Elevating Life as a Mom, Climber, and Entrepreneur
Elevating Life as a Mom, Climber, and Entrepreneur
How can business owners overcome challenges?
Resilience is the key. If we can keep moving forward, face our obstacles, setbacks, and challenges, learn from them, and continue, that’s where true freedom lies. We don't want to be limited by what holds us back; instead, we should overcome those limits and grow. I got into mountaineering because of a challenge from my son. I was giving him the usual pep talk about doing hard things, and he raised the bar by challenging me to climb a mountain. My coach took it even further, and here we are today.
How can business owners focus on challenges instead of fearing failure?
The timing of events was key for me. The car accident really shifted my perspective—it became a line in the sand for my life. I stopped caring about failure. I wasn’t focused on succeeding; I was focused on the experience, meeting new people, and exploring different cultures. The mountain gave me something consistent to pursue, something to work toward. It hadn’t been done by a woman before, so I figured if I didn’t succeed, it was no big deal—no other woman had, and only one man had. This gave me the freedom to stay curious and try. It felt like a big enough challenge to be worth my energy. With seven children competing for my time, if I’m going to say yes to something, it has to be significant.
How should business owners celebrate progress and seek help along the way?
I would ask them to look at their goals and see who around them can be part of it. Who can help them? Who can they help? One unique thing about climbing mountains is that we can all picture the person at the top waving the flag, saying, "I made it to the summit. Here's my flag to prove it." We sometimes convince ourselves that we climb for the summit, but that’s not the whole story. If we truly only wanted the summit, we’d take helicopters from summit to summit, wave our flag, and take photos.
The summit is significant because it symbolizes all the challenges we’ve overcome and who we’ve become in pursuit of the goal. When we’re at the top waving our flag, we’re really signaling to ourselves: “Look what I’ve achieved. Look what I’ve overcome.” In business, no matter the size, you need to wave your flag. It’s great to wave it at the top, but you also need to wave it along the journey. It signals to the world, “Here’s what I’m trying to do. Here’s what I need, and here’s how I can help.”
What can business owners learn from setbacks to move forward?
When I went to climb Everest, I thought you went straight from base camp to the top, taking as long as needed. But when I arrived, I learned about acclimatizing. Acclimatizing means going from base camp to camp one or two, depending on your body, until you reach a point of failure where there’s not enough oxygen to continue.
At that point, you stay as long as possible, even trying to eat lunch there, living in the failure. Then, you return to base camp for three to four days. While at base camp, your body makes physiological changes, producing more red blood cells in response to the failure. Once you return to the mountain, you skip a camp that was previously a struggle. It’s a totally different experience.
In business, when you face obstacles or setbacks, that's your chance to return to base camp. What did you learn? What’s going well, and what isn’t? How can you adjust your situation to move forward?
*This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.*
