Australia's first astronaut Katherine Bennell-Pegg on why effort trumps talent
She's determined to inspire others
She was the first person to become an astronaut under the Aussie flag. So we asked this trailblazer everything.
You beat 22,500 other applicants to be one of six people to train at the European Astronaut Centre in Germany. What gave you the edge?
I’ve always pushed myself out of my comfort zone. Before I started astronaut training, I did internships at NASA, the European Space Agency and the Royal Australian Air Force. I think mental resilience is a learned trait. When you really strive for something, it’s important to remember it doesn’t always come easily. As an astronaut, your character is as important as your academics. In my opinion, effort is more important than talent.
What did you learn about your own character during astronaut training?
Astronauts are recruited for their ability to seek excellence, rather than perfection. Chasing perfection can lead to frustration and fear of failure when there are obstacles, whereas those that seek excellence aren’t unafraid of uncertainty, but thrive in it. It’s OK to make mistakes, to fail, to recover, and enjoy that process. I think this is the same whether you’re in space or on earth. Once I realised how important it is, I tried to hone this skill in all areas of my life.
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A Person With No Public Appeal'
Interviews with writers are now accepted as a discrete literary form, like rondeaus and villanelles, probably for the same reason people read the biographies of writers whose work they have never read. I suppose the Paris Review encouraged the trend starting in the Fifties by publishing an interview in each issue – T.S. Eliot! Evelyn Waugh! – and lending them further respectability by periodically collecting them between hard covers. The point of an interview is to encourage an impression of intimacy with people we are unlikely ever to meet, though most writers in my experience are not memorably articulate speakers. I’m not being a snob. If I admire and enjoy a writer, I will seek out and usually read his or her interview, just as I read the biographies of cherished writers. I have no problem with the higher gossip, so long as I don’t take it too seriously.
