Passion Struck with John R. Miles - Astronaut Chris Cassidy On The Importance in Life of Being Present EP 26

Starting point is 00:00:00 riding the rocket on your first time is amazing, but there's nothing that you, I can't even put words to effect when you open the door and just your glass visor and you're looking down at Earth below you and in your outside and you know that there's been a great deal of effort to get you to this point and you're part of a team that's repairing something or installing something you, but yet you're in this crazy team that's repairing something or installing something new. But yet you're in this crazy, crazy location that it doesn't make any sense to your brain like why are you there? This is not the place you should be. So that first moment of your first space walk. Welcome to the Cash and Struck Podcast. My name is John Miles, a former combat veteran and multi industry CEO, turned entrepreneur and human performance

Starting point is 00:00:46 expert. Each week we showcase an inspirational person or message that helps you unlock your hidden potential and unleash your creativity and leadership abilities. Thank you for joining us today on the show and let's get igniting. Thank you so much for joining me today on the Passion Start Podcast. Astronaut, Naval Academy, Distinguished Graduate, Captain Wendy Lawrence, said this quote, when I asked her, what was the dynamic force

Starting point is 00:01:14 that propelled her to the astronaut? She said, for me, I was 10. I had just perned 10 in July of 1969. And like millions of people around the world, my mother put me in front of a TV so I could watch. That is the day I became possessed with a dream. To me, that is the best way to describe it. As I got older from that day forward,

Starting point is 00:01:37 when I thought about what I really, really want to do, I came to the same conclusion. I want to be an astronaut and I want to be in space. And I picked that quote on purpose because we have a very special guest today, my naval academy, classmate, Navy SEAL, and astronaut Captain Chris Cassidy. And for me this is a very special interview not only because he's my classmate, but because I was able to speak to him virtually a year ago today as he was preparing to launch off in the Soyuz Castle in Kazakhstan where he was going to become

Starting point is 00:02:12 the commander of the ISS. And for me being able to follow up a year later and hear about those experiences during his six months in space and many more, I think, is going to make just for an amazing episode today. And if you are not the familiar with Chris, let me tell you a little bit more about him. Maybe Captain Christopher J. Cassidy was selected as an astronaut by NASA in 2004 and is a veteran of three space lights. STS 127, Expedition 35, and most recently served as the commander on the International Space Station for Expedition 63. During that shuttle mission, STS 127, Cassidy served as mission

Starting point is 00:02:53 specialist and was the 500th person in history flying space. This mission delivered the Japanese Experiment Module Explosive Facility and the Experiment Logistics Module Exposed Section to the Station. Expedition 35, Cassidy and the European Space Agency, astronaut Luca Parmato, had their unplanned spacewalk to replace a pump controller box. Touch short, when Parmato had pulling water leak into his helmet.

Starting point is 00:03:23 And then, Cassidy became NASA's 14th Chief Astronaut in July 2015, where he was responsible for flight assignments, mission preparation, and unorbit support of US crews, as well as organizing astronaut office support for future launch vehicles. Cassidy, a US Navy SEAL, has been deployed twice to the Mediterranean and twice to Afghanistan. He is the recipient of two bronze stars with combat V and presidential unit citation for leading a nine-day operation on the Afghanistan-Hackestanning border. Brist received a Bachelor of Science in Mathematics from the US Naval Academy in 1993, a master's of science and ocean engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 2000, and an honorary PhD

Starting point is 00:04:12 from Tucson University of Maine in 2015. And I am just ecstatic to have Chris on today, and I know this is a show for all the listeners you are not going to want to miss. Welcome to the Passion Struct podcast. Today I am so excited to have a long-term friend and Naval Academy classmate and Naval Academy school classmate of mine, Chris Cassidy. Welcome to the show, Chris. Hey, John. It's so cool to be with you after all these years. And ironically, my stepson is at Nath right now. We'll start his play beer this summer.

Starting point is 00:04:54 So it makes me reflect back to when we were in his shoes. You know, it doesn't seem that long ago. It does it. No. And in fact, it seems like yesterday that Gunny Zachary was driving us through clock in the morning, PT, Dross, doesn't it? Oh my God, yeah. Bad memories.

Starting point is 00:05:15 I, as I was preparing for the show, I actually reached out to our whole class and asked them for things they wanted to talk about. And the experience of Gunny Zach must have come up about 10 times in that thread. So I think he left an impression on all of us. That he certainly did. Well, you and I had a similar starting point. We're both from Hounds, named York, me, York, Pennsylvania, you, York, Maine. And I think, you know, for the listeners

Starting point is 00:05:46 out there, you and I had a chance to do an interview. It was kind of, I sent you questions and you sent me audiograms back at that time because it was actually almost to the day a year ago, and you were about two weeks out from blasting off from Kazakhstan. And in that, one of the things I was in the process of writing my book and the chapter was on perspective. So our interview was about different perspectives that we faced. And I think you and I both ended up going to naps for similar reasons. I went there on an athletic scholarship, whereas you did not. But I think for both of us, it was a much needed year in our life that had profound impacts

Starting point is 00:06:30 in the way we approached the Naval Academy and beyond. And so I thought maybe for the listeners out there, sometimes you look at something like having to go to an extra year of school as a negative, but I think both of us found it to be a very big positive in our lives. And I wanted you to unpack that a little bit. Yeah, absolutely. There's a super cool story about how I ended up at NAPS. And I'll share that in a second. But when I found, found out that I was going to the prep

Starting point is 00:07:01 school, I had this kind of moment of after it all settled and I kind of was putting things in perspective in my high school classmates removing on a college. I had a little bit of a man, I'm gonna be a year behind my friends and I don't feel like I need to go to prep school. Why am I not good enough to have gotten right in directly and And you know, sort of had a jumbled up bunch of feelings inside me. A little bit, I know it was going to be the single greatest thing. I really believe for me. And probably just like you're getting at, I mean, there's a huge difference in maturity

Starting point is 00:07:39 between 18-year-old and 19-year-old. And then you're surrounded by other folks that are there, just like you. And some members, some of our classmates were prior and listed, so they were a little bit older than us even and just kind of soaking up that maturity. An extra year of pay, learning the military system and having an extra year of the same curriculum

Starting point is 00:08:00 that you get in your plea beer. All of that just made us, all of whatever we were, 200 or so of us, just so much more prepared to go into that freshman year and it allowed me anyways to be really successful academically and feel like it, none of it was a stress in that plebeia and I think it just put me on such a positive trajectory. If you want, I can go into the story about how I ended up at Napsits because it's in my mind, it's one of the most pivotal moments in my life. For the reason, I just kind of talked about about NAPS.

Starting point is 00:08:32 But for those listeners that aren't aware with about the admission process to a service academy, you have to apply both to the school itself and to a congressional nomination. And I didn't have any mentors in the process. There wasn't a blue and gold officer who kind of guides you through the system at that point, or at least I didn't know them. So I was navigating on on my own, and I learned that you had to do this congressional application. So I did that. I went for the interview at the congressional staff with theional staff, and they said, Okay, good job. We got it from here. And I thought, Oh, that's it. I don't have to do anything else. And they had no son. We got it.

Starting point is 00:09:13 You did a great job. And we got it from here. We'll get back to you. So this was this fall of my senior year. And everybody's getting the letters that you got into college or not. And I hadn't gotten a single thing from the nail academy. So I called them up to the admissions office and the woman asked my name, asked my social security number, I could hear going through files, nothing. She said, we don't even have you in our system. And this is like April or late March of our senior year in high school. It just so happens. My friend, my friend's dad, we were in Maine who was taking a business trip to

Starting point is 00:09:53 Washington DC the next week and I had planned to go with my friend and his dad to just enjoy DC honors, bring great. And so one of those days I drove over to the academy went to the admissions office and the same woman at the front desk said, oh, you're from Maine Down the hall on the right second door captain Milo. He's the person for New England. I'll see him So I walk down the hall and enter and There he is like the stereotypical Marine Corps Captain not a wrinkle to be seen You can see your reflection in his shoes. Perfect haircuts, square jaw, and he's just looking at me as I'm telling my story thinking, is this guy, I could tell it even my 18 year old self, I could tell this guy was thinking,

Starting point is 00:10:35 is this kid a total goofball who didn't get his act together in time or is it really something I should give him some some attention to? He didn't give me any feedback in the room and he just said, okay, I understand, I'll get back to you, drive back to Maine. And the next week I get a phone call from him and he's squall him in school. And he says, hey, Cassidy, I got good news.

Starting point is 00:10:58 I can get you into the prep school, but you need to tell me on the phone right now if you want to go. And I just like, didn't hesitate, yes sir. Thank you phone right now if you want to go. And I just didn't hesitate. Yes, sir, thank you very much. I'd like to go. And that alone allowed me to go to prep school, which as I just described previously, set me up for success at the Naval Academy,

Starting point is 00:11:15 which enabled me to select the SEAL teams. And then in the SEAL teams, I learned about Bill Shepard to become an astronaut. And that motivated me to try to become an astronaut. And now, here I am having had a 17-year career at NASA. So, if it wasn't for Cap Mololo, having the belief in me and giving me the opportunity just to go there, none of that would have happened. So, I think it's the most pivotal moment in my life. I was just an 18-year-old didn't know any better. Well, similar to you, my dream since I was a young kid was to go to the

Starting point is 00:11:51 University of Michigan. My parents went there, grandparents, everyone, and I got an athletic scholarship. And the Naval Academy really wasn't on my radar because when I was a young kid, York wasn't that far from anapolis, and we would take all our relatives there. And so I, as a young kid, saw all these leaves, and underclassed on getting screamed at, I'm like, why would I do that? But then Coach Elk, Coach Owl, the cross-centric coach, Kent and Tanna, I think was his name, ended up starting to recruit me, and the more they talked about me, talk to it with me, the more I started getting excited.

Starting point is 00:12:28 And I, you know, I'd always had a fascination for leadership. And I thought, you know, what better place to learn about leadership and get experiences. So, you know, for me, it was really not the initial path I was going to take. So very similar to you, but I think, for me, it paved the way to making the Academy much easier.

Starting point is 00:12:47 And luckily, my leave year roommate was self-summon, I don't know if you remember him from NAPS, but was a wireless marine. And so having someone like that for the first semester, he ended up leaving second semester. But he was so locked away. It just, that influence as well, just taught me so much. So you then get to the Naval Academy

Starting point is 00:13:09 and you were a math major. What were some of the highlights for you of that experience? Because the motto for a lot of people is it's a terrible place to be, a great place to be from. But I found some great moments when I was there and especially the bonds that you build with your classmates. You know, it's funny, John. I really liked my whole four years there. I never really felt like

Starting point is 00:13:30 all this is miserable place. Even plebe- plebe summer is kind of a drag as you know, but with our experience at NAPS, I kind of knew that it would just end eventually. And that was a theme that helped me through seal training as well as is like those tough times. They eventually end, pleap summer, hell week, whatever, a crazy time at work or sickness. You can get through it. But back to your question, what some memories that I really think back on. And trying to answer that, it's not so much the exact things that we did as the people that I did them with, like probably just like you, some of my best friends today are those guys from my company that I bonded with, and then Napsters as well. And I think it's because when you're young like that

Starting point is 00:14:21 and you're in your formative years, when you're collectively going through tough times together or I like to call type two fun, like type one fun is fun when it's happening and type two fun, it's when you look back on it, it has funny stories, but while you're living it, it wasn't so fun. But really, the friendships and the bonds that we formed at that time frame, you know, like just staying up late cramming for a final or summer cruises, I thought those were awesome. I love the summer cruises, so I don't know, what were yours? What were some of your favorite times? Well, some of them were the camaraderie and with your company mates for sure, but also your teammates and the sports you played. So for me, the rugby members especially had a profound impact on me,

Starting point is 00:15:13 and I remember we both got the chance to go back for our 25th reunions, and it so happened that almost the entire rugby squad was there, and so being able to see all of them again, and it feeling like it was 25 years ago and not being captains and colonels and generals and admirals in the service. So I thought those were some, but I also thought that the exposure that we got, not only being able to see the real world during the summers, but also the exposure to some of the amazing leaders that we had and who gave us forestall lectures or other things where you really could learn from them, what passion and drive really meant and how some of them like Admiral Stockdale, Lawrence, others had to overcome John McCain who did our commencement, had to overcome such brutal situations, and yet similar to your type 2 pun,

Starting point is 00:16:11 how they looked back upon some of the worst circumstances in their lives as some of the most defining. And so for me being a young kid and being able to hear those experiences and get exposed to leadership like that, me was paramount in where I am today, which leads me to a question for you. If you remember the four-stall lectures and you were to give one today, what message would you deliver to the Brigade of Mitchemann? Oh, wow, that's a good question.

Starting point is 00:16:36 You know, there's a thing that I've learned in both my time in the seal teams as well as at NASA. There's nothing more important than what you're doing right now. And by that, I mean, when you're on a sealed mission or military operation, you could have chaos in your personal life or things, you know, you could be irritated at your buddy in the squadron or in your platoon, but when you bring it together and you're actually conducting the operation, all that has to be go out. You have to focus and be paying attention to the very specific thing you're trying to accomplish. Same thing in my space career.

Starting point is 00:17:15 When you're in a cockpit or you're on the board, the space station and you get distracted by something else, you could very easily flip the wrong switch or do an action that can harm the vehicle or worst case people's health and safety at risk. And it applies, I've learned that it's not just an operational concept. It applies in life too, so many times you see people buried on their phone and in a conversation and you kind of get a feeling like, oh, they're not really paying attention to me. And so I strive to do that. And occasionally I'll catch myself in a conversation with my wife if I'm distracted and realize, oh, I'm not paying 100% of attention. That means I'm

Starting point is 00:18:02 not giving her or whoever you're talking to, 100% and you're not giving the other tasks that you're trying to do at the same time, 100%. So that's one of the things that I try hard to reiterate from my lessons learned in the military and in the NASA is the thing that you're doing right now. Like for me, I'm talking to you on this podcast. It's the most important thing I'm doing at this moment. You know, there could be a crisis that happens, which, you know, offense to you, John, but would elevate me to go pay attention to the crisis, but that's all what you do in operational environment, too. Like you're, you got to deal with the alligator that's closest to the boat and,

Starting point is 00:18:43 and you're constantly making prioritization decisions on what you got to deal with the alligator that's closest to the boat and you're constantly making prioritization decisions on what you got to do immediately and what you can push off and deal with later. But that's probably the message. I'd probably, if I was giving a four-cell lecture, I'd give a few examples. Some personal stories where I learned this, but that's the theme I would go with.

Starting point is 00:19:00 So I think that's a great topic. I just did a podcast a couple weeks ago and I called it the importance of showing up. And I used of all people, Matthew McConaughey is my example, because at the time my son was having a really rough time in middle school, we had just moved to Austin and he just wasn't fitting in and it was a huge school he was in and we started. We always took him to church, but we were trying to get him excited to go to church and meet new friends.

Starting point is 00:19:32 At a point where I don't think he wanted to go at all, all of a sudden Matthew McConaughey started showing up every single week, sat a row in front of us, didn't just go. I mean, he and his family totally showed up, he participated, and I think watching him and his enthusiasm for that moment and being present with his kids really made a profound impact on my son, and for me, it showed me a completely different side of him from what I had heard about him as a person. So I think you're right so many times today, you're in a restaurant and everywhere you look,

Starting point is 00:20:11 half the tables, three quarters the table, they have the persons on the phone. And I say this concept of, why are you so focused on what appears to be urgent as opposed to what is important? And I think your point about whatever you're involved in at your particular moment should be the most important thing for occupying your time. So I think that's a great point.

Starting point is 00:20:32 So for those who don't understand the way that the Academy does service selections and I think it's changed a bit now, they learn earlier than you and I did. But I remember being interested in potentially becoming a seal. And I remember that process for making that decision started a couple of years earlier. I don't know if you remember Richard Rodriguez used to be part of the football team. I remember doing workouts with him and those who were interested

Starting point is 00:20:58 were starting to get a feel for it. But when did you get that urge inside of you? Because at the time you and I went there, they were very limited billets, I think 10 or less. It was probably youngster year, sophomore year, when it kind of dawned on me that service select, plebe year, even though I knew service selection was a concept, it wasn't something that felt that I had to deal with anytime soon. But starting sophomore year, I remember, oh, there's prerequisites and lead up to these things. You can't just delay the decision to all of a sudden in your senior.

Starting point is 00:21:33 And I was intrigued by CLTN, which was quite different than the CLTN weren't in the news. There wasn't a million books in Barnes and Noble about written by SEAL. So it wasn't something I readily knew about, but in talking to, we had Matt Hickey was the SEAL officer on staff, and there was Cheek guy named Cheaf Black, and just seeing them around, and going to PT sessions, it got me a little incrementally more and more enthused. And there was a couple of my company mates, Brad Gresham and Mike Pierce, we all worked out together. And I think collectively we spurred on each other's motivation. And so that was when it really started. And I put some thought into, okay, in order to make it a reality that I can select it, I must, I need to do this mini-bud's thing and do a summer,

Starting point is 00:22:26 which is a summer, summer cruise type event before your senior year. So I just kind of put it all in place about what I need to do to stay competitive for the process. Okay, so if there was one thing you learned as a midshipman, what would you say it's been in propelling your career now to be a seal and, you know, an astronaut? That's a good question also. I think probably that the, you know, a little bit, I learned this in high school sports and that's the cohesiveness that you get from a team, a camaraderie, and the energy that you boost each other up. But it really got hammered home in my time at the academy with your company. You have different groups of friends, right? Maybe you're the same way you've got your company, then you've got people

Starting point is 00:23:15 that were in your major together. And then maybe you had a really fun summer cruise or something with a group of people and you stay connected with them. And so, and then I played company sports. I wasn't on a varsity team, but I met you and get, obviously for you, Crest Country or Rugby is another source of that camaraderie. And so the lesson I learned that was really hammered home at the academy is how much energy you can give each other

Starting point is 00:23:44 when you're in it together. Okay. Well, I think that definitely would apply to your experience going through buds. I remember in our last discussion, you kind of told me that one of the most important things you found about being at buds was that if it's kind of this, you know, trying times and there's this reality that you've got to get over doubting yourself. And those two things really stuck with me because having not been to buds, but no one, many people who have, I mean, it is probably one of the most crying times at that point that you would ever experienced. So how do you get through periods like that

Starting point is 00:24:20 where, you know, you're faced with things or for you when you're in that combat situation in Afghanistan, how do you break that mindset that these trying times are going to end? Yeah, for me, it was figuring out that your time horizon of the future is like an elastic band, right? Like the more available bandwidth you have, you can have that rubber band stretch out further and further and you can look for deeper ahead of you. But when you get really, really in the thick of it, in the buds analogy, is you're just buried in sand and you're in your hundreds push up and the instructors are yelling at you, your time horizon shrinks kind of just in front of you. And that's where the, like you said, trying times end.

Starting point is 00:25:10 If you're in that heat of the battle and it's really, really, really, really struggling, it's too much to even think about getting to lunch. You just have to get to the next set of 10 push-ups. And so that's where I realized like in the beginning of buds, it's overwhelming to think about the end. It's even overwhelming to think about, oh, I just get to the end of the first phase. You have to break it up into much smaller chunks. And the ability to like a rubber band stretch this time horizon until, you know, the sort of little mini milestone, John milestone, is very, very helpful. In general, I broke it down into chunks of meals, get to lunch, get to dinner, et cetera.

Starting point is 00:25:51 But you need to be able to make that smaller increments if you need it to. Well, and one of the other things you mentioned was that during Buds, certain tells you that they didn't think about quitting. They're probably lying to you because almost everyone goes through that. And you tell me the story that, you know,

Starting point is 00:26:08 most people that they haven't been to California think that the water is gonna be like it is on the East Coast. And it definitely is not. It's freezing cold and especially the conditions. It put you guys through. And I remember you telling me the story that you were cold, you were uncomfortable, but one of your classmates at Buds was from Thailand and that called you were uncomfortable, but one of your classmates at BUDS was from Thailand,

Starting point is 00:26:26 and that while you were uncomfortable, he was just so uncomfortable, you know, it took every, I guess, part of his anatomy to keep pushing through and seeing things like that, how did that change your outlook and your desire to stay with the program? Right, exactly. That no matter how miserable you think you have it, somebody else somewhere has it a little worse. And then there's certainly that also means somebody else somewhere has it a little better than you.

Starting point is 00:26:58 And being able to be the person that gives support and gives energy at the same time where you can take it from others is something I learned in steel training and yeah officer from Thailand he was always cold and that's all I needed was whenever I thought I was cold and unhappy I just look over him and he's like shaking like crazy okay well he's still here I can be still here and I I don't think that if you ask most of the people who went through who succeeded going through buds, I don't think all of us were always thought about quitting. And I think it just means that any one person,

Starting point is 00:27:36 there was probably a fleeting, at the minimum, a fleeting moment where they were really, really hate in life. And thought, what am I doing here? Maybe they didn't think about quitting, but really they start to self-doubt like why am I here? And the period of time where that goes through your mind, I think is directly related to how your support, your buddies around you get you through it.

Starting point is 00:28:02 That's a great analogy. And you know. Especially as you then went into the teams and got your tried in the Special Forces, I think has a different version of what that squad or team makes than maybe other portions of the military. So in whether you're a Green Bray, Force Recon, SEAL, I think for you that inner-platoon squad of people you're deploying with AXON, a completely different meaning.

Starting point is 00:28:28 Can you talk about that a little bit and how it's different than maybe if you were in the infantry, as opposed to being in a special forces team? Yeah, I mean, all I know is my experience, which was 100% in the SEAL teams, but I will tell you that this bond you form with your platoon, which whatever the small unit element is in SEAL teams we call it, a platoon in about 20 people, and you're together for two years and you've got a junior officer leading at a senior and listed person working co-ent hand in hand with that junior officer and then a senior and listed person working co-ent hand in hand with that junior officer and then fill out the rest of the group with the guys. And you just get really close and understand how each other operate and almost without

Starting point is 00:29:14 communicating after the course of a two year workup, getting ready for a six month deployment. By the time that process is over and you're out on deployment and ready to do your operational work. You almost don't need to communicate verbally with each other. You just instinctively know who's flowing where, who's picking up which task, who's going to take care of X, Y, or Z. And what I really liked about it was that peer leadership was what drove it. As a seal platoon commander, it was very rare, almost never did I ever have to tell somebody, hey, you didn't do your job. The other peers of those of the folks in the platoon just kind of pushed everyone to give their best and to perform their best. And even to this day, what I fear most is letting down my teammates and I think that was something that really was instilled in me in my first and my silted.

Starting point is 00:30:15 Did you know that Forbes Magazine recently cited that 70% of individuals who do personal development masterminds and one-on-one coaching benefited from better work performance, increased communication skills, and overall better relationships. And we, at PassionStruck, are obsessed with self-development, coaching, and mentorship. That is why we've created a free resource to help you unlock your hidden potential. Because people doing great things in business and life are just like you, only they've had a coach along the way. And we've got that cover too. Let us show you the systems and frameworks that we teach for both minded individuals to help them step into their sharp edges, execute on their passion journeys

Starting point is 00:31:05 and get predictable results time and time again. Go to passionstruck.com slash coaching right now and let's get igniting. I don't even know if you were aware of this about my background, but I was stationed in Rota and I was a formation warfare officer back in the day they called as cryptologists, but I was what they call a formation warfare officer back in the day, they called us cryptologists, but I was what they call a direct support officer.

Starting point is 00:31:27 And so, which I love because I got to go on subs, aircraft, aircraft carriers, stores, cruisers, but about halfway through that tour, the heads at NSA wanted to start a new practice. They now call it the Information Dominance Expeditionary Forces. And so I got assigned to Naval Special Warfare Unit 10 and wrote it for 18 months. And so I guess I can tackle this because I saw a big difference. You know, I got to work not only with the Navy SEALs, but some French foreign Legion, lots

Starting point is 00:32:01 of the Spanish and Italian special forces because worker unit time is kind of a training command. But what I saw that was different is kind of what you're getting on is in these small teams, everyone has a role and they know what their role is. And there's no question about it. And that was something that I saw as different than when I was on ships, or somewhere else was just not only that, but the camaraderie that each of the teams had with each other and the thrust and familiarity

Starting point is 00:32:32 that they would have with each other. And so when I went on a few deployments with some of the teams in a Green Bray unit, it was a completely, it was more disciplined in some ways, but also more loose in others in the bonds that you felt for each other. There was less of a separation between officer and enlisted, I found, and it was more, you know, co-equals on emissions, so to speak. So, I agree with that, yeah. So for those who aren't aware of your background, you spent 10 or 11 years as a seal and then you

Starting point is 00:33:06 happened to get selected to get MIT to pursue an ocean engineering degree. And I think it was at that point that you met Bill Shepherd, who was first astronaut, who was a Navy SEAL. But, you know, I think we both know Captain Wendy Lawrence, another Naval Academy graduate and astronaut. And you two took very different paths. When I interviewed her, you know, she came up in the Apollo days and, you know, the day that she saw the landing on the moon for her, it kind of on launch, it launched this passion for the rest of her life that she wanted to be an astronaut. Similar kind of to both our experiences and finding the Naval Academy, you didn't go into this to be an astronaut. It kind of

Starting point is 00:33:46 came midway through your career. And I think, you know, that is becoming more the norm and many people's careers where you start off in one direction and then you end up reinventing yourself. But for you, what was the force that that kind of carried you from that decision to want to stay in and be a seal or do I want to pursue being an astronaut? You know, once I met Shep Bill Shepard and I kind of looked at his background and then and then where how mine was shaping up, I was in graduate school at the time and realized if he was able to be selected with the background that he has, then is a math major you could do the correlation to that theorem is that I would have the same qualifications and maybe I would be a competitive applicant as well. I also kind

Starting point is 00:34:35 of put it in my own framework as if it doesn't happen, it's fine because I really I like what I was doing in the SEAL teams. I really enjoyed the SEAL community and had no super urgent need to leave it. But I thought if the astronaut thing worked out, then that'd be pretty darn cool and pretty amazing. And I would love to spend some time in my career working at NASA. You know, honestly, though, when I was applying, I didn't really know what the job involved. Like when you just see astronaut, you think of like space walks, you think of people sitting in a cockpit of a spacecraft.

Starting point is 00:35:11 But that's just only a very small fraction of the number of day. I mean, I've been an astronaut for 17 years and just a total accumulation of a year of that has been in space. So 16 years I've been doing non-space things. But it's been, I've loved every bit of that as well, supporting other missions, leadership roles in here at the Johnson Space Center in various things, all been fun to be a part of. So I always feel grounded in my professional career in the SEAL teams and that will never ever be taken away, but I really enjoyed the second half of my career in ASA. Okay, so a question I always,

Starting point is 00:35:51 personal question I always wanted to ask you were one of a few astronauts who's left who actually was able to go to space on a space shuttle and on a Suez capsule. And I wanted to understand, what was the difference like in blasting off in both of those different vehicles? And for you, what's that sensation like and do you always get kind of nervous for it? Well, the physics is the same regardless of what vehicle you're riding. So the length of the powered flight

Starting point is 00:36:22 is about eight and a half to nine minutes in both cases. The G-force profile is the same, pretty much the same in both capsules. The difference is one that makes a lot of sense, and that's physical size. The Soyuz is a small capsule. Three people squished in there, not a whole lot of room. The space shuttle, much larger cockpit, you're comfortably seating in chairs, there's seven of you, and you're not so squished, and you're carrying lots of cargo in the cockpit as well as in the payload

Starting point is 00:36:56 bay. The other difference is not so intuitive, but that's in language. I mean, when I say it, you probably get it, but on the Soyuz, all the Czechosar in Russian, the people talking on the radio, it's all in Russian. The cockpit communication amongst the three of us are in Russian, displays the whole nine yards. And on the shuttle, and that's our second language. And for me, I'm okay at it, but it's still here. It's another level of effort to do the translation and then make sure you're doing the right action. In the shuttle, everything's in English, you're talking in English, it's your native tongue, so you don't have that extra layer of mental gymnastics that you're trying to do on top of it. So in that respect, I thought that it was

Starting point is 00:37:45 more challenging to fly in the Soyuz, but I also didn't have as prime of a role in the Soyuz as my two Cosmetic Crumies. So I had some tasks I knew them in the end of the language. When you were up on the space station this time, it was historic for a couple of reasons, and I want to tackle each one of them separately. I'm going to get to COVID in a second, but when you were the commander of the expedition, SpaceX did a very monumental flight that I knew you were looking forward to, but what some people who might be listening don't understand is that that is because one of the other astronauts who was on that SpaceX flight was actually a crewmate of yours on I think both your initial flight on the

Starting point is 00:38:33 space shuttle. I'm not Mike Braggd. Yeah so Doug Hurley and I were space shuttle crewmates on our both on our first mission each of our first first missions. And then his wife, he's married to an astronaut Karen Nyberg, she was my crewmate on my second mission to the space station. So yeah, very inter, our space careers are interwoven. So for those of us who are observing the space program and it's, you know, evolution now, what is the significance? You've seen this being the chief astronaut, you've seen it being an astronaut. What was the significance of that flight and that docking situation for you and seeing where the space program can go in the future?

Starting point is 00:39:17 Yeah. So in 2011, the space shuttle flew its final. And since then, so essentially for nine or 10 years, we have been in this situation where we've been 100% reliant on our Russian colleagues to get astronauts to space. So we NASA and the United States of America has to pay for each flight. And at the price of significant, it's, I think it's now about 80 million per person

Starting point is 00:39:47 paying that to our Russians for launch services. Now, since SpaceX is online and soon going, we can kind of wean off of that. We're not 100% out of it. In fact, I think in a couple of weeks, not a think, I know in a couple of weeks, another astronaut Mark Van Hyde is going to launch on a Russian. So he may be the last one, but we'll see. But anyways, nonetheless, we now have the capability to launch our people from Florida again on the US rocket. And folks might not realize this, but SpaceX and NASA,

Starting point is 00:40:27 when we were in the early agreements on trying to figure out how their vehicle would be operated, they'd think of it like a rental car versus a taxi. And if you take a taxi, the company provides the driver of the vehicle. If you take a rental car, you are the driver of the vehicle. And it's more of the rental car model for SpaceX. So SpaceX provides the capsule to the government, but the government provides the operators of the vehicle. So in this case, Bob Bankin and Doug Hurley were active NASA astronauts. They were the test pilots of this first base-space flight. So, with this now in place, where do you see the evolution of space flight now going? How long until you think we'll be paid a paper going to the moon and then Mars?

Starting point is 00:41:18 Did this being successful short-circuit that significantly? Yeah, people always ask me, is there a competition now between commercial companies like SpaceX and NASA? And absolutely not. It really will work in hand in hand with SpaceX's success. That allows really commercial companies to do more of the low-Earth orbit kind of operations. And then therefore, NASA can focus its energy, money,

Starting point is 00:41:44 and budget, manpower on getting to Mars and even sooner than that getting back to the moon and having a lunar gateway where, and so all of that is happening now. There was some thought that we'd do that in 2024, that's not going to happen that's too soon to the moon. And the economics of COVID definitely makes that even more of a challenge. So, so sometime in the 2020s is when we should be on the moon lunar surface. And then I would say it's probably like mid 2030s or late 2030s when we have the ability to get to the Mars surface of Mars. Just around on the corner? Is there on the corner? In many ways. So when you were about ready to go up last time,

Starting point is 00:42:29 one of the concepts I brought up to you was this thing that many astronauts experience called the overview effect that people have been talking about now for a few decades, where you kind of see the big picture when you're up there and put that into perspective because of your height. What I wanted to ask though is this time going up, you know, you launched right at the beginning of COVID and you were seeing a drastically different planet. I thought it was pretty

Starting point is 00:42:57 interesting because you had the Apollo 11 anniversary that happened, but it was kind of the reverse. You know, we were looking at them experiencing something amazing on the moon, whereas you're up in space looking down on an alien planet in many ways because of what it was happening. And I was wondering, did this trip have a different significance for you than the previous ones? It did, and there are several reasons why this one was most significant. COVID is an obvious one. I mean, I launched, I left Houston at the end of February. My wife and I hopped on a flight to Moscow. She came with, because we spend about six weeks, the six

Starting point is 00:43:42 weeks prior to launch in Moscow or not in Houston. And COVID, if you remember, was just starting to kind of make its way to the United States in that late February time frame. We arrived, we did a normal airport process and no effect, but very soon after that, all the flights started closing down and routing back home was an issue, and my wife wasn't sure if she would make it back if she stayed for the launch, and my launch guests family, close family and close friends weren't sure if they were going to come be able to come to Kazakhstan within weeks. that went away. She left and so I left the planet really as COVID was raging starting to rage and on the

Starting point is 00:44:32 bus ride to the launch pad it was just a technician and the crew and the bus driver at the launch pad there was hardly anybody there. Very very different type launch experience. But also, so that's the COVID part. But also, I had a different mindset independent of COVID, and that was this, it's my third mission could very likely be my last mission. And so I would have a viewpoint more of soaking it all in and savoring the experience because the other to previous two missions, I knew that or I had no intention of being done. I knew I wanted to fly more. And at this point in my career, you know, I was like, hey, it could be my last space flight.

Starting point is 00:45:18 It could be in my last space walk. Every so take advantage and cherish and embed these moments in my memory. So that was the bigger difference why this mission was different. So in your 17 years now, what has, if you could highlight the single most memorable moment that you had as being an astronaut, what would it be? Probably the moment, the hatch opened on my first space walk, right in the rocket on your first time is amazing, but there's nothing that you, I can't even put words to effect when you open the door and just your glass visor and you're looking down at Earth below you and in your outside and you know that there's been a great deal of effort to get you

Starting point is 00:46:04 to this point and you're part of a team that there's been a great deal of effort to get you to this point and you're part of a team that's repairing something or installing something new. But yet you're in this crazy crazy location that it doesn't make any sense to your brain like why are you there? This is not the place you should be. So that first moment of your first space walk. Well, and you have had some very interesting spacewalks. I remember one, in fact, where the person that you were doing it with had water, I remember correctly, a merge in this helmet. When you're faced with something like that, is that when your instincts from buds and being a seal and other things came into play, or are these things that you were training for?

Starting point is 00:46:44 came into play, or are these things that you were trained for? Yeah, I mean, everything, no matter what you're doing, it reverts back to training. And if you're experiencing something for the first time, you'll be slower to react. And just think about like putting a bicycle together for your kid on Christmas Eve. If you've got to do three of them, the first bicycle takes you three times as long by the second and third bicycle you can crank it up. And the same thing is true for training for space. That's why we train over and over and over for space blocks in the pool. We train over and over and over for malfunctions in the cockpit with the simulators. And when that that particular EVA happened,A happened, I can't remember the actions

Starting point is 00:47:28 that I did to get the hatch closed. It just, my hands just did it. And it's so weird even right now. I'm trying to think, how did I get the hatch? How did I move Luca out of the way? How did I swing the hatch closed? How did I get the hatch to be sealed without anything fouled in the seals? I can't remember. It just happened. And it happened because of iteration training, and it was just rope memorization. And maybe part of it too is, at that point, I like to think of it, like my whole career preparation enabled me to respond quickly and efficiently and do it, do it right. And that's the value of training.

Starting point is 00:48:07 What's interesting because when you talked to me about your mission to Afghanistan and I asked you about what was it like being in that situation, you gave the same answer. You said, I was there to do the mission right and I just relied on my training and it carried me through the successful completion of the mission. So it's very similar. So I guess what where I was leading this so the qualities

Starting point is 00:48:32 of being a successful steel, a successful astronaut are probably very similar to being a successful entrepreneur or leader if you're not even in one of those professions. And if there were one or two qualities, you would say are the most important. What would you tell the listener? Yeah, that's a good question. And it all boils back down to this concept of crew and team. Every member of your organization has value to add that they're there for that reason and to, and there's certainly times when a time critical decision needs to be made and someone, the leader needs to just execute the 80% plan now. And there's other times where consensus

Starting point is 00:49:15 and make the 80% plan into a 93% plan. But knowing when to do that, but just inherently understanding that every member of the organization has value to add and listen and incorporate, because you never know who's gonna have the best idea on an in-given day. And that's true, and the SEAL team is true and a cockpit of a spacecraft,

Starting point is 00:49:41 and it's true in the boardroom or your office place. And you have had a lot of success throughout your career, but do you think you would have had that success? Had you not faced adversity? Or do you think it's the adversity that helped define where you are today? I think as you go through adversity, it makes you more prepared for the next thing that you're going to encounter in life. Each building, each brick that's laid in who you are, makes you more your foundation more stable for the next thing. So I don't know to answer that if adversity makes me capable or it just makes me more able to handle the next thing.

Starting point is 00:50:22 I have probably the latter, probably the latter. I think of it as building blocks on the foundation to make you more robust to the next failure. Okay. And going back to your time and space, one of the questions that I forgot to ask was, is there any type of through-rest standard and if there is, do you actually get it?

Starting point is 00:50:42 Yeah, our lives on the space station are driven by this daily calendar and every day there's, you know, absolutely. You always have an eight hour sleep block in there and our culture is that you don't mess around with it. I mean, there are certainly some nights where you used to say up a little bit longer because you got some special project that you must get done for tomorrow. But, by and large, we take very seriously the concept of being well-rested and having some gas in the tank for the next time you got a surge. Because if

Starting point is 00:51:19 you're right at red lines all the time, you have no margin in your hip pocket to surge when you need to. So we're very strict about sleep and on Sunday is an unscheduled day like you just take Sundays in space and do it every one and call home, call friends and just chill out. That's great. So we're nearing the end and I've got a rapid round of questions for you here in a second, but I did want to ask, you know, for the listener out there who's bored and what they're doing, broken, battered, they're the, feel like they're an underdog in their life and they can't achieve the success that you have done in yours. What are three things that you would tell them that you credit are things that helped you get to where you are today and things that they could impact in

Starting point is 00:52:09 their own life? Well, I feel like I'm doing things each day that I like doing. That's one thing. I think I'm a person that likes organization and structure, like I like to have a thing that work in towards if it's physical fitness, I like to have a thing that work and towards if it's physical fitness, I like to have a race or an event that kind of has kept me focused. I notice that I'm in fact right now,

Starting point is 00:52:32 I don't have anything fitness-wise that's on my horizon. And it's a little unsettling that I don't have a routine in fitness just because we've done a few trips lately and haven't gotten back into the groove of it. So it's daily routine fitness and doing something that you like to do.

Starting point is 00:52:53 Those are probably the three things that keep me most focused when I have those things in my life. Okay, great. Well, are you ready for a rapid round of questions? Okay, let's do it. Okay. So the first one is Fruit or false is beef yaku soba with a cannon bar run your traditional pre-launch meal false

Starting point is 00:53:17 If you could meet anyone alive or dead who would it be and why maybeK, because I feel like my career in the SEAL teams is tied to him since it was his vision that sort of established the SEAL teams and his vision for space exploration is keeping me employed right now. OK. And on those lines, did anyone try and ever discourage you from becoming an astronaut? No.

Starting point is 00:53:44 OK. If you were to colonize a new planet, such as Mars, Did anyone try and ever discourage you from becoming an astronaut? No. Okay. If you were to colonize a new planet, such as Mars, and you could establish one law, having been an astronaut now for as long as you've been, what would it be? People that are but holes go back to Earth. Okay. And on those same lines, what do you consider as your kryptonite? Letting down the people that I care about and love. Okay. Now working backwards is there something that you learned from being a seal and

Starting point is 00:54:10 now astronaut that you wish you would have known when you were a metter junior officer? That seals and astronauts are no different than mids or junior officers. We just are in different stages of life. I mean by that I mean everybody's a person, everybody puts their pants on every morning, whether you're a four star admiral or a seeming recruit. Okay, great answer.

Starting point is 00:54:33 And if you could win any award, what would it be in one? I would win the Passion Struck podcast of the year. Ha ha ha ha. I have a question. You made me, you made me onto that, maybe on that one. One final question. What took more perseverance completing a day in Buds during Hell Week or completing the Iron Man Why? A day in Buds during Hell Week. Yeah, the Iron Man, I loved the actual race. And I didn't think of that as a grind.

Starting point is 00:55:07 The grind for the Iron Man was the six months of dedicated hardcore training leading up to it. So the actual day of the race was like eating cake and ice cream. It was just fun and the prize for doing the hard job. The day in hell week is just hard and there's no getting around it. Yeah. Well, the last episode that I released was actually about an Iron Man triathlete named Cindy

Starting point is 00:55:36 Hooper, who completed the Iron Man Whistler three months after getting pancreatic cancer whipple surgery and walled still in the middle of going through chemotherapy and radiation. It was very, it wasn't your typical, in any way, run. She's the first pancreatic cancer survivor or person who's been on chemotherapy to ever complete one, but it's a really good, emotional, good feeling story, if you have time. Oh, listen. Well, Chris, thank you story if you have time. Oh, listen. Well, Chris, thank you so much for taking the time to do this.

Starting point is 00:56:07 I know you're extremely busy, and I really appreciate your time today and the amazing career that you've had and representing all of us who your classmates have been able to handle me so well. Thank you so much. Thank you so much. You bet my pleasure has been great to know you too.

Starting point is 00:56:22 Thank you. Thank you so much, spending time with me today on this special episode, the Passion Start Podcast. And Chris, thank you so much for taking your time to share your passion journey with us here today. And I hope you got as much out of that episode as I did. Wow, was there a lot to unpack. From what it took inside to get through initially

Starting point is 00:56:45 the Naval Academy of Cresco and the Naval Academy going through buds and becoming a seal to face and combat and then becoming an astronaut and all the tips and lessons that he provided all along the way. The heartfelt thanks to all of you for continuing to support, watch and listen to this podcast where our aspiration is to make passion go viral. Until next time, watch, and listen to this podcast, where our aspiration is to make Passion Go viral. Until next time, thank you and keep on igniting your potential. Thank you so much for joining us. The purpose of our show is to make Passion Go viral.

Starting point is 00:57:17 And we do that by sharing with you the knowledge and skills that you need to unlock your hidden potential. If you want to hear more, please subscribe to the Passion Start podcast on Spotify, iTunes, Stitcher, or wherever you listen to your podcast at. And if you absolutely love this episode, we'd appreciate a five-star rating on iTunes, and you're sharing it with three

Starting point is 00:57:39 of your most growth-minded friends, so they can post it as well to their social accounts and help us grow our passion start community. If you'd like to learn more about the show and our mission, you can go to passionstruck.com where you can sign up for our newsletter, look at our tools, and also download the show notes for today's episode. Additionally, you can listen to us every Tuesday and Friday for even more inspiring content.

Starting point is 00:58:06 And remember, make a choice, work hard, and step into your sharp edges. Thank you again for joining us. you

Passion Struck with John R. Miles - Astronaut Chris Cassidy On The Importance in Life of Being Present EP 26

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