# From NASA Engineer to Blue Origin Astronaut and CEO

An episode of [Earn Your Leisure](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/1450211392), 28 Jul 2026, 6:39.

Audio: https://podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/traffic.omny.fm/d/clips/e73c998e-6e60-432f-8610-ae210140c5b1/8dbc4f54-a337-4481-9ef2-b355012b0a3d/442970ee-724c-40ff-a760-b495018a4708/audio.mp3?utm_source=Podcast&in_playlist=eac4c628-29cb-469a-b5c8-b355012b0a48

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## Transcript

[0:00] Speaker 1: So how is it for you to be a go
[0:02] Speaker 1: from being an employee to being an entrepreneur?
[0:06] Speaker 2: You know, I feel like my strength in this situation
[0:11] Speaker 2: is knowing that there's so much that I don't know.
[0:15] Speaker 2: Like when I was an employee, when I would go
[0:17] Speaker 2: to work every day, all I wanted to do was
[0:19] Speaker 2: be respected for the things that I know. And as
[0:23] Speaker 2: an entrepreneur, all I want to do is go out
[0:25] Speaker 2: and speak to people and tell them that I don't
[0:27] Speaker 2: know right, so that I can be made better by
[0:30] Speaker 2: the things that they know. That is my goal, just
[0:35] Speaker 2: be able to listen and support and have people improve
[0:39] Speaker 2: the things that I create.
[0:41] Speaker 3: That's not on the personal level as an entrepreneur, but
[0:43] Speaker 3: you're also the CEO, yeah, and so there's people that
[0:47] Speaker 3: are relying on you for their leadership. So walking into
[0:50] Speaker 3: that role, how's the dynamics been for you? You know?
[0:54] Speaker 2: Like I shifted when he asked me that question, because
[0:57] Speaker 2: the question really strikes at home because I spent so
[1:00] Speaker 2: many years as a woman professional just wanting to be
[1:03] Speaker 2: seen as being good enough. And when I let go
[1:07] Speaker 2: of that, I realized that my strength is being authentic
[1:11] Speaker 2: and being empathetic. And when I took a step back.
[1:15] Speaker 2: I was crowding out the sun because I was trying
[1:17] Speaker 2: to always lead and be strong in all this other stuff.
[1:20] Speaker 2: And so when I said to the team for both businesses,
[1:25] Speaker 2: I want to make space for you to bring your gifts,
[1:28] Speaker 2: that's really when I started to see exponential growth. So
[1:31] Speaker 2: I have this concept of eighty twenty. You hire somebody
[1:34] Speaker 2: eighty percent for the things on the resume that you
[1:36] Speaker 2: know that they can that they can do, and the
[1:39] Speaker 2: twenty percent that they can bring to the table that
[1:41] Speaker 2: you haven't discovered yet, and you cultivate that person and
[1:44] Speaker 2: they will take you to places that you never you
[1:48] Speaker 2: never knew that you would go.
[1:50] Speaker 1: So let's talk about going to space. So what is
[1:55] Speaker 1: the program that you're going out of space? How did
[1:57] Speaker 1: you get involved in that? And are you just going
[2:01] Speaker 1: up coming back down? Is there observation that you're going
[2:04] Speaker 1: to be doing when you're up, Like what's happening with
[2:06] Speaker 1: that situation?
[2:07] Speaker 2: So I'm going to be flying to space on the
[2:09] Speaker 2: new Shepherd vehicle with Blue Origin. We will be coming
[2:12] Speaker 2: up and we will be coming back down.
[2:15] Speaker 1: And I'm excited about how long will you be out
[2:16] Speaker 1: of space?
[2:17] Speaker 2: The total trip, so the round trip is roughly, I
[2:21] Speaker 2: don't know, less than an hour, and it's about ten
[2:24] Speaker 2: minutes of microgravity.
[2:26] Speaker 1: Ten minutes out of space, yes, twenty five twenty minutes
[2:30] Speaker 1: coming up, ten minutes out of space, and twenty minutes
[2:33] Speaker 1: come back go.
[2:33] Speaker 2: I think so, and I think we got to fix
[2:35] Speaker 2: our hair before we can get out, so there's some
[2:36] Speaker 2: time there.
[2:39] Speaker 1: For sure. Well.
[2:40] Speaker 2: Look, so I will be the first to tell you
[2:42] Speaker 2: that I never thought that I was going to be
[2:45] Speaker 2: leaving the Earth's atmosphere. I don't even like turbulence on
[2:48] Speaker 2: commercial flights, and so for me, this is a try
[2:53] Speaker 2: it before you buy it situation where I get to
[2:55] Speaker 2: try space and it controls scenario. Once I started working
[2:59] Speaker 2: at NASA and meeting amazing astronauts, I never thought that
[3:02] Speaker 2: I could be them. And this is what I like
[3:04] Speaker 2: about life and karma in the world is like, right
[3:07] Speaker 2: when you think that you can't be something, life will
[3:10] Speaker 2: show you that you can. And I said to myself
[3:13] Speaker 2: many years ago, one of these years, I'm going to
[3:16] Speaker 2: apply to be a NASA astronaut. I'm going to go
[3:18] Speaker 2: to the International Space Station. And somehow I manage not
[3:21] Speaker 2: to do it for a year after year after year,
[3:25] Speaker 2: and all of a sudden, I have the opportunity to
[3:26] Speaker 2: be a Blue Origin astronaut, and my goal is to
[3:30] Speaker 2: complete this and if I like it, which I'm probably
[3:33] Speaker 2: gonna love it, I'm going to turn around. I'm going
[3:35] Speaker 2: to apply to be a NASA astronaut.
[3:37] Speaker 3: What's the preparation light for this? I remember it, maybe
[3:42] Speaker 3: it was last year they had Michael Strahan and he
[3:45] Speaker 3: was going through and they had to take some time
[3:46] Speaker 3: off from Good Morning America. What do you have to do?
[3:50] Speaker 3: What are they putting you through to get you prepared
[3:52] Speaker 3: for this moment?
[3:53] Speaker 2: So they have a trading program in their facility in
[3:56] Speaker 2: Van Horn, Texas. That's mandatory. But in addition to that,
[3:59] Speaker 2: you can do a host of other things. And so
[4:02] Speaker 2: I'm participating in a microgravity flight. I'm looking to fly
[4:06] Speaker 2: on a fight or flight with the jets, like real fast.
[4:10] Speaker 2: I like to go fast. I'm looking to do a
[4:12] Speaker 2: high altitude skydive. And then in addition to that, for me,
[4:15] Speaker 2: this is about bringing it home right. There are so
[4:19] Speaker 2: many people in my family are like, what is NASA
[4:22] Speaker 2: doing for me? What's space doing for me?
[4:23] Speaker 1: Like?
[4:23] Speaker 2: Why does any of this matter? And so I've been
[4:25] Speaker 2: reaching out to organizations HBCUs in high school so that
[4:29] Speaker 2: I can either fly a patch for school or do
[4:34] Speaker 2: experiments like I would like to partner with HBCU and
[4:37] Speaker 2: do an experiment on orbit right, or fly a sensor.
[4:40] Speaker 2: I really want the outcome of this to not be oh,
[4:43] Speaker 2: you know, like that's like ten minutes. I want it
[4:46] Speaker 2: to be. This was something that made me believe, or
[4:50] Speaker 2: inspired someone to believe that they could reach for the
[4:55] Speaker 2: stars and realize that it was only the beginning to
[4:59] Speaker 2: take the flight.
[5:00] Speaker 3: I know it's expensive. So were you chosen, Like did
[5:03] Speaker 3: you have to apply to become one of the astronauts
[5:07] Speaker 3: or was there a sponsored event like Okay, this is
[5:11] Speaker 3: the person we're putting forth as our choice.
[5:14] Speaker 2: Yeah, it's really cool. I got a call all the
[5:19] Speaker 2: blue from this lady named Nancy Conrad, and it just
[5:23] Speaker 2: so happens that that first day when I was at NASA,
[5:25] Speaker 2: when I had a badge and I was decided to
[5:27] Speaker 2: be there, I met Nancy. Nancy is the wife of
[5:30] Speaker 2: Pete Conrad, who's an Apollo astronaut. I remember seeing her
[5:33] Speaker 2: and being like, wow, like one day I hope to
[5:36] Speaker 2: speak with her. Fast forward right over a decade. She's
[5:40] Speaker 2: calling me and she's like, look, there's this mission coming up.
[5:44] Speaker 2: I think you'd be a really really good fit. How
[5:47] Speaker 2: about you apply this time. I didn't say no. I
[5:50] Speaker 2: put my application forward and it happened to work out
[5:55] Speaker 2: that I was in the position to join the crew.
[5:59] Speaker 2: Now back to the even if I had it, I
[6:02] Speaker 2: don't know if I'd want to spend it. And the
[6:04] Speaker 2: reason for that is there's a lot of support for
[6:07] Speaker 2: space and for science right and go to African proverb,
[6:11] Speaker 2: it's like, if you want to go you know fast,
[6:15] Speaker 2: go alone. If you want to go far, go together.
[6:17] Speaker 2: So I went out to sponsors and I said, look,
[6:21] Speaker 2: I want to know if you're going to back me
[6:24] Speaker 2: on this flight. And they have and so I'm getting
[6:27] Speaker 2: ready to announce some significant brand partnerships. But we really
[6:32] Speaker 2: are going to challenge the way that people look at
[6:34] Speaker 2: going to space, and I'm excited to have amazing brands
[6:37] Speaker 2: behind me to do it.

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