fire department or in the astronaut program or in the companies I speak to, it's the same thing. Whereas a pharmaceutical company or a startup or whatever, there's that camaraderie, that, that teamwork. Um, so I think that work ethic was important. I think the, the perseverance of not giving up, always trying that no matter what, I would keep applying until this day because my definition of success is not necessarily meeting the goal, but at least continuing to try because that's all that you can control. And I think the other thing is being a team player is really important.

1:00:49So I'm giving you those three. I think that that combination is kind of what we look for in astronauts. And I think that's what also makes people successful in other things. And not giving Giving up is really important. I've never met a successful person who's never failed. Successful people are those that don't let failure stop them, right? And there's examples of that. Even those with early success or have some early luck, in order to continue that, everything needs to be built organically. And a lot of time you see those people really deal with reality in a harsh way because they didn't have to beat those challenges in order to reach that that place it was uh they had a they were lucky enough to have the lightning strike and then what came after that was is some real floundering and uh it's it and it can take a toll on somebody as well yeah you've got you can't be brittle and i see that a lot with my students as well because a lot of you know students get to they've been very successful in high school and then some you hit you hit walls i hit walls when I was in when I was a little eighth grade was a huge wall earth science I got a d in earth science mrs.

1:02:02Katz like what made it to space that way and I made it to space you know so I don't know mrs. Katz wasn't thinking this kid's gonna grow up to be an astronaut I was like this find something else maybe work in the deli or something that that's a good job too but you know find something else my kid uh and uh but I you know that was my first lesson in in needing to change the way I could do things so I was lucky that I had a lot of failures at an early age you know I failed a lot just nothing ever worked the first time for me and that was a blessing looking back on it absolutely because you are definitely going to hit that wall and and things are going to happen and if you're not it's because you're not challenging yourself probably or who knows maybe just really super lucky well that's certainly one of the most valuable lessons from moonshot and we encourage all of our listeners to read the book where can they find out more about you you're speaking in the book my website is mike massimino.com you can reach out to me there the book is available just about everywhere that you might want to buy a book also you can follow me on social me i was the first guy to tweet from space so you can find me on twitter or whatever they call it now the thing that used to be twitter instagram facebook linkedin all that stuff you can find me there too thank you mike right on thank you thanks guys

1:03:23this week's shout out comes from kevin who wanted to write and tell us how the x-factor accelerator has helped him in his new role at work i wanted to share how the art of charms x-factor accelerator changed things for me especially in my new role at work i was stepping into a new role and i knew i was qualified, my training got me this role, but I wanted to make an impact. And that's when I discovered the X-Factor Accelerator. The X-Factor Accelerator helped me not just adapt, but thrive in my new role. The tools and strategies that I gained were like secret weapons, boosting my confidence, improving my communication skills, and helping me navigate complex social situations.

1:04:08It's incredible how this program unlocked my potential. I found myself leading discussions, making impactful decisions, and being noticed for all the right reasons. And the best part? It wasn't just about work. It spilled over into every aspect of my life. If you're ready to shine in your career, this is it. The Art of Charms X-Factor Accelerator isn't just a course. It's a career accelerator. Trust me, it'll take you places that you've never thought possible. Visit theartofcharm.com slash x-factor today and get ready to ace your new role. Your success story starts here. All right, I love hearing that, Kevin, and it was great and amazing and fun working with you.

1:04:55If you've listened this far, my guess it's because you want more out of life and make the right decisions to succeed in work, love, and life. If that's the case, then join us, the Art of Charm team, and hundreds of people just like you who are experiencing breakthrough conversations, supercharging their confidence, making better decisions, and growing an incredible network inside our world-famous X Factor Accelerator program. The X Factor Accelerator is where high-achieving, like-minded people meet, strategize, and unlock your hidden X Factor to make sure that you get the most out of life's opportunities and unlock those doors keeping you from success.

1:05:28We start every month with an intense goal-setting strategy session so you have a personalized plan of attack and remove decision fatigue from the equation. Weekly implementation sessions with opportunities to practice your conversation skills, rapport building, supercharging your charisma through powerful communication, and unlock the charm to attract the right people into your life. Imagine what you can accomplish with coaching and mentorship with the art of charm. What are you waiting for? Join us today at unlockyourxfactor.com. All right. Now, if you have gotten value from our show, head on over to your favorite podcast player and rate and review our podcast.

1:06:07It will mean the world to us and it helps others find the show. All right. Now, before we head out, a huge thank you to our producers, Eric Montgomery and Michael Harold. Go out there, guys, and have an epic week.

1:06:27You were the bad boy You threw your love away Like it was just a toy And you sold the world Your song of the tragedy Cause you had your taste Of black only yesterday Yeah, but I remember you Oh yeah, I remember you

1:07:24The Limu Emu Liberty, Liberty, Liberty, Liberty.