Fear.

Each time, I talk about a scientific breakthrough, I ask myself:

What really drives breakthrough ideas?

What makes the difference between a normal idea and a revolutionary one?

And most importantly, why do some people create the future while others watch?

That is what made me curious and go dive deep: to find the answer, it is not strength, opportunity, or luck, it is the courage to be different and breaking the barrier of fear.

Every great mind dared to think ideas that were illogical and unreasonable to others for example:

The Wright brothers building a flying machine when everyone said human flight is impossible.

Einstein proposing relativity when people thought time and space were absolute.

Alan Turing proposed the idea of thinking machines and others...

All were mocked, labeled insane and crazy, not because their ideas were wrong, but because their ideas shattered what people believed was true, destroying the assumption that we know everything which leads to fear. And when logic and reason lose their battle against fear, the mind remains captive to prevailing beliefs or traditions attacking anyone who dares to think differently, they confuse ignorance with stupidity, believing that ignorance is as shameful as stupidity, not realizing that we are all ignorant of something in one way or another. But those who changed the future understood that we are all ignorant of something and knowing that ignorance is the beginning of every breakthrough and that breaking the fear barrier is one step closer to that breakthrough. Those people are not the ones who are fearless, they move forward despite fear, they wear craziness like a badge of honor, they turn why and what if into personal mottos, they know that fear is not lack of courage, but lack of knowledge, and knowledge is earned by daring to explore the unknown, like:

Rosalind Franklin dove into X-ray crystallography.

Louis Pasteur dove into microbiology.

Katherine Johnson calculated flight paths at NASA...

Each one of them defied fear, broke what used to be logical and reasonable, and built the future while others watched and called them crazy.

Personally, if I had let fear control me, and just stayed scared of the assumption of rejection and failing, I wouldn't be dreaming of getting into an Ivy League university, winning a Nobel Prize one day, I wouldn't be trying to change the world for the better, and certainly wouldn't be applying to TKS today. Because just like them, I believe that breaking the fear barrier is the first step toward building what doesn't exist yet.