Self Doubt Isn't Rocket Science
By Eryn Swann
By Mikayla Lobasso; modeled by Kate Noel
When I was 7, I remember my whole Grade 2 class watched The Challenger Disaster documentary. It was projected on a blank classroom wall; the size of a movie theatre, large enough for all of us to witness every detail of one of the most horrific mistakes to be captured on television. For those that might not have had the fortune of being traumatised by watching this documentary at such a young age, I’ll summarize the events:
In 1986 NASA launched a space shuttle by the name of Challenger. Now, what was so revolutionary about Challenger was that NASA held a contest for civilian school teachers who wanted the chance of being the first ever teacher in space, without journeying on the traditional path aspiring astronauts take to accomplish their dream. Christa McAuliffe was the luckiest person in the world. She was selected as the chosen school teacher to board Challenger with fellow astronauts in hopes of achieving a once-in-a-lifetime feat, all while her schoolchildren and countless others watched on TV. Within 73 seconds of launching, the space shuttle suffered a chain-reaction of structural failures and exploded in the air, resulting in the deaths of all 7 people on board. This came to be known as the Space Shuttle Challenger Disaster and grounded the Space Shuttle Program.
Now what does all this have to do with self doubt and STEM? Well, after seeing this documentary, my entire class (including me) were crying; we were devastated at having watched such destruction of human lives, all in the name of exploration and endeavour. The teachers had no idea what to do until they made the wisest decision of all; showing us an hour’s worth of Asterix cartoons in hopes our little minds would forget what we had just seen. But while everyone else was suddenly entranced by the cartoon and all the crying had ceased, I began to wonder how on earth a corporation as massive as NASA, with some of the planet’s smartest people working there, could possibly let something like Challenger even happen. I’m aware there were problems before Challenger back in the Gemini and Apollo days, but to me, Challenger meant so much more. At 7 years old, I came to the realisation that even the smartest people in the world made mistakes. And so began my interest in space, rockets, and the dream career of most kids – astronaut!
Now, even though my interest was already peaked, my journey into the STEM field only occurred when I graduated from high school and chose to study Aerospace Engineering.
I expected to excel and feel at ease studying what I loved learning about. This was not the case at all, and I realised that within my first week. It was extremely rigorous – something that no one had mentioned. I found the things that I was supposed to be excited about learning so mundane as well as tremendously difficult. Teachers in school had always held my hand and reminded me when I had to hand up assignments and I could ask for help if I didn’t understand something because classroom sizes were quite small. Well, welcome to University, where your lecturer doesn’t care if you show up because you are 1 out of 400 students per class. Oh, and if you think you didn’t understand something, chances are about two thirds of the class didn’t understand either. But all this aside, what I found I struggled with most was doubting my ability in being able to pursue a career in STEM – not because I’m a woman – but because I doubted my own intelligence when everyone else around me seemed to succeed so effortlessly.
Nowadays, all I hear people talking about is that we need more women in STEM (and that’s absolutely true) and are pushing this idea to high schoolers and children. I don’t have a problem with this at all but what I found is that because women are the minority, currently, within this field, we feel as if we are competing against one another in order to stand out. I never once felt confident about myself at all, but my confidence never felt so low until I was surrounded by people who also faced the daunting task of standing out – in the minority. Suddenly I went from being the kid that always loved space and dreamed of building rockets to feeling like I didn’t belong in the very place I always saw myself in. Self-doubt is something I know many people, regardless of what you’re studying or have accomplished in life, face every day and entering the adult world is scary – extremely scary. These two seem to always go hand-in-hand as it’s the first time in your young life that you are on your own, in the real world, dealing with real problems and are expected to find real solutions; all on your own accord. To put this bluntly, there is no official solution for any of this. Eventually you will get more used to everyday adult life while juggling homework, stress, making new friends, losing old friends, all while finding your identity outside of school. It’s a tough part of life we will all undoubtedly go through.
The hardest things in life tend to be the most rewarding though. There will always be people who seem naturally gifted at everything they do and it seems like they never have to work hard to succeed in anything they set their minds to. But there’s a quote that I accidentally stumbled upon by Theodore Roosevelt and it certainly helped me put these thoughts into perspective and realise that life is just one giant lesson.
“Far better it is to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs even though checkered by failure, than to rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy nor suffer much because they live in the gray twilight that knows neither victory nor defeat.” – Theodore Roosevelt.
We are supposed to make mistakes and learn and grow from them, and do better the next time and keep failing until we achieve success. So never be disheartened by self-doubt and question your place among other people. Take things at your own pace and push through. You will eventually get there in the end and you will look back on the things you truly worked hard for and feel most proud about them.