{"id":20149,"date":"2026-04-12T07:32:11","date_gmt":"2026-04-12T07:32:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/grow24.us\/?p=20149"},"modified":"2026-04-12T07:32:11","modified_gmt":"2026-04-12T07:32:11","slug":"she-went-farther-than-any-human-and-still-doubted-herself-at-47-christina-koch-just-made-history-by-flying-to-the-far-side-of-the-moon-but-behind-this-seemingly-unattaina","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/grow24.us\/?p=20149","title":{"rendered":"SHE WENT FARTHER THAN ANY HUMAN\u2026 AND STILL DOUBTED HERSELF.\u201d At 47, Christina Koch just made history by flying to the far side of the Moon \u2014 but behind this seemingly unattainable achievement, she was quietly battling the feeling of \u201cI\u2019m not good enough.\u201d Not with self-reassurance like \u201cyou\u2019ve got this\u201d\u2026 but with a completely different mindset that helped her overcome the pressure \u2014 even when she didn\u2019t truly believe in herself. If someone who has reached the limits of humanity still doubts themselves\u2026 then the story behind it is far more thought-provoking."},"content":{"rendered":"
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What astronaut Christina Koch tells herself to beat imposter syndrome at 47 \u2014 as the first woman to travel to the far side of the moon<\/h1>\n

The Artemis II astronauts have travelled further from Earth than anyone in human history, but Christina Koch still experiences self-doubt as a midlife woman in a male field<\/h2>\n<\/div>\n
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\"Record-breaking\u00a9 AFP via Getty Images<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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It might seem hard to relate to a NASA astronaut, no matter how much she loves her pet rescue dog, but it turns out you might have more in common than you think with Christina Koch. As a woman in midlife who\u2019s at peak professional performance, she still experiences\u00a0imposter syndrome\u00a0\u2014 but she\u2019s found ways to combat it that we can all learn from.<\/p>\n

At 47, Christina has just become the first woman ever to travel to the far side of the moon, aboard the\u00a0historic Artemis II space mission\u00a0as part of a team who\u2019ve travelled further from Earth than anyone in human history. But, despite her literally stratospheric success, the electrical engineer isn\u2019t immune to the feelings that so many of us at this life stage can experience, even \u2014 or perhaps especially \u2014 when we\u2019re objectively at our most competent.<\/p>\n

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\"(L-R)\u00a9 Getty Images<\/span><\/div>
Christina Koch and her fellow Artemis II astronauts<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

In an\u00a0interview with Brilliant Star magazine\u00a0last year, as she prepared for the milestone mission, Christina explained the concept of \u201cstereotype threat\u201d and how simple affirmations didn\u2019t work for her. Instead, she learned to view herself through a different lens.<\/p>\n

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\u201cI think there are a lot of challenges when you\u2019re part of a group that\u2019s not well represented around you when you\u2019re going to your job every single day and you\u2019re working through things,\u201d she said. \u201cI also think one of the biggest challenges is not really knowing what is difficult because you are part of an underrepresented group, or this is just difficult because it\u2019s just difficult.\u201d<\/p>\n

Overcoming challenges<\/h2>\n

She went on: \u201cI think just having that extra circuit always running in your mind, wondering what about this is harder because I\u2019m a woman? I\u2019m trying to communicate in this field where people are not used to seeing someone like me. Where I don\u2019t necessarily hang out with my colleagues as much. We don\u2019t identify as much in, say, our off hours, or I don\u2019t get that time together. There are so many different things. And I think, kind of like a computer circuit, when you\u2019re thinking about something all the time, it can take away your processing of everything else. So that\u2019s a challenge in and of itself. But overall, I came up with different things that worked for me personally to overcome some of those challenges.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Christina<\/p>\n

She explains: \u201cYou hear people talk about giving yourself a pep talk, like, \u2018All right, Christina, you\u2019ve got this. You\u2019re awesome. You\u2019re really good at this.\u2019 For some reason, that never really helped me in achieving the challenging thing. But I learned about this thing called stereotype threat, which means that people actually do worse when they think that they are being judged based on a stereotype.\u201d<\/p>\n

Stereotype threat<\/h2>\n

So, how did she combat it? She reveals: \u201cI wouldn\u2019t tell myself, \u201cChristina, you are awesome.\u201d I would tell myself, \u2018Christina, everyone up in that evaluation room that\u2019s watching you and evaluating you, they think you\u2019re awesome. Every time you make a mistake, they\u2019re just going to be like, \u2018Oh, she\u2019s got it. That was just a little thing. No big deal.\u2019 And that actually really helped me a lot. I would just tell myself over and over again, \u2018They know I\u2019m really, really good at this.\u2019 It didn\u2019t matter that I didn\u2019t actually believe that. But that was kind of something that helped me overcome some of those stereotypes that would creep in and have a negative effect on how I did.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Meet<\/p>\n

Stereotype threat is a psychological phenomenon where individuals feel at risk of conforming to negative stereotypes about their social group \u2014 whether gender, race, age or profession \u2014 which can then trigger anxiety and an increased cognitive load, and ultimately lead to a reduced performance. It\u2019s why feeling like an imposter can be so damaging.<\/p>\n

So, if an astronaut who\u2019s just smashed through the glass ceiling in an actual rocket says something works, we\u2019re listening. The trick isn\u2019t convincing yourself you\u2019re brilliant, it\u2019s assuming everyone else has already noticed. This mindset shift might not take you to the actual moon, but it could help your confidence sky-rocket to infinity \u2013 and beyond!<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

What astronaut Christina Koch tells herself to beat imposter syndrome at 47 \u2014 as the first woman to travel to the far side of the moon The… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":20150,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-20149","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/grow24.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20149","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/grow24.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/grow24.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/grow24.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/grow24.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=20149"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/grow24.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20149\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20151,"href":"https:\/\/grow24.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20149\/revisions\/20151"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/grow24.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/20150"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/grow24.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=20149"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/grow24.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=20149"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/grow24.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=20149"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}