The Story Doesn't End Until You Say So

Stage 1 Exam

"I can't let you pass, you're just not ready," Jim, the Chief Flight Instructor said.

I sat there in his office, partially dumbfounded. The tears were welling up in my eyes. I sat across the table from him and tried speaking, but my voice was shaking and I was trying my best to not let the tears stream down my cheeks. The lump in my throat was the size of a softball.

"You don't understand, I'm putting everything in to this! I am spending every dime I have and every free second I have trying to change my whole life trajectory! All I ever wanted to do was fly airplanes. I come here after a 9 hour work day that starts at 3am and after I have stayed up until 10pm the night before studying. What do you mean, I'm not ready?"

I wasn't ready.

This moment occurred about 10 weeks in to my flight training. The way flight training works is you have to get numerous ratings and 1500 hours to eventually fly big airplanes. Each rating is broken in to stages. I was trying to get my private pilot certificate, which is the first rating one gets on their way to the airlines.

I was trying to go from Stage 1 to stage 2. After stage 1, is the all important solo. This is where you take the airplane around the traffic pattern for a few laps and take off and land without an instructor present. During my stage 1 exam, my knowledge wasn't as good as I had hoped and my flying wasn't good enough to instill the trust they needed in me to take the airplane up by myself.

I had been giving it everything I had and it still was not good enough.

Mentally, I went to a place where I thought I would never get to where I was going. I was defeated. I had many conversations with myself and told myself that I just didn't have what it takes. I took a couple days off. I let those sharp emotions dull, I cracked the books, got my shit together, and kept going. After studying for a couple more weeks and brushing up on my communications work and landings, I got back in the airplane with Jim and he passed me.

I've come to this point in my life countless times where I thought, "I'm never gonna get past this shit." "I'm not good enough." "I just don't have what it takes." How many times do we tell ourselves all this stuff that just isn't true? The weird part is, we actually believe it too! My mind has lied to me so many times and continues to to this day and probably always will.

This was a big learning moment for me, somewhat about flight training but more about life. I could have packed it in at that moment said, "Ok, I gave it a shot, and I just don't have what it takes." My wife told me at that time that I had to appreciate obstacles like this. They are simply there to show you how badly you want it. How much you will go through to get it. It also helps you appreciate it on the other end, once you finally arrive at the "destination." I am grateful for all the failures and all the obstacles that I had to go through.

Not much more than that for today. I hope you enjoy it. Have a wonderful day and remember to be grateful for anything shitty that happens today.

Randy