David Bowie cover of “Space Oddity” filmed in space <\/a>that has more than 20 million views on Youtube)<\/em> I pulled out my phone in the middle of the packed restaurant during lunch and snapped a photo of the page to remember the quote.<\/p>\nWhen Col. Hadfield is asked about retiring from the space program on his return from his position as commander of the ISS by reporters he writes, “Endings don’t have to be emotionally wrenching if you believe you did a good job and you’re prepared to let go.”<\/p>\n
Col. Hadfield spent his entire life preparing to be an astronaut. As a young child, he remembers witnessing the moon landing and declaring then and there he was going to be an astronaut, even will the full knowledge that Canada didn’t have a space agency. His entire life was orientated towards that one goal, being in space. At the age of 53, Col. Hadfield has gone to space 3 times, spent a total of 166 days orbiting the earth and 14 hours in space walks.<\/p>\n
If he counted success in a different way, he’d writes he’d must certainly be let down. Instead, he viewed very accomplishment as a small success. Life is so much more interesting with a continued presence of small successes and miracles than one huge failure.<\/p>\n
It occurred to me the other day, that the best thing we can do when we say goodbye, move on or find ourselves on a different path is to make sure that we’re satisfied with what you you’ve done and how you did it. We are all called to be witnesses to the Gospel and the love of Christ to the world whether through our personal lives, professional opportunities and all of our actions with others no matter how small.<\/p>\n
From Paul we hear in Acts 20:24, “My only aim is to finish the race and complete the task the Lord Jesus has given me – the task of testifying to the good news of God’s grace.”<\/em><\/p>\nThat’s better than a “cliche” any day.<\/p>\n
![\"Finish](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.austincnm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/01\/acnm1.png?resize=300%2C200\")
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
There are cliches and overused quotes for every occasion in life. In high school, our English teachers would caution us against using cliches in our writing. For starters, they’re sometimes hard to understand for someone who has never heard them before. How do you explain to someone that while an apple a day may help… [Read More]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":62,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[4],"tags":[2169,2172,2171,2170],"class_list":{"0":"post-43577","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-blog","7":"tag-acts-2024","8":"tag-an-astronauts-guide-to-living-on-earth","9":"tag-col-chris-hadfield","10":"tag-moving-on","11":"entry","12":"has-post-thumbnail"},"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":41875,"url":"https:\/\/atxcatholic.com\/index.php\/2013\/10\/pope-francis-and-parenthood\/","url_meta":{"origin":43577,"position":0},"title":"5 Things Pope Francis Can Teach Parents About Parenthood – Part 1 of 6","author":"Trey and Stephanie Cashion","date":"October 9, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"Pope Francis has taught us quite a bit about parenthood. \u00a0In word and deed and in just the first six months as \"Papa\", his words and his actions have taught us and can teach any parent something about raising children. \u00a0Today, we'd like to share some of what we've learned\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Column"","block_context":{"text":"Column","link":"https:\/\/atxcatholic.com\/index.php\/category\/acnm\/column\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Pope Francis and Holy Spirit","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.austincnm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/07\/Pope-Francis-and-HS-300x221.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":7632,"url":"https:\/\/atxcatholic.com\/index.php\/2011\/11\/the-required-remember-to-give-thanks-post\/","url_meta":{"origin":43577,"position":1},"title":"The Required “Remember To Give Thanks” Post","author":"Brandon Kraft","date":"November 23, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"We're neck deep with family here at La Casa de Kraft. My mom is the sole representative of my family in for the holiday. My wife's family includes her parents, her grandmother, a cousin in the military in San Antonio for training, an aunt, an uncle and a few more\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Blog"","block_context":{"text":"Blog","link":"https:\/\/atxcatholic.com\/index.php\/category\/acnm\/blog\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":40161,"url":"https:\/\/atxcatholic.com\/index.php\/2013\/06\/the-call-behind-the-silence\/","url_meta":{"origin":43577,"position":2},"title":"The Call Behind the Silence","author":"Matt Sullivan","date":"June 20, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"One unfortunate artifact of the technological mindset of our age is that we are uncomfortable with what we cannot grasp.\u00a0 Silence makes us uneasy because it makes us aware of a certain emptiness inside ourselves.\u00a0 So we fill our lives with noise and distractions - television, games, music, frivolous shopping.\u00a0\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Faith"","block_context":{"text":"Faith","link":"https:\/\/atxcatholic.com\/index.php\/category\/acnm\/blog\/faith-blog\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Picture courtesy of commons.wikimedia.org.","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.austincnm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/06\/stars2.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":40992,"url":"https:\/\/atxcatholic.com\/index.php\/2013\/08\/setting-your-family-ablaze-part-5-of-5-evangelization\/","url_meta":{"origin":43577,"position":3},"title":"Setting Your Family Ablaze – Part 5 of 5 – Evangelization","author":"Trey and Stephanie Cashion","date":"August 1, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"The last key to setting your family ablaze is to embrace the call to evangelization, \"that is, the proclamation of Christ by word and testimony of life\" (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 905).\u00a0 For most Catholics, this seems to be the hardest one to embrace.\u00a0 Faith and Integration, the first\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Column"","block_context":{"text":"Column","link":"https:\/\/atxcatholic.com\/index.php\/category\/acnm\/column\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Bonfire","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.austincnm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/10\/mini_500_10882_123826151651710-300x225.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":78266,"url":"https:\/\/atxcatholic.com\/index.php\/2015\/01\/martha-on-the-wall\/","url_meta":{"origin":43577,"position":4},"title":"Martha on the Wall","author":"Adam Shaivitz","date":"January 21, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"Some of us are Marthas, and some of us are Marys. For me, the writing -- or at least the picture -- was on the wall. I had never given too much thought into Luke's story about Martha welcoming Jesus and associates into her home, getting right to work serving\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Faith"","block_context":{"text":"Faith","link":"https:\/\/atxcatholic.com\/index.php\/category\/acnm\/blog\/faith-blog\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/lh6.googleusercontent.com\/-ZuDT8irVUo8\/VLJp3AXrXCI\/AAAAAAAAB5I\/C8qggR76Fko\/s500\/Photo%25252020150111061725637.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":41538,"url":"https:\/\/atxcatholic.com\/index.php\/2013\/09\/remember\/","url_meta":{"origin":43577,"position":5},"title":"I remember…","author":"Lauren Gulde","date":"September 11, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"I was pregnant and tired, sleeping in on that Tuesday morning, since my firstborn was still resting in her crib. I ached, my head hurt and I felt I could sleep another 10 hours straight. But the phone kept ringing in the kitchen. And there were voices on the answering\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "ACNM"","block_context":{"text":"ACNM","link":"https:\/\/atxcatholic.com\/index.php\/category\/acnm\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"i remember september 11","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.austincnm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/09\/iremember-630x472.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/atxcatholic.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43577","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/atxcatholic.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/atxcatholic.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atxcatholic.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/62"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atxcatholic.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=43577"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/atxcatholic.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43577\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/atxcatholic.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=43577"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atxcatholic.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=43577"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atxcatholic.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=43577"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}