Making space for everyone: A new book from astronaut Cady Coleman
Former NASA astronaut Cady Coleman's new book "Sharing Space: An Astronaut's Guide to Mission, Wonder, and Making Change" is now out, and is well worth reading
In March 2021 the first episode of the podcast Mission: Interplanetary aired, and I was a little star struck. I was co-hosting the show with a prominent astronaut who’d been on two Space Shuttle missions and spent over 150 days on the International Space Station. And each week I got to hang out with her and long line of deeply impressive guests.
I first met my co-host and former NASA astronaut Cady Coleman a couple of years earlier, when she joined Arizona State University as Explorer in Residence. But it was while working with Cady on the podcast that I got to know just how amazing she is — which is why I was particularly excited to read her new book Sharing Space: An Astronaut's Guide to Mission, Wonder, and Making Change.
Sharing Space is based on Cady’s career as a scientist and astronaut. It’s an inspiring and personal reflection on her career. But more than this, Sharing Space is a book about making space relevant and accessible — whether directly or indirectly — to as many people as possible; especially if they don’t fit the long-outdated cookie-cutter white guy astronaut mold.
Over the years I’ve talked a lot with Cady about her experiences as a seasoned astronaut. On and off the podcast we’ve discussed the importance of conducting scientific experiments in microgravity, the joys of weightlessness, food on the International Space Station (this seemed to be a recurring theme in our conversations), the awe and wonder of being in space, and much more. But it’s her passion for making space accessible that especially sticks with me.
Cady is a fierce advocate for inspiring young girls and women to follow pathways that have traditionally been the domain of men. The astronaut Sally Rider was one of her own early inspirations, and Cady is passionate about ensuring others like her get to see what’s possible through the work she does.
But Cady’s advocacy for meaningful inclusivity and access is much bigger than this — and it’s something that shines through in Sharing Space.
As she writes in the closing chapter (which is a must-read for anyone interested in why we need to make space more accessible), “The work of inclusion confronts all of us within the limitations of or own perspectives and hidden biases. It requires us to have difficult conversations with one another, and with ourselves. We each see the world through the lenses we’ve grown up with, shaped by our education, experiences, socioeconomic circumstances, and the people around us. Whether we are part of a group that has been marginalized or consider ourselves an ally, there is so much for all of us to learn about creating more space for diversity in our personal and professional worlds.”
When we were working together on Mission: Interplanetary this was abundantly apparent in pretty much every conversation we recorded. But two episodes in particular stick with me from the podcast.
These two back-to-back episodes focused on making space accessible, and drew extensively on Cady’s connections and work with AstroAccess — a project dedicated to promoting disability inclusion in human space exploration by paving the way for disabled astronauts.
In part one we talked with then-Mission & Communications Director for AstroAccess Ann Kapusta, while in part two we hosted the incredible Sina Bahram about his experience aboard AstroAccess’s zero-gravity flight.
Cady was a consultant for AstroAccess and a mentor to program participants, and her commitment to accessibility in space is very clear in in these episodes.
Talking with Cady and our guests, I was left with two lasting impressions. The first was just how important it is that the experience of being in space is made as accessible and inclusive to as many people as possible, and that disability should never automatically be seen as a barrier to this. The second is that evolving and living in Earth’s gravity too often leads to us having a crushingly limited perspective on the meaning of “disability” and “ability” — to the extent that what we think of as a disability here on Earth can flip to being a valuable ability in space.
Cady talks more about her work with AstroAccess in the final chapter of Sharing Space:
Another humbling and powerful experience I’ve had in recent years has been advising the AstroAccess group, whose goal is to advance disability inclusion in space exploration. I help coach their ambassadors, people with disabilities who are carrying out flight investigations on the zero-g airplane. I worked most closely on the first two flights with two extraordinary women. Diana Bolles, a NASA space-flight engineer and science communicator, and CeCe Mazyck, a U.S. Army veteran paratrooper and Paralympics gold medalist. Seeing Dana, born without arms or legs but maneuvering herself more precisely than any first-time zero-gravity flyer I had ever seen, made me rethink what’s possible, both in space and here on Earth. CeCe, who uses a wheelchair, was speechless after she took her first “flight” down the center of the airplane. She looked at me as if she had suddenly been transported to another world. Finally, freedom of flight. It was powerful—and uncomfortable—for me to realize that as inclusive as I try to be, I had been leaving an entire group of people behind in terms of the abilities they cold bring to a team.
This passage both captures the core message of Sharing Space and reflects an inspiring openness to enabling and empowering others that threads through the book.
It’s also very much the Cady I’ve had the privilege of coming to call a good friend over the years we’ve worked together.
If you get the chance to pick up a copy of Sharing Space, do — I’d highly recommend it.
Sharing Space: An Astronaut’s Guide to Mission, Wonder, and Making Change by Cady Coleman Ph.D. is available everywhere you find good books!