A banker who left her job to climb Everest

One of the most awful things about change is that we want it as much as we fear it. Have you never had the urge to walk away from your old life, leaving behind everything to travel ? The longing to have a fresh start and lead a life we have always dreamt of haunts us time and again. However, very few of us have the real guts to pursue our dreams and execute it.

Vanessa O’Brien is someone who is certainly winning at life and gives us life goals. A banker who turned her back on business to climb Everest and says being able to climb mountains is ample compensation for never having children.

Vanessa has now climbed 7 summits, 7 highest mountains in seven continents, including the mighty Everest. She has also skied the last degree (60 nautical miles or 111 km) to the South Pole in Antarctica and the North Pole in the Arctic Ocean. As of April 2013 Vanessa became the fastest woman to climb the 7 summits, in 10 months, and one of only 54 to do so.

She decided to leave her job in 2010, when the recession occurred. She said: ‘It was a case of my friend saying “Why don’t you climb Everest?” in jest, and me saying “Sure and you fly to the moon and we’ll meet back here”.

Vanessa was completely new to mountaineering back then and had no idea about climbing. But she wanted a new change in life and opted to go for it. Hard work certainly pays off. Vanessa has transformed herself from a non – mountaineer to someone who has climbed the highest mountain peak on every continent. All we can say is, Kudos to her !

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