Artemis II And The Question Every Dreamer Must Answer | Episode 474

Artemis II And The Question Every Dreamer Must Answer | Episode 474

A Moon launch has a way of making you feel like a kid again and also forcing you to face what you are actually afraid of. I’m watching Artemis II lift off and suddenly I’m back in that old dream of wanting to be an astronaut, back in the reality of what space training costs, and back in the bigger question: what do we do when something we love collides with fear, anxiety, or the limits of our own bodies?

We talk through what Artemis II is, why this mission matters for the future of NASA’s Artemis program, and what it means to circle the Moon and travel over the far side. I share memories of visiting Kennedy Space Center and seeing a shuttle launch from a distance, plus the little details people forget like the rocket angle change, the plume you see at liftoff, and how tightly planned launch trajectories are. And yes, we even touch the very human side of spaceflight, including a reported toilet malfunction and why redundancy and safety planning matter when you are in a sealed spacecraft.

Then the conversation turns personal: claustrophobia, agoraphobia, dizziness, and anxiety. If four astronauts are living in a dorm-room-sized space for ten days, what does that stir up in us? I reflect on how my own symptoms show up, how a past car accident makes me wonder about untreated injuries and trauma, and why mental health awareness often comes later than the events that shaped us. The takeaway is simple and tough: try looking fear in the eye, take one step, and see what changes.

If this resonated, subscribe to the show, share it with someone who needs it, and leave a review so more people can find Voices for Voices. What did you want to be when you grew up, and what fear are you ready to challenge now?

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Chapter Markers

• 0:00 Welcome And How To Support
• 2:39 Childhood Dream Of Being Astronaut
• 4:41 Space Camp Cost And G-Force Fear
• 9:14 Artemis II Launch With My Daughter
• 11:28 How Rockets Launch And What You See 
• 12:23 Seeing A Shuttle Launch In Florida
• 17:20 Artemis II Mission Plan Explained
• 19:40 Moon Landing Doubts And Questions
• 25:40 Claustrophobia And Closed Quarters
• 29:30 A Car Accident And Anxiety Links
• 33:42 Malfunctions In Space And Redundancy
• 36:43 What Did You Want To Be
• 39:32 How Space Can Unite People
• 40:16 Look Fear In The Eye And Try
• 42:48 Final Support Requests And Closing

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Transcript

Welcome And How To Support

Voices for Voices, Justin Alan Hayes 0:01

Hi everyone, it's Justin here of Voices for Voices. Thank you so much for joining us, whether you're watching, whether you're listening, whether you've been with us from the beginning, or that this is your first show. We are growing rapidly, and it's only because of you that we're able to do so. Um where we have this huge goal of wanting to reach and help at least three billion people over the course of my lifetime and beyond. And it's only going to happen with with uh with your help. And uh we we thank you. If you can give us a big thumbs up, like, follow, subscribe, share, that'll help us greatly. It'll also help us greatly if you reach out to 25, 50, 100 contacts in your phones and and let them know about Voices for Voices and Voices for Voices TV show and podcast. Voices for Voices is a 501c3 nonprofit charity organization. Uh all donations, all book sales uh can be written off here in the United States when you do your taxes, as we uh as as we are a charity, uh you're able to uh write off uh those uh those donations. Uh they're federally uh tax deductible here in the United States, and we are reaching countries all across the world, cities all across the world. So just check with who your tax uh preparer is and and see if it is the same uh when uh uh in in your country. So thank you so much for being with us. And if you do want to make a donation, you're able to. Uh you can you can do that on the cash app, you can do that on Venmo, and you can also do it at lovevoices.org. Lovevoices.org. That's lovevoices.org. So thank you again, as we have to say, because we don't have a show without listeners or viewers. Uh, we're gonna talk about we're gonna talk about space, we're gonna talk about the moon, we're gonna talk about spaceships in this uh uh episode. I don't know how I don't know about you or people that are are are close to you about you know as you're as you grew up and are as you are growing up and continue to to grow up how many how many of have you when asked what would you like to do when you get older? Right? You know, we're uh when we're when we're small children, we have a limited view of the world, and for me when I was growing up, I wanted to be an astronaut, I wanted to go to space, I wanted uh to maybe go to a different planet, maybe also go to the moon, and so growing up that was one one thing that I wanted to do, and so much so that I remember vaguely uh my sister, she was on a travel softball team, and there was a I think there was a tournament in South Carolina or Alabama or near there, and we had, I believe it was either at our hotel or it was at you know a welcome center or a rest stop, you know, where you have to go in and use the bathroom and and that is uh you know, when you're traveling long distances, you know, keeping that blood flow. Uh, but there was information about one of the space centers that was in Huntsville, Alabama, and then there was within that packet of information, there was information about space camp. And I I grew up with everything that I needed and more. And even at that, the price tag of traveling to Huntsville, Alabama to go through this space camp where nothing was nothing was gonna be guaranteed. It wasn't like, well, if you go to this base camp, you'll be able to be an astronaut. There's so many years that goes into training, preparation, and then there's so many astronauts that they go through the same preparation and training, and they're not selected for a particular mission to fly at that time on the space shuttle uh vehicles. Um and so yeah, there was there was no no guarantee, and again, we had everything we needed and more, but the the cost was just so so much. And and I remember one of the pictures was of one of the things that they they do. So they show I don't know that they showed like you know, you know, deep sea, you know, where you you put on all the you know, like the scuba gear, and then you know, you're fixing things underwater to give that feeling of you know the gravity and stuff and in in space. Uh but there was another photo, and this one I remember vividly, it was kind of like your feet and your legs are uh I'll say like strapped in, and then this machine would basically simulate like these the G forces, I guess, uh, of how it affects the body, how it affects the stomach, and and so it it was going forwards and then sideways and then backwards, and and I I I don't remember the amount of time that uh the particular brochure said that you did that. But I remember looking at that and go, oh my gosh, I was excited to see that, but then there was a part of me like, oh my gosh, like I could be one of the people that throw up on this this particular part, um, just because it was like once it was shown, like it was a static picture in the brochure, but then doing more research and finding a video of how it operated, how it operates. And so that was one thing on top of others that kind of like got me you know thinking like five times. Um and that was honestly a parting thought because the decision, like I just wasn't gonna be able to afford it. If we weren't gonna be able to afford it, like it was just a lot of money. And so I was like, well, maybe I can get one of the space suits, not the ones that they wear in space, but you know, the one you see them walking to and from different test things where like I don't know, some of them are or like all orange, and then have you know the the the different logos of you know whether it's NASA or SpaceX or uh whoever is uh is is uh you know putting that mission together. So I bring this together because Artemis II so Artemis II took off from Merritt Island in Florida earlier in the week that we're filming this. And I remember remember having you know, it was on TV, uh, so we had it on. Hey my daughter, we were I was I was watching, she was semi-watching, she was doing what kids do, playing, and uh and so I was like, hold on, hold on, there's gonna be a spaceship that takes off. And lucky for us, it did. And so I was like, I I was able to get her to to stop just to see because it's a big deal, uh for this this this uh this particular mission because they were taken off with one of the biggest rockets that has ever ever been used on like a space shuttle, a space vehicle. Um so right, there's all kind of safety concerns for the astronauts for uh it it it's amazing. Like stuff that I'd learn over the years is when you see the uh space vehicle take off, like go straight up, basically, especially at the for quite a bit, and then it starts going at an angle, and when it gets into outer space and it gets into orbit, all that. Um but if you've seen any pictures or photos of the space vehicle taken off, and you see what looks like it's all this smoke that's uh being forced out of the engines and over and up. And I found out multiple years ago, uh, but when I was younger, we went to Kennedy Space Center. There wasn't a launch near uh near the time we were gonna be there, but we were you know, we went on, and I wish we had phones with you know cameras, uh, because we were doing the old-fashioned way with the old Kodak, you know, one picture at a time, and and and so we did uh a tour of kind of you know the launch pad and as close as we could get. There were like I said, there's no space shuttle or space vehicle that was close, so there was nothing like that that we could see that was live. Um so that was when I was younger, and then I went to say like I was in my mid-20s, probably mid to late 20s. Uh went on a cruise with a couple of my buddies at the time, and we were leaving out of the Jacksonville port. Uh and it, I mean, any we couldn't have planned it any better because where we were at, so we flew down the day before in case, right, like something happens with bad weather with the planes, you don't want to miss like a cruise, you know, get you know, put a lot of money into any any type of trip, but a cruise is what we were going on, and so we flew down the day before, and as we were getting closer to the dates and closer to flying down um that that day before, there were still NASA was still flying the shuttles, and given where we were gonna be at in Jacksonville, we were gonna be able to see the the launch, the takeoff. Uh I remember very little about that. Number one, because I still wasn't on the track of taking care of my mental health, and so I was drinking alcohol. Uh, but it wasn't that wasn't the reason why the only reason why I couldn't see because the space vehicle right had uh or the space shuttle, it had the vehicle that the astronauts were in was white, and the rocket boosters that were white, and then the external fuel tank that was orange. So I can't remember if we were able to see, but there was gonna be a literally a liftoff that day before our cruise, and so we went to eat at a restaurant, and we were able to see the launch, and so like I said, I can't quite remember if we're able to see that you know the colors, like I said, of the um you know, the external fuel tank, the rocket boosters, and and the shuttle, if we were able to see the colors, uh, but it we're able to see you know the what would have been I guess the fuel burn, and and so like if you watch an airplane, you know, on Earth, and you look up and you see, and sometimes you can see like a trail behind it. And so we were able to see the trail in it for at least a few seconds, and it went up, and then because you had to be you had to be looking in the right direction, uh, because everything is down to a T scientifically of the Earth's rotation, getting into the right orbit, of how they're able to circle the Earth so quickly. Uh anyway, so I was able to experience that. So that was I was probably the closest in person. Uh, and again, I we we weren't at the the Space Center for that, but we were able to actually see it like as if we were sitting on a deck and looking up and seeing you know, a trail and and saying, okay, yeah, that that is an airplane, and and see, you know, it kind of moving along. So I'm just bringing all these things and all these like memories together to again earlier this week when we're we're filming this, it's earlier in the week that happened. So my daughter stuff she was doing, and we're watching it, and I was like, you know, that's been quite a while that there's been this type of uh uh this this type of a launch uh with this type of again, it's a new rocket, there are people on board. There's been a lot of uh lot of tests that went into each bit of equipment, probably tens of hundreds of uh tests, and these astronauts were were there and and they're still there. It's a ten I think they said it's a ten-day trip, but it's called Artemis II, A-R-T-E-M-I-S, and then the numbers two, and they use the Roman numerals, which look like the look like the capital I. Oh. And so it kind of looks like all because like if you had like that's the I, but then you have you know the the lines at the the horizontal lines at the top and the bottom, and and so that's what the the patch that's on the spacesuits are, you know that yeah, we're all humanity, we're all humans, and so it was cool to watch the takeoff, and so it's a 10-day mission, and they're not gonna land on the moon, they're gonna circle them the moon, and they're actually gonna go on the opposite side of the moon, which is the dark side of the moon, and it seems like from what I'm gathering, that no nobody's done that yet, at least with human eyes, you know, they may have had unmanned vehicles, and then I'm I'm not sure at the earlier flights when they did land on the moon how or why they couldn't go on the dark side of the moon, and maybe it was probably because there's been advancements and different types of rockets and uh you know having X extra energy, I guess you would say, like to be able to, you know, propel the space vehicle around the totality of of the moon on the on the dark side. And so kind of that I heard uh talking about how the astronauts and the space vehicle is gonna use the moon's gravity to propel it around the the dark side of the moon and then come back and have the trajectory be to Earth and then land. It might be a splashdown, I think. Uh because the space shuttles years ago when they had a space shuttle program, uh the space shuttle would it's very bulky and not only were the solid rocket white solid white rocket boosters after the space shuttle took off after a certain amount of time they've burned all their and all their fuel, and so then they release and they go into the ocean or the Gulf of Mexico, and then the same thing with the uh orange external fuel tank. And and so what's left is the space vehicle with with the uh the astronauts in in in in there. Uh so that's uh that's what the 10 days is, and so back again with the space shuttle, it landed like an airplane, so you know, with the tires coming down, the landing gear, but I believe it's gonna be a splashdown. Meaning it's once the astronauts in the in this the the the the part of the um space vehicle that returns to Earth, it's gonna splash down, and then there's uh you know recovery teams that are you know they'll know exactly when and where have a good idea or to position themselves so that they can they can uh retrieve the uh the space vehicle and then obviously then retrieve the astronauts and it's gonna it's gonna be uh uh an interesting time. I I I I don't know. It's probably Already been laid out there, what time day and time, and I'm sure there's a window depending on the weather, because I mean the I forget how many thousands of miles an hour miles per hour did the spaceship when it took off and it launched from Earth, it got up to 2,000 miles an hour. It was the last number I heard. I just remember like shaking my head, like that is just incredible to be going that fast. And so it makes sense why there's so much training that goes on, and I don't know how the selection process goes, uh, but there's a lot of a lot of astronauts that uh again go through all the training and that, and some of them are training for future missions. I think Artemis III, so Artemis II is what's what what uh what took off and what we're talking about now. So they're gonna go to the around the moon, go to the light side and the dark side of the moon, and then come back. They're not gonna land on the moon. Artemis III, I don't know if it's gonna be a manned or unmanned trip, and I think that one might land on the moon. Don't quote me, and then I think it's either Artemis four or five that is slated to take astronauts to actually go back to the moon and land. And I know there's all kinds of conspiracy theorists out there. I don't I don't know. I mean, from what I've seen about the landing on the moon and that, I mean, I don't I guess I don't understand. I know it takes a lot of money and uh to do things, so I'm not acting I'm I'm not giving NASA a break or anything. I I just find I find it hard to believe that the technology, the money that was spent, and we put people on the face of the moon, you know, in the one one video, I think they're driving like like basically space car you know, planning the you know, the US flag there, and I don't know. I mean, there has to be some reasoning why we we haven't done that again until I mean shoot the 19 was it the 1960s, 1970s when that happened. So we're talking like 50 years, and so is it like well we did it one time, so that's it? Um I don't that's that's for another day. So what I really want to talk about, and I know we're quite a bit into the show, is how claustrophobia somebody's claustrophobic, and I've I'm just gonna know starting to notice things more and more about my myself, and I do have I think a bit of claustrophobia, and if you're if you want to be an astronaut, the the size of the space that they have during their 10-day mission is a space is a size, so there's four or four astronauts, and the size of the space that they're living and and doing experiments and doing what they do uh is the size of a dorm room, and when you think of you know the stat size and then being that close 24 hours a day for the duration of the the mission, I don't I know I couldn't do that, and so not only did that you know that machine, you know, kind of testing out like if you know all the g forces and and and the dizziness I talked about at the beginning of the show, uh but the claustrophobic that I think that that's part of why I'm so maybe so introverted most of the time is that I just kind of I don't I guess not not curl up like a not curl up, but I I just come into myself and it's when I see if I'm in a building that there's high ceilings or if the weather's nice, uh being able to go outside and not be super close to a lot of people. Um so claustrophobic phobic, I think agoraphobic is something similar about, but I think that one's about being in large crowds. So I've got a little bit of I got a little bit of everything going on, uh, you know, being claustrophobic and agoraphobic uh in in particular situations. And again, we can we can change as as humans uh over time of uh how how we are like I haven't gone on a roller coaster in a long time. Uh I used to love going on roller coasters, and I'm not even talking about like finding out like ones when they malfunction and that, but just in general, I'm like um I'm I'm worried that like my dizziness is gonna like come back. And I don't I don't know when I was in when I was in Houston, Texas, living for a couple of years. Uh you know, they have for those of you who live live down in Houston, and you know, there's the U-turns and that. Well, here where I live, we don't have U-turns, so I'm not you I I didn't grow up driving with them. Excuse me. And so I got into an accident when I first moved down there where I was in I think the center lane or the right lane, and I needed to be all the way to the left lane, and I needed to do a U-turn because where we were going was you had to be on the other side of the road. And where I live now, you just go, there's usually a middle lane, and you put your turn signal on, and then you turn left there, or you turn at a traffic light, not a U-turn. So I wasn't used to it, and and so I got an accident because I I saw that I needed to get over last minute. I don't even know if I put my turn signal on again. This is many years ago, it's already it's water under the bridge at this point. But what I'm bringing this up is I don't know if I had any whiplash or anything because I uh or my car got hit from the back and it kind of jolted me forward. And so I never I didn't go to the any medical or anything to get checked out, and so I don't know if that played a part of a certain part of my life of not getting that treated, if there was to get something medically treated. Uh but that happened and then how big of a you know how big of a how big of a part did that play in you know potential not a whip whiplash, but uh traumatic brain injury, you know, like did my brain move and uh you know neurologists and that have better terminology in that. I'm just talking about like did my brain move just a little bit or um and then again that bring back trauma and did that did that lead to increased anxiety or acute anxiety that now that I've been diagnosed with? Uh I don't know. I it I didn't have any tests done at that time, and so everything now it's been many years. Oh, I think it's been 15 years or so, 14, 15 years, and so kind of dealing then dealing with the aftermath and thinking about this uh you know the the uh the spacecraft and Artemis 2 and the 10-day trip going around uh circling the moon, going on the dark side for the first time for humans, uh the astronauts, uh you know, being in closed quarters versus being with a lot of people uh and feeling sometimes the same anxiety, same feelings, the you know, the sweaty palms and feeling a little bit dizzy or feeling like I might pass out. Uh all these things came to mind when the space vehicle when they they they launched. Um and so we hope that they would the astronauts return safe. Hope that whatever information, whatever experiments, uh testing that they're doing, uh, that everybody's you know safe and and secure. Uh I did see that there was, I don't know, it was a malfunction with the toilet.

SPEAKER_01 33:49

Um I I'm not sure exactly what was going on there. And I'm in a space vehicle circling the moon.

Voices for Voices, Justin Alan Hayes 34:09

I mean you can, uh but the mission would probably have to be cut in really, really, really short. Uh they'd have to abort part of the mission if they weren't able to get that fixed. But uh there's probably redundancies that if this doesn't work, if the toilet doesn't work this way, maybe there's an alternative way.

SPEAKER_01 34:37

I don't know.

What Did You Want To Be

How Space Can Unite People

Look Fear In The Eye And Try

Final Support Requests And Closing

Voices for Voices, Justin Alan Hayes 34:42

Um, but when you know you're spending a lot of money to do these things, uh having redundancies in case I mean let's say you have something and it needs two batteries, and you have two batteries, and let's say it can work on one battery, one good battery, and so it it works only until the one battery is if we find out that the second battery is not working, then we say, okay, is this something that we need to fix? Like we need to get another battery before we can even think about playing this toy, whatever it is, uh, or can we continue? And so there's you know, the science behind all that, uh physics, all kind of you know, gravity, stuff that's just way over my head. That I I just heard about the toilet, it kind of made me chuckle a little bit. Uh but I believe they did get it fixed that they got what whatever they needed fixed. I don't know if it was the handle, I don't know if it was, I don't know. Uh so there's things like that that you kind of chuckle a little bit, chuckle a little bit, however, you want everybody to be safe and and as comfortable as possible in that confined space. So anybody watching and listening, maybe throw throw in the comments what you wanted to do when you grew up, when when you were young, when you first you know, kind of came to it with you know thinking and going, oh, that's really cool. Like, I want to be a baseball player, I want to I want to play hockey, I I want to do this and be an astronaut with the understanding that a super small percentage get picked to be astronauts and an even super smaller amount. Four people, four, probably hundreds of astronauts, four got selected. So we'll definitely be watching in our household uh as long as it's not like in the middle of the night uh for them to you know for them to you know re-enter the Earth's atmosphere and for they circled and seen what's on the dark side of the moon. Who knows? Uh maybe a light, I don't know, maybe maybe there's maybe there's glow sticks on the other side. I have no idea what's on the other side. Uh maybe half of the supposed dark side of the boon is all dark, and maybe half isn't. I don't know. That's that's part of what they're doing or why they're doing what they're doing. Uh so be so it'll be interesting again. This is Artemis 2. Uh you know, NASA, there's so many partners. Uh it's not just a United States effort. There's uh you know, our viewers and listeners, there's uh a lot of parts, a lot, a lot of knowledge, uh sharing between countries, and uh kind of got the chills, like I'm getting the chills now of you know everybody. I don't say everybody, but a lot of people watch, you know, the the the lift off and are gonna be watching the splashdown. And it's something I think that can bring us all together because again, it's not every day that uh a spaceship takes off from Earth and is doing what it what it what it's what it's doing. I mean it it's um so cool, even now at 44, because it's been so many years uh sense kind of this ambition and like the Elon Musk you know talking about wanting to go to Mars and have people live on Mars. Uh that'd be super cool too if I'm around to see that, or if that's a possibility, but it's one of those things, like he said, like Elon Musk said, whether you love them, you hate them, whatever. Uh we can be afraid of things, and there are things that make us afraid. But he said a lot of a lot of people get afraid in their mind, and they don't actually like look at the fear in the eye. He said if if you look at fear in the eye, it usually goes away because there's you know, we're standing up to the fear, we're looking at it, going, you know what? I think I can do whatever, whatever the thing that I'm fearful of. And so maybe we take take a little bit of that thought process of yeah, there's a lot of things that are and can be fearful a lot. But why don't we if we're able to, why don't we look fear in the eye of that thing and go, I I can do this. I don't have to be afraid. Or I could do half of what I'm afraid of. And what you thought of like, I never thought I could do that. So all I gotta say is try. Give it a try. I gave Voices for Voices a try. Those astronauts they did they took all their training and uh all that seriously. They gave it a try. They could have thought, oh, there's no way that I'm gonna be picked to be an astronaut to be on a mission to actually go you know up into space, so I'm just not gonna try. If you have the ways and the means, and that's something you want to do, try. Give it a shot. Maybe it works, maybe it doesn't. But let's try spending maybe uh a little less time being afraid and more time trying. So thank you for watching and listening. It's been a great episode. Thumbs up, like, follow, subscribe, share, reach out to 25, 50, 100, 1000 contacts on your phone. Let them know about the Voices for Voices TV show and podcast. Let them know that we're based in mental health, mental challenges, trauma, uh, recovery, substance abuse, traumatic brain injuries, uh, so much. And so all that is embedded in every single show and every single thing, our books, our audio, our records, music, so much more. And if you're able to head over to Venmo or Cash Out, send a dollar our way. We're a 501c3 nonprofit charity, and we have over 470 episodes of the Voices for Voices TV show and podcast. I promise you at least 50 episodes will hit your in the wheelhouse of a topic, a person. I know it. And we're going to be hitting 500, and we're going to be continuing through 500. We're going to go straight through the number 500. And then we're going to do 501, and then we're going to do as many as God wants us to do. So let's celebrate all the voices of the world. And let's be a voice for ourselves. And there may be somebody that we know that isn't able to share their voice. That we can share their voice for them or help them. So take care. Love you or thinking about you. And we'll see you on the next episode of the show. Bye bye for now. See you later.