YouSaid · the spoken record

Scott Kelly

lines on the record: 70
first: 2020-11-05
most recent: 2020-11-05
sittings or episodes: 1
sources: podcast

Every line below is reproduced as it was said and linked to the record it came from. Nothing here is summarised or generated. Directory · Search · Corrections

“Spend hours or even days trying to figure out why their data looked funny and not focusing on what is important. So much better to just be honest and move on. And if that doesn't work, you can always say the American did it.”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Now, once we were in space, the question of blame got real for my Russian friends. They were always dealing with the possibility of losing their income to the smallest mistakes, so I tell them to blame me. As far as I could see it, it was a win win. They wouldn't lose their bonus and their control center wouldn't spend a day trying to figure out what went wrong because they were avoiding responsibility. Real teamwork means its crucial for everyone to admit their mistakes. If you want to solve problems, move fast and make sure everyone's doing their best. You can't punish people for speaking up. That's true in space, but it applies anytime, anywhere. In my experience as a space shuttle crew member and later as commander of the International Space Station, I learned how important this was. On the space shuttle, if I had actuated the wrong switch at the wrong moment, always a possibility with two thousand of'em, I might have caused a hundred people in mission control.”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“After our final simulation flights in Russia, we would have to answer to a panel of Russian space agency officials about our performance. Kind of a public stoning, I would call it. It took me a while to understand that we were actually expected to create an elaborate excuse matrix about how we hadn't done anything wrong, how everything was somebody else's fault, and that no blame should be attached to us Came to think of this practice as blamesmithing, and some people were quite skilled at it, bending the narrative of events to always move the blame away from you and towards some other poor bastard. I was terrible at this, but that was fine with me. And I think it annoyed the Russians that during the public stoning, when it was my turn to make an impassioned speech about how I didn't flip the wrong switch, I just say Yep, that was me.”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Cosmonauts are given higher bonuses for their achievements like a successful spacewalk and lower bonuses to reflect mistakes for flipping the wrong switch, missing a step in an experiment, or similar everyday human errors. And you might not believe this, but there's actually a real person in Russian mission control whose only job is to track the mistakes of cosmonauts, and when each cosmonaut comes back to Earth, they have to sit in a room with the mistake tracker and an accountant to determine what their bonus was going to be. Experienced firsthand the way this sort of negotiation is supposed to work. When I was preparing to fly on the Russian Soyuz spacecraft, I trained with my crewmates in a simulator, much like the simulators I've trained on in Houston to fly the space shuttle.”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Sometimes people are incentivized to dodge blame or even cover up their mistakes, and I've seen this in action as well. The Russian Space Agency has a very different way of managing and compensating their cosmonauts than NASA does its astronauts, and part of that has to do with how blame is distributed. Both astronauts and cosmonauts are paid extra when they are flying in space. In the case of the cosmonauts, they get a significant bonus of somewhere between three hundred fifty to seven hundred US dollars per day, depending on how experienced they are, so for someone like my friend Gennati who has spent eight hundred seventy nine days in space, that can really add up. Which is where the problem comes in.”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Katie and I are now lifelong friends, and when I think of the mission we flew together, I hope she remembers as fondly as I do the times I'd find her playing her flute in the cupola and couldn't help but tell her Katie, go to sleep. It's a school night. I don't care if you're friends with Jethro Tull.”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I've learned from my colleagues who grew up in different cultures, practiced different religions, and were born with different sexual orientations. It's only been very recently that NASA has recruited astronauts who openly acknowledge a same-sex partner. And I hope to see a transgender astronaut in my lifetime. I have a transgender son who is one of the smartest and kindest people I have ever had the privilege of knowing. And it would be a loss to NASA if they didn't choose to include people like him among the ranks someday. Retrospect, I think the people who told Katie and me we would kill each other in space underestimated both of us and overlooked the power of our differences. I try to keep this in mind when I see people who seem very different working together, and I want to encourage them.”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“We all learned a lot from each other up there. In training to fly in the Russian spacecraft, I spent a lot of time in Russia getting to know the culture and learning to speak the language, not very well, I might add. I've had the chance to get to know Russian literature and history in a way I never expected. There's always potential for conflict and challenges, particularly with the Russians. Our countries are not always the friendliest. I guess you could call us frenemies. But in space you set all that aside, because we rely on those cosmonauts, and they rely on us. Space is a great place to do that, because no one owns it. It's a common ground where peaceful scientific collaboration can occur.”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Wasn't what I thought I had been trained for, but this kind of work was able to bring all kinds of people into the experience of our mission and bring them closer to science, engineering, and the amazing things we accomplish when we all work together. But it was Katie with her flute and her always positive attitude that made that positive.”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“By this time I'd figured out Twitter and Instagram. I'd been building up the year in space hashtag. I did a Reddit AMA. I showed off the first flower we grew in space. I played water ping pong and had a Super Bowl party for one. I juggled fruit, which is still impressive even though the fruit just kind of hangs there. I also explained how I had to clean up a gallon sized ball of urine and acid. I explained that space smells like burning metal, and that my favorite David Bowie song is not space oddity. But probably under pressure.”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Packed a You know, it's interesting when you vacuum pack something, it doesn't take up a whole lot of room. And, you know, for one, when you try to get kids' attention and teach them about science and math and engineering and things like that, the first thing you have to do is get their attention. And nothing gets people's attention like a gorilla in space.”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“My favorite part of the day. Later, Katie confronted me. She said, You know, if you don't sound excited about what we're doing up here, no one else will be either. She was right. I learned a lot by watching Katie, and by the time I flew a year long mission on the space station, you could certainly hear the difference.”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“She made time for art and music, even playing the first Earth space duet on her flute with the founder of the band Jethro Tull. One more aspect of our personalities that couldn't be more different. I had always seen the public relations part of my job as a nuisance. It needed to be done because the public has a right to know what's being done with their tax dollars and to feel involved in the space program. But I'm not a newscaster or a YouTuber, and I didn't really enjoy being pressed into service as one. I felt that my job was to command the space station, carry out the many complex procedures and experiments I was tasked with, to run a tight ship, to keep my crew safe, and obviously, to keep everything from exploding. One day we had a standard public affairs interview. Here's what I sounded like, answering questions in my factual, straightforward Are we done yet, Tone? We got up here about a little over 100 and something days ago. Not that I'm counting, but it felt like I picked up just where I left off last time. This was not my...”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Throughout the workday, I always knew what Katie was working on because she would leave experiments and projects half done or there would be scraps and remnants of her activities, just floating around. I used to call it a Katie Trail. But whatever else she needed to do, Katie always made time to speak with people on the ground, especially school children, even beyond the many events that NASA schedules us for.”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Katie was a military officer in the Air Force, a chemist, she was a veteran of two space shuttle missions just like me. But Katie and I were as different as two military officers can be. In fact, some of our colleagues were seriously concerned that we might kill each other. For months, we would have to cooperate and live together in a space the size of the inside of a 747 filled with stuff. So when Katie first arrived, I could see why people had been worried. Katie didn't entirely live her life by schedules, and I would often find her in the little window filled module called the Cupola, looking at the earth and playing her flute at three o'clock in the morning.”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I'm grateful that throughout my 20 years at NASA, I had the chance to work with a wide variety of people from different backgrounds. I flew in space with a French engineer, a school teacher from Idaho, a Swiss astrophysicist, and more Russian cosmonauts than I can count. He spoke different languages, believed different things, problem solved in different ways, and when you're trying to do something as challenging as flying in space, you need as many different strengths as you can get. And then I met Katie When I was preparing for my first long duration spaceflight, I was slated to overlap for a majority of the hundred fifty nine days with Katie Coleman.”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Solve those problems and then move on to the next thing. And I'm just very hopeful that we can get there and hopefully get there soon”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Well, you know, certainly I think having this platform and an opportunity to speak to your viewers, and that is we're living in some really crazy times right now. And I've had the privilege to see people work in some really challenging environments and things that are very risky, things that you might not even believe is possible. And we're able to be successful success requires teamwork. And I think our country just needs to realize that we just got to have to start working together. I mean, we can't live in this divided society where people are in conflict with one another because we have some serious challenges. And the way you meet those challenges is with teamwork. And that has been my experience, my whole career at NASA. And I just wish more people would just kind of come together, identify problems, do it in a thoughtful way, believe in science.”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Might be an answer you're not expecting or weird, but I don't think I ever have. Maybe I don't think so. Tears of joy I'm not much of a crier. No crying in space”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“That don't knowables, it's a new app that gives exclusive audio courses from different types of experts. Chris Paul is one of them, Alexis O'Hanian, me, a bunch of other people. It's basically kind of like listening to Spotify, but it's for learning something. And, you know, hopefully people will learn something that will help in their lives from the audio course. I was able to put together. They can find this course unknowable.fy forward slash Scott. At least that's what they told me where you can find it. And I hope I said that right. And yeah, I hope people enjoy it. Some humor in there until a couple of jokes every now and then. I hope people find them funny and hope they enjoy it.”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I think my life story has a lot of lessons in it that I think will help other people and inspire other people that they can do things that maybe they didn't think they were capable of. They can take risks. They can challenge themselves. I'm hoping that people will look at this as a way to find maybe more success in their own lives. And I've done that with the public speaking I do. I've done it with the books that I've written. And this is just a new way of reaching a different audience. I really didn't know much about Knowble before I was approached to do this. But when I learned about it, I was like, hey, that's a really good idea. You know, people like to listen to books on tape now, especially a lot more recently. And why not listen to something that is not a book but has a particular lessons from different kinds of people? So for those”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“It inspires kids, not only in the United States, but around the world to be better students, to study math and science and STEM careers, to be better at those in those areas of study that are so important to our economy, because all those people, all those kids around the world that are so inspired by NASA, they're not going to work for NASA. I mean, some of them will, but all of them aren't. They're going to go into other fields that contribute to our economy, our society, and our way of life. And if that's all we got out of it, that's worth every penny. I mean, if the six or whatever billion dollars we spend a year on human spaceflight, if the only thing we got out of that is that kind of inspiration for our kids, which I don't think it's the only thing we get out of it, but if it was, it's worth every cent.”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“May not have today. Maybe it won't. I don't know. It may not. It'll definitely push our envelope of what we are technically capable of doing. I think it would be a great way to cooperate internationally. You know, we have a lot of conflict here on Earth, but we've been flying on that space station with the Russians for the last 20 years. And it gives countries that are sometimes in conflict with each other a place to work on something that is peaceful, that benefits everybody. I think that we're explorers. I think it's in our nature, our DNA. I don't think we would have developed to be the species we are today if we didn't explore. I think it's part of who we are and we should continue to do it. And then I think if everything I said was wrong, the fact that that kind of mission, that going to Mars, going to the moon, the space station, the space shuttle, the space program in general,”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yeah, I think going to Mars is going to be expensive, but that expense is paid with very high paying jobs that Recently, there was this NASA study that talked about the return on investment. So, you know, NASA is a money-making prospect in that it generates more tax dollars than it.”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Necessary is a planet B kind of thing. Yeah, I do think this planet could be pretty well destroyed. And I don't think we should do that, but it could be, and it would still be easier than living on Mars, living here.”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“To take care of it, we're not going to move the whole planet to Mars. I think it's important to go to Mars and establish a foothold. It's great that we've had a foothold in space. We're coming up on the 20-year anniversary of having people in space continuously. So kids that are alive today have never been on planet Earth with everybody else. And I think we should continue to do that. I think we should go to Mars someday. I think we should have people living on Mars, but I don't look at it as a...”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Radiation whether we have some protective materials or we just get to Mars quicker so they're not exposed to radiation for that long. But it's something that we're absolutely capable of doing and I think we should do. I don't think though we need to look at Mars as a lifeboat for planet Earth. Now I say that having been wrong about things that Elon has said before. So, you know, when he was going to land the first stage of the Falcon rocket on a ship and reuse it, my initial thought was he's crazy. But then he went and did it. Then he did it again and again and again and again. So I will never say Elon's crazy again. But I always think it'll be easier to live on earth regardless of what bad thing might happen to it. And I also think it's important that we need to recognize that really this is our home.”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yeah, so a few things come to mind. You know, one is, and I'll quote my brother and give him credit for this because he said it, and that's the only place I've ever heard this. And he says, going to Mars is not about rocket science. It's really about political science. Because, you know, we know much of what we need to know technically about how to do it. But if we're going to really do that someday, put people, put boots on Mars, it's really more about having the money, the political support, and the public support. It's going to take people to vote in to office, you know, science-minded people that feel like this is important. You know, I do think we can do it. We could probably do it pretty soon. There are some challenges. I think we need better life, you know, our life support systems probably need to be a little bit more robust. We certainly have to protect the crew from.”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“That, yeah, you don't have to be a scientist to understand science. And even if you don't understand it, find the person that's the expert and believe them because they're the experts, right?”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I'm not an expert on many, many things. You know, there are things that I know a lot about, things I don't know a whole lot about. But when I don't know about those, I ask the rocket scientist of whatever that thing is. I get my information from trusted sources, government agencies that are the authority on the pandemic, like the CDC, the World Health Organization, these kind of places, media outlets that have been there for a long time and that have a reputation, not your crazy uncle on Facebook, not people you've never heard of. So it's just shocking to me that people will just discount things that are the truth without even trying to go find out what the real story is and just saying, well, I just don't believe, I don't believe that.”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“For it, and I felt bad for them because I like them. I'm a fan, so I just reached out to him and I said, hey, you know, if you want to talk about the moon landing, I'd be happy to share what I know with you. And he was very happy to have that conversation and to take back what he said about that. And he wasn't doing anything malicious. He was just kind of agreeing with the guy, a guy who said that. And then he was kind of on to the next thing. But a lot of people gave him a lot of heat for it. So we had a little talk about it. I think he understands now.”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I would just go set up like a taco truck and make a billion dollars With my edge of the earth tacos. Yeah, so I generally don't give those kind of folks any acknowledgement because I just think it's so outrageous. And I know some of them do it kind of as a goof and they think it's funny or it's cute or whatever. You know, some people really believe it. The danger is if you're willing to believe that the earth is flat, what else are you willing to believe that vaccines don't work, that we are not living in a pandemic where people by the thousands are dying every day throughout the world that climate change is a hoax? So it's a risky thing. You know, with regards to Steph, Steph is an awesome guy. I think he's a smart guy. I think in his situation, he just kind of got caught up in a thing where he said he just agreed with somebody about the moon landings, probably would not even give it a whole lot of thought. And then he got a lot of heat.”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Flat earthers. Now I don't even like acknowledge their existence. I probably shouldn't even have brought them up because I don't believe that they should even be given any kind of acknowledgement because it's just so absolutely outrageous. It's like if you're a flat earther, well, why don't you just deny that the sun is in the sky? I mean, the earth is round. I mean, you can go up in an airplane and look out the window and see that it's round. You got to look pretty closely because you're not very high. But if you do look closely, you can see we lived on a curved planet, not to mention that thousands of years of science has determined that the earth is round. And of course, I've seen it from space, and it is pretty round. It's not flat. And if it was flat, wouldn't the edge be like the most popular tourist attraction on Earth?”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Tell you what, I'm not a scientist either, although I do play one on TV occasionally. Space. I do other, you know. A lot of people think hey, you're an astronaut, you must be a scientist. No, I'm not a scientist. I've done a lot of science. I think I'm a science-minded person. I know what science is. I know what it isn't. And unfortunately, I think in today's society, a lot of people have lost their reality in some ways where all of a sudden in our society like science is now opinion or politics. It's not. It's subjective observation. It's evidence, it's experimentation, it's critical analysis, it's peer review. It's always evolving, but it is the truth as we know it at that particular time. The science deniers we have in our society now are dangerous. It's like I used to kind of goof around with the”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yeah, so it's about Pearl Box the Gird Earth. It's brilliant. It's about this guy named this farmer in China, this peasant farmer that I haven't read it in a long time, but I think his name was Wang Lung. He goes from peasant farmer and survives all these famines and eventually becomes a major landholder. Really a great book, incredibly well written and a great example of like what life was like in that time during China before the Revolution and when they had many, many years of famine and having massive numbers of people having to migrate as a result, highly recommended. One of my favorites of all time.”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Transits of hundreds and hundreds of miles and lifeboats in the Arctic, a crossing of South Georgia Island in the winter that no one had ever done before. But Shackleton and a small team of his guys did that as at the end of them trying to save themselves. And he was able to do that. And no one died. None of his crew members died. Everyone survived. That book is very meaningful book for me that I have actually given it to other people. Hemingway fans certainly, you know, the old man in the sea is a favorite. And I'm also looking at Pearl Bucks, the good earth. I think I've given that book to other people.”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Looking at my bookshelf in my office here. Certainly, the right stuff. I've given that to people. Shackleton's or Alfred Lansing's book Endurance, which is partly where the name of my book Endurance comes from because that book about Ernest Shackleton and his voyage with his crew of endurance, the ship to the Antarctic in the beginning of the last century was really one of the greatest examples of leadership in a very challenging and dangerous environment that I could ever imagine. I mean, it's just extraordinary what Shackleton as the leader of that expedition was able to do when their ship endurance got stuck in the ice, eventually crushed, and they spent, I forget exactly how long, but it was almost like two years saving themselves that involved, you know, living on ice packs.”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Nauseous, you don't have a second chance in that it's a glider, a big glider, with very poor flying qualities and you're only going to get to do this once or twice in your life. You know, everyone's watching you, so it's a lot of pressure. Different kind of pressure in the F-14.”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I'm not sure how wide the landing area is, but it's not much wider than the airplane. Don't have a whole lot of margin. The airplane lands, it depends on the weight, what weight you're landing at. But it's somewhere around 150 miles an hour. Not the fastest landing on the ship you have to land relatively slow. The T-38 that we flew at NASA would land at like 170 knots. So the F-14 is a little bit slower. But the thing about the Tomcat or any airplane that's landing on the ship is not only are you trying to land on this very small runway, but that runway is constantly moving up and down, heaving up and down, it's pitching, bowed astern, it's rolling left to right, and it's moving away from you because the deck is angled as the ship is going forward. And then sometimes it's dark, so you can't really see anything either. So it's pretty challenging piloting task. Actually, it's harder than landing the space shuttle, believe it or not. Difference with a space shuttle is you're not feeling well. You're dizzy.”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“If they don't, they're never going to be able to see what they could possibly achieve. Now, hopefully the risk-taking I'm talking about is not something that would get you killed. It almost got me killed on a number of occasions. But yeah, hopefully it's not those kind of risks, but career risk, you know, other kind of risks in putting yourself out there for maybe getting a degree you don't think you're capable of applying for a job you think you might not get those kind of risks or something I think people should be challenging themselves like that all the time”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Because at least this way, you kind of know what you stand, like what you're capable of. I always feel like if we're not always moving that bar higher and risking failure, then we're not really reaching our potential. And the people I've come across, not only at NASA and the military and industry are the people that are really successful are the people that are willing to take the risk of failing. And oftentimes I'll come across kids or adults that they don't want to do something because they think they might not be able to do it. But what if they are able to? They would never know. So to put yourself out there, to expose yourself to failure, I think is something that everyone should strive for because”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I was one and done on that, sent home, you know, had a stern talking to. I was given an option of actually going to fly a cargo plane that the commanding officer thought, well, maybe that would be easier for me because my first experience at the ship was so ugly. But, you know, I was given another chance. In this situation, I just thought to myself, I'd never flown a bigger airplane before. Didn't even know if I could do that, but I thought, you know, if I'm going to fail at something, I might as well fall at something that I think I might not be able to do rather than something that's easier.”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Well, you know, failure is an option, I think. It's something that we all probably experience and hopefully we learn from it and move forward. Certainly my early education was one big failure after another. I'm not proud of that. Wish I could have a do-over. It's actually one of the greatest regrets of my life, and that is sitting in class for thirteen years, not paying attention. Talk about a colossal waste of time. I wish I could have a do over on that. You know, other failures that would set me up for success, the first time I qualified to land an F-fourteen tomcat on the ship, I disqualified. My first landing, the hook of the airplane, the tail hook, actually hit the back of an aircraft carrier, the stern, you know, the part that goes down towards the”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“But I decided he had gotten good grades through high school and was doing very well Where he was in college, and I thought, well, maybe I'll listen to my twin brother after he was yelling and cursing at me on the phone. And yeah, I did what he said. And then at the end of the week, I took the test and I got 100. And then from then on, I basically knew what it took to do well. And that is for me, what has always taken for me is just know as much as you can about anything you're doing. And then even if you fall a little bit short, you're still not going to fall so far that you're failing or doing poorly.”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Hey, have you had any tests yet like a calculus test? That was my first year of calculus. And I said, no, we have one next week. And then he immediately cursed at me, yelled at me, and basically said, what the hell are you doing? I mean, you've never been good at this. You have this motivation to like change your path in life. And you're thinking about going to a frat party and spending the weekend at a frat house. And I go, yeah, well, you know, the tests at the end of the week, I'll study when I get back. He says to me, he goes, you should be doing every single problem in every chapter multiple times until you can't stand it anymore, because that's what it's going to take. And I remember thinking to myself, I'm not too sure I'm going to listen to him. I actually really wanted to go to this Brat Party.”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“We were coming up on Columbus Day weekend, so it's kind of the beginning of the school year almost. And I called my brother up and I say, hey, some of our friends are having a... a frat party at Rutgers, some of our high school friends. And I was thinking of going there for the whole weekend, you know, leave on Friday, come back on Monday. And I called my brother, I said, hey, you want to go with me? And he's like, yeah, I got some work to do. I get some tests next week. And then he says, goes”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“That was the primary reason I went there. The other reason was it was really one of the few places I could get into because I had such bad high school grades and my first year college grades weren't all that great, but I needed that kind of discipline and structure. I felt like I did. My brother, who was on a completely different trajectory once we went into high school, was at the US Merchant Marine Academy and asked me a little bit later how he became upon a different trajectory because it's actually kind of a funny story, but he was across the river, actually the Long Island Sound at the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy. He was a year wound up a year ahead of me because I took that first year mulligan on college.”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Well, I don't know if confidence is the right word. I've always felt that kind of like a below average guy performing at an above average level. And I think that's a good place to be. If you get too confident, I think you get lazy. And once I figured out what I needed to do, I always felt like I needed to work harder than other people because maybe I didn't have as much natural smarts or talent or ability. So there was never a moment where I ever got confident. There was kind of a turning point, and that is from a learning and education perspective. And that is eventually I figured out how to study well enough that I was able to change schools, I changed majors, I became an engineering major. But now I'm starting my freshman year all over again, but still haven't really cracked the code on what it takes. It was coming up on Columbus Day. I went to a school called the State University in New York Maritime College. It's in the Bronx. It's a college that has a military regimental system, which I felt like I had to have that.”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“A lot more help, especially if you have diagnosed ADD or ADHD, it would be. There'd be ways to get support and assistance, but for me, strictly the brute force method, like chain myself to my desk, don't move until I can figure out how to do this. Pre-calculus problem. I remember that being a big struggle at the school I was at. But eventually, you know, like many things, you know, what I've always found in my career, whether it's in the military, in the Navy, you know, flying airplanes, whether it's at NASA, and that is how good we are when we start something is not related at all to how good we can become at anything.”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Hey, let me just comment first on you mentioning that email, which his response was so Tom Wolf-like in that he had words in there that were not really words. An outrageous punctuation. Pretty cool email to get back from him. But you know, in my case, it wasn't really focusing on like new subjects that were more and more in line with being an engineer or a pilot because those were really the subjects I had the most challenge with, like math as an example. I wasn't really a great math student or actually I wasn't great at anything. But for me, it wasn't necessarily like a change of course or like you said a vector or doubling. It was more the doubling down on the fact that no matter how hard I've tried in the past, that didn't work. And I just have to try a lot harder to force myself to learn how to learn really was the first challenge of the next year after I read Tom's book and I decided that this is what I'm going to do. I just had to do it kind of brute force method by myself. I think today you would have.”
2020-11-05 · The Tim Ferriss Show · #478: Scott Kelly — Lessons Learned from 500+ Days in Space, Life-Changing Books, and The Art of Making Hard Choices · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT