Translator: Mariana Yonamine Reviewer: Silvia Nogueira I am here with you today to talk about the greatest teacher I’ve ever had. The teacher's name is failure. It's January 2014.
I'm walking along the beach with my high heel shoes in my hands, and I'm crying a lot. Exactly 25 minutes before, I had been fired from a multinational company where I had worked for six years. I felt pain in my belly, my chest, my head and my heart.
Along with that, my engagement had come to an end. All at once, I had lost reference points in my career, my job, my home. I had truly got knocked out for the first time.
At that moment, I had two options: quickly hand out resumes to the market, to stop the pain, and, with luck, even forget about the broken engagement, or I could use that opportunity to do a workshop to learn and explore new perspectives. I decided to brush it all off, enrolled for a coaching course and started my project of developing my own company, working with human development, career and business coaching. And, along with the many coaching techniques I devoted myself to, I brought back a childhood dream: to someday climb the Everest, the highest mountain in the world.
The childhood dream had become a grown-up dream, which was to accomplish the Seven Summits project, to climb the seven highest mountains from each continent: the highest mountain in North America located in Alaska; the highest mountain in South America: the Aconcagua located in Argentina; the highest mountain in Europe on the tectonic plate: the Mount Elbrus in Russia; the highest mountain in Africa, the Kilimanjaro; Mount Everest, the highest mountain in Asia; the Carstensz Pyramid, the highest mountain in Oceania; and finally, Vinson Massif, the largest mountain in Antarctica. The grown-up dream became a plan and I had a lot of work ahead of me. I had to start somewhere, and I started attending a rock climbing course in Rio de Janeiro which revealed two things to me: One: rock climbing has nothing to do with the preparation required for ice climbing.
And two: I was scared to death of heights. (Laugher) Rock climbing obliged me to look for an ice climbing course. I had the chance of going to Bolivia to climb my first mountain, 6,000 metres high.
Climb up to 6,000 metres gave me the confidence that I was one step closer to my Everest dream and, of course, along with that, I was training my physical conditioning, endurance, strength and power. Six months later, I found myself flying to Argentina to climb up Aconcagua, on January 2015. I got there feeling happy, accomplished and ready.
My coaching company was taking off, the lay-off and the engagement break-up felt very far away. The expedition took 16 days. I insisted on carrying all my own weight with my large body structure - I had a 21-kg backpack on my shoulders - and I was completely amazed with all the beauty of that place.
Then the day to attack the summit arrived. I woke up in the early hours of the morning, feeling like a child. It was 2 a.
m. I managed to climb for eight hours and, being disobedient and stubborn, going against my guide's express orders forbidding me from using the bathroom at that place, I fell. I fell in a dangerous and steep place and couldn't recover to resume climbing.
At exactly 312 metres from the summit, I made the toughest decision so far: to go back down. So I got knocked out for the second time. At that time, I remember the days passing by very slowly, question after question.
Had I prepared myself enough? Had I eaten what I needed to eat? Had I practiced enough?
And the answers were no, no and no. From that day on, I went from 50 to 60 kilos; I changed my training schedule from three to seven days a week; my 2,000 daily calorie intake increased to 4,000; and from sleeping six hours per night, I started sleeping eight or nine hours. I did only four activities during one year and nine days of my life: eat, sleep, practice, work.
Oh, and I'd drag a tire, my new best friend for that year. It was the best way to simulate pulling the sled over snow in the streets of Rio de Janeiro. After that, I climbed seven mountains in one year and nine days - a dream come true; a Brazilian record.
I was the first Brazilian to finish the project in one year; and, above all, many lessons learned. The first lesson I share with you is that to accomplish something in our lives, we need to know what we want to do. Any dream has to start at point A and finish at point B.
The more specific and measurable our dream is, the more our brain boosts us to get there. I learnt that lesson at Denali, in Alaska, the coldest mountain in the world. The journey took 16 days, we were 6 Brazilian climbers, everybody carrying their own weight, up to 58 to 60 kilos, considering the sled and the backpack.
How did I learn that every dream starts at point A and finishes at point B? Because when I climbed to that summit, the first of the Seven Summits, this was just a little part of my dream. My greater dream was to finish the whole project, and I had to go on.
After that, I learnt that a big dream can only be reached when you break it down. I learnt that lesson in Africa, when I combined two expeditions - Africa and Europe - in one go, to take better advantage of the logistics, finances and time, so I could get back to Brazil and continue training. And when I did that, I found out that I wasn't breaking my dream down.
In reality, I was just draining myself and enjoying less the experiences and the lessons of that magical place. At the South Pole, I learnt that only with planning and strategy we can accomplish difficult tasks. The Vinson Massif is a mountain where I faced minus 45 °C.
All my gear froze, my clothes froze, my mask froze, my nose guard froze. On one occasion I was wearing all the clothes that I had taken. I got inside the sleeping bag with minus 40 °C, and, for one hour and a half, I shivered until I fell asleep from exhaustion.
Without planning and strategy, we can't go very far. Mount Everest taught me many lessons. The biggest lesson I learnt is that we can't accomplish anything great by ourselves.
Climb up to that mountain summit, a big part of my dream, involved group effort, support, caring, preparation, exercises, the expedition itself, and walking to the summit. Nothing was in the singular. Everything was in the plural.
On the largest mountain in Oceania, I learnt a lot. Amidst a very friendly cannibal tribe that still exists who guided us through forests. .
. Friendly. .
. I'm still here in one piece. .
. (Laughter) They guided us through forests and swamps. We walked soaking wet for six days, through rain, mud up to the knees, carrying umbrellas, rubber boots, raincoats, enduring rock climbing, enduring ice climbing, facing abysses and steel cables.
I learnt an important lesson that fits every environment in our lives: the treasure of diversity and of the imponderable is always ahead of us. The uneasiness that the imponderable generates, blinds us, and only those with eyes to see can reach beyond that. I've saved the greatest lesson to the end.
On January 16, 2016, I learnt that failure teaches more than success, and at 4 p. m. I arrived at the summit of Aconcagua.
Today I retire my teacher of failure, and welcome a much more important teacher, who will take me on the most thrilling, challenging and profound climb of my whole life. This teacher's name is love, and our expedition has three people: me, my guide of all the mountains, and our baby. We are pregnant.
Thank you very much.
