Chris Hadfield Quotes

Decide in your heart of hearts what really excites and challenges you, and start moving your life in that direction. Every decision you make, from what you eat to what you do with your time tonight, turns you into who you are tomorrow, and the day after that. Look at who you want to be, and start sculpting yourself into that person. You may not get exactly where you thought you'd be, but you will be doing things that suit you in a profession you believe in. Don't let life randomly kick you into the adult you don't want to become.

Ultimately, leadership is not about glorious crowning acts. It's about keeping your team focused on a goal and motivated to do their best to achieve it, especially when the stakes are high and the consequences really matter. It is about laying the groundwork for others' success, and then standing back and letting them shine.

Focus on the journey, not on arriving at a certain destination.

I wasn’t destined to be an astronaut. I had to turn myself into one.

Every single day you're the result of what you did on the days prior.

Decide in your heart of hearts what really excites and challenges you, and start moving your life in that direction

There is no problem so bad that you cannot make it worse

Anticipating problems and figuring out how to solve them is actually the opposite of worrying: it's productive.

Remember, nobody changes the world on their own.

No one ever accomplished anything great sitting down.

In any new situation, whether it involves an elevator or a rocket ship, you will almost certainly be viewed in one of three ways. As a minus one: actively harmful, someone who creates problems. Or as a zero: your impact is neutral and doesn't tip the balance one way or the other. Or you'll be seen as a plus one: someone who actively adds value. Everyone wants to be a plus one, of course. But proclaiming your plus-oneness at the outset almost guarantees you'll be perceived as a minus one, regardless of the skills you bring to the table or how you actually perform.

Almost everything worthwhile carries with it some sort of risk.

Spaceflight isn't just about doing experiments, it's about an extension of human culture.

To me, it's simple: if you've got the time, use it to get ready. What else could you possibly have to do that's more important? Yes, maybe you'll learn how to do a few things you'll never wind up actually needing to do, but that's a much better problem to have than needing to do something and having no clue where to start.

Don`t let life randomly kick you into the adult you don`t want to become

In any field, it's a plus if you view criticism as potentially helpful advice rather than as a personal attack.

There's really just one thing I can control: my attitude during the journey, which is what keeps me feeling steady and stable, and what keeps me headed in the right direction. So I consciously monitor and correct, if necessary, because losing attitude would be far worse than not achieving my goal.

If you start thinking that only your biggest and shiniest moments count, you're setting yourself up to feel like a failure most of the time.

Competence means keeping your head in a crisis, sticking with a task even when it seems hopeless, and improvising good solutions to tough problems when every second counts. It encompasses ingenuity, determination and being prepared for anything.

As I have discovered again and again, things are never as bad (or as good) as they seem at the time.

When you have some skills but don't fully understand your environment, there is no way you can be a plus one. At best, you can be a zero. But a zero isn't a bad thing to be. You're competent enough not to create problems or make more work for everyone else. And you have to be competent, and prove to others that you are, before you can be extraordinary. There are no short-cuts, unfortunately.

My optimism and confidence come not from feeling I'm luckier than other mortals, and they sure don't come from visualizing victory. They're the result of a lifetime spent visualizing defeat and figuring out how to prevent it. Like most astronauts, I'm pretty sure that I can deal with what life throws at me because I've thought about what to do if things go wrong, as well as right. That's the power of negative thinking.

The cool things about space is when you put your pants on here, you can put them on two legs at a time.

Good leadership means leading the way, not hectoring other people to do things your way.

Every decision you make, from what you eat to what you do with your time tonight, turns you into who you are tomorrow and the day after that.