Nurturing Unconventional Interests and Dealing With Competitions

   Being passionate about something that is often not a popular and "normal" topic can be hard at times. All those cheesy Youtube videos about motivation and success tend not to work so well in the face of reality. So how do you stay motivated? Well, I might not give the best at giving out advises, but I believe that one should take pride in knowing what they want and slowly work towards that goal. Only a handful of teens know what they want to become and what career path they want to choose or even what they truly like to do. That decision or momentary thought will most likely change overtime and that is okay because time will tell you if that is the correct path. Toning down the intensity, being interested in a topic makes me want to become an expert at it. Thus, I get a bit depressed when others show their intelligence in astronomy (Ahem~a bit jealous of the Scioly team). To me, being interested in a topic doesn't mean that you have to excel at it. I, myself, am still constantly reminding myself that it doesn't matter if someone is better at doing something. View and appreciate your interest simply as a hobby and you will see improvements along the way. The solution to dealing with competitions is, in fact, not to think of the whole ordeal as a competition. This paragraph is more of a way to advise myself more than anyone else, but I hope you have found your source of enlightenment of the day.

   Recently, an one-way trip to Mars has been set up for 2024. The non-profit organization, Mars One, chose 100 people out of the 200,000 applicants. The age of the applicants ranged from as young as 18 to 71. Although the odds are against the participants, all of them are willing to settle on Mars for the rest of their lives. There is no guarantee that the participants will even set their feet on the planet, nor is there any chance of them coming back. However, the candidates are chosen based on their ability to handle the psychological stress of living in a foreign planet with a few other people and their survival skills. Most of the applicants are lovers of the outer-space, they are people who take risks for their interest and inner curiosity. My question for you is to what extent are you willing to take risks for the sake of your interests?

http://www.gmv.com/blog_gmv/mars-one/