Play Book Tag discussion

This was a great way to start the New Year.

I picked up the book mainly for the space content. Chris Hadfield (who famously recorded himself singing David Bowie’s ‘Space Oddity’ on the ISS) was at the forefront of the trend for astronauts to use social media to share glimpses of their view from space, and this book delivered what I'd hoped for: first hand insights into the experience of space travel, presented with warmth and humour. As well as the detailed descriptions of rocket launches and life on the space station, I was particularly struck by the explanations of terrestrial processes such as the ‘contingency simulations’ in which everyone involved (including family) walk through the likely scenarios that could follow an astronaut’s death, or the rather sweet way that another astronaut is assigned to act like a ‘surrogate spouse’ to run errands and look after each astronaut’s immediate family during a launch.

Hadfield himself comes across as deeply likeable, and seriously impressive. I had lower expectations of the ‘life advice’ aspect of the book, but I ended up finding it genuinely inspiring. He talks about the survival training that astronauts do to instill “expeditionary behaviour—essentially, the ability to work in a team productively and cheerfully in tough conditions,” and the intensive preparations that all astronauts go through to acquire “our core skill, the one that made us astronauts—the ability to parse and solve complex problems rapidly, with incomplete information, in a hostile environment.” From his many years of training and experience he distills a set of universally applicable lessons, including looking on the dark side (gaining confidence and competence by continually rehearsing for catastrophe) and aiming to be a zero (entering a new situation, not trying to be a star, but instead observing, learning, and trying “to contribute in small ways without causing disruptions”).

Most memorable for me were the conclusions he drew from his success at becoming an astronaut despite recognizing as a 9 year old Canadian boy watching the moon landings that it was probably impossible. (“Astronauts were American,” after all!) Hadfield writes convincingly of a middle path between giving up on a highly unlikely dream and allowing yourself to be defined by the probable ‘failure’ that chasing it involves. Drawing on the technical meaning of the term “attitude”, meaning the orientation of a spacecraft, he advises going all out in pursuit of your goal and always choosing paths that could make you more prepared to reach it, but also remaining clear about the fact that the outcome is out of your control. To reconcile these demands for determination and acceptance, he suggests viewing learning and training as an end in itself, ensuring that you make career choices that you’d be satisfied with even if an opportunity to pursue the end goal never materializes, and remembering that “what really matters is not the value someone else assigns to a task but how I personally feel while performing it.”

“But fundamentally, life off Earth is in two important respects not at all unworldly: You can choose to focus on the surprises and pleasures, or the frustrations. And you can choose to appreciate the smallest scraps of experience, the everyday moments, or to value only the grandest, most stirring ones. Ultimately, the real question is whether you want to be happy.”

Lovely review, Nikki! Another book I would never have heard of, if not for this group! Thank you for sharing!

I wouldn't have picked it up if I hadn't been looking for something tagged space - I love how this group pushes my reading in unexpected directions!

I enjoyed your review, Nikki. The book sounds inspiring.

Excellent review Nikki. Thank you for including some great examples. The "aiming to be zero" idea was surprising but I can see how that could be a crucial stance in many situations.

The training process sounds particularly interesting to me. It's relevant to the very real demands of the job, but it can apply to other situations as well. I like his attitude about learning and training. It sounds like "Love of learning" would rank high on his list of character strengths (in the VIA classification).