We Are Power Podcast
The We Are Power podcast is the podcast for your career and your life. A weekly podcast with listeners in over 60 countries worldwide where you'll hear personal life stories, top-notch industry advice, and key leadership insight from amazing female role models. The podcast not only aids your personal and professional development but also delves deep into conversations around Gender Equality and Social Mobility. Each week the We Are Power Podcast will bring you a new interview from a leader within the 100,000-strong We Are Power community, hosted by Simone Roche MBE.
We Are Power Podcast
Mindset, Mentorship and Unlocking Bravery with Sophie Storm Roberts
"A ship is safe in the harbour, but that's not what ships are made for." Meet Sophie Storm Roberts, an extraordinary adventurer who shares her story on how a powerful mindset, mental resilience, and psychological tools helped her overcome both physical and emotional hurdles.
You'll learn how she built confidence by confronting challenges head-on, proving that bravery is a skill anyone can develop.
In this episode, Sophie also shares the gripping tale of her Alpine coast-to-coast expedition, where she climbed the highest mountains in eight Alpine countries and cycled between them—all in just 32 days. Her narrative is a testament to how pushing beyond conventional limits can lead to remarkable personal growth and deeper fulfilment.
Sophie also discusses:
✨ Her inspiring youth empowerment project aimed at uplifting teenage girls from underprivileged backgrounds
✨ Free diving in the Bahamas
✨ The profound impact of mentorship
✨ The transformative power of daily actions
Sophie’s experiences highlight the importance of connection and the extraordinary potential within all of us.
Tune in for an episode filled with inspiration, practical advice, and heartfelt stories that will motivate you to take your own leap of faith.
You can now nominate for the 2025 Northern Power Women Awards to be in with a chance of celebrating with changemakers, trailblazers and advocates on 6th March 2025! Nominate now at wearepower.net
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Hello, hello and welcome to the we Are Power podcast. We are live in podcast studios for our first ever in-person podcast in a very, very fancy studio and I'm so excited. And every single week we talk to the most amazing role models, people who've got the stories, the inspiration, the guidance, and we always want those top tips, those takeaways, those hacks and those side hustles that people are taking as they go through their path. And I am so excited this week to be speaking to someone I met many years ago who I know is going to bring all of her tote bag moments. We'll get on to that in a second. We always talk about those quotes and those one sort of phrases that will go on the side of your tote bag when we have our we Are Power merch range. And this week I am delighted Eight years, I think, since I last saw you, sophie Storm Roberts, adventurer, superhero, queen of just being totally unafraid. Sophie, welcome, welcome to our live podcast.
Speaker 2:Thank you, it's such a pleasure to be here in this amazing studio and just amazing to see you again, simone. I can't believe it.
Speaker 1:I've followed everything that you've been doing over the years and one of the big things that I always love, and I always get the quote a little bit wrong and I shouldn't, because I know it's on a tattoo but you talk about a ship is safe in the harbour, but that's not what ships are made for, right? Exactly, go sailing, go sailing. Now I live on a boat. I was in the Navy, I love paddleboarding, so literally I'm not as brave as you, but you know my boat just stay in harbour, but I think all my other activity goes on outside. Tell me about where that quote is so meaningful for you, so much so that you got it tattooed right.
Speaker 2:It was the quote that made me quit my nine to five job and leave behind everything I'd worked for, everything I'd built, for the whole path that I felt I was on my whole life. You know, we get given this rule book and this path and these messages continuously from society of these are the things that you need to do. These are the things you should do. These are the things that will lead to fulfillment, success, happiness, growth, exploring your potential, all those kinds of things. But when I was 27, I got to the point where I had to make a decision and there were these two paths in front of me. Do I stay in the startup that I'd worked so hard to build, where I had so much security and share options and all this kind of stuff, or do I take this leap of faith and do I put literally sail my ship away from the safe harbour and go out and explore the world and see what else is out there for me?
Speaker 1:And how did you, let's say, nautical, then how did you navigate that? Because you were at one of the fastest growing tech startup businesses, weren't you? Yeah, I was. Business development. How great, like you say, sure, options ahead, you know, a great future could have been sort of so amazingly financially wealthy, all that kind of thing. But money doesn't make us all happy, right? And you've had that slide indoors moment. So where did you?
Speaker 2:navigate. Yeah, there was a lot to give up, but I felt as though you know, if I make, if I, whatever decision I make at this moment, will become part of who I am for the rest of my life, and and so that was the choice I needed to make, okay, am I going to go towards the unknown, where my curiosity is? You know, and you've asked me, how did I navigate that? And I think that often in life we talk about, like you know, kind of throwing ourselves off cliffs and making those big leaps of faith, and we feel confident to do that. If we know where we're going, how are we going to get there? What are the challenges and going, how we're going to get there, what are the challenges and the dangers that we're going to overcome on the way? How are we going to navigate that? What's our chances of success? You know what are the risks, da-da-da-da. And the reality is we never know those things and because those things are so powerful and so fear-inducing that most of us stay where it's safe and we say well, actually I don't know the answers to those questions and I don't feel confident enough, I don't feel brave enough to do it, so I'm just going to stay here where it's safe, and I'm just going to, you know, move along in with with this, and there's absolutely nothing wrong with that at all like just to just to preface that I am. You know, all I ever want for people is the best for them, whatever it is that they want, and I can only share my journey.
Speaker 2:But for me, I have developed the and I had developed before I took this leap of faith, the confidence in myself. Because of all the challenges that I put in front of myself, I'd created so much kind of counterfactual evidence to fears being true that I was able to face my fears and say, okay, I see you fear, but you're not going to stop me. You know, actually I think that I can overcome this. And so what it's done to me over the years of challenging myself, of facing my fears, of building confidence and, like you said, you know, you said, oh, I'm not as brave as you and I, you know, would love to have a conversation about that another time.
Speaker 2:But I think that bravery and confidence that they can be trained like any muscle or any skill that we want to get good at, and so the way that I navigated that was by having that confidence and that trust and that faith in myself and being like when that's when that is in you and in your ship. You then feel like I've got the I'll be able to navigate whatever challenges lie ahead, and so for me then the unknown just becomes exciting, and you know this adventure and you know it's more than that. It's like when you make these big moves, you move the world around you, you say yes, that you're ready for something bigger, something bolder, and that creates this momentum around you that you would never be able to create if you were taking more timid steps forward.
Speaker 1:And well, we may as well stay nautical as well, because if you take your ship out or your boat or your yacht or your paddleboard, if you have calm waters you're not really going to get very fast, so sometimes you need that bit of a wind and a storm to take you places. So how did you get to the Bahamas? Because that was your first sorry, not the Bahamas, sorry Borneo that was your first sort of super adventure. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Borneo was before all of this. So Borneo was the first time that I actually was like I'm going to challenge myself, I'm going to build my confidence, I'm going to do something that feels really brave. I was in my early twenties, just graduated from university, six months into my job, doing sales for a tech startup in East London, and I was just like, well, this isn't the place that I'm going to figure out who I am, why I was put in this planet, what my limits are. You know all these burning questions that we all have when we well, throughout our whole lives, I think. But you, you know, when you come out the other side of the education system, and you know, I was so excited to grab my life with both hands and to say okay, come on, world, I'm ready for you. I've been training for this, I've been preparing for this moment for my whole life.
Speaker 2:But the message that the world sent back to me was like oh, okay, just, you know, settle and do something that doesn't really fulfill you, and you know you might see yourself doing X, y, z, but you have to bide your time, you have to play by the rules.
Speaker 2:There's a ceiling, there's a process, there's all these things and I thought, okay, well, I'll buy into that. That's the rule book that I'm being given, but at the same time, I'm going to take the other side of my life into my own hands. And what I found was that, if you're staying nautical, but when you go sailing, when you go and into the mountains through adventure, the world of adventure, sports opened up this whole arena for me where I could play around and I could actually dream the biggest thing that I could imagine and I could go and make it happen. And that changed the whole game for me, because it empowered me. It showed me, you know, what I was capable of. It showed me what I could achieve with the power of my mind and the courage that I was building.
Speaker 1:And you are the only person in history to complete the Alpine coast to coast expedition to climb the highest mountains in eight alpine countries and cycle between them in 32 days. That is true, yikes. Oh, my goodness. We talked about that mindset and that strength and that. What was your superpower to enable you to?
Speaker 2:fulfill that? Yeah, it's a great question. I think the superpower was exactly that was the mindset I wanted. To put myself in a situation, over and over and over again, where I would have to raise my game, I'd have to step up, I'd have to explore what it meant to perform at my absolute best, no matter what obstacles or challenges were being thrown in my way. Whether that was the terrible weather I had lots of rain, lots of storms whether that was being exhausted, whether that was having an injury or an accident, whether that was, you know, just feeling really down or just being like I just do not want to get on my bike today, you know, and finding ways to.
Speaker 2:You know, I think as human beings, we are incredibly good at getting in our own way, and our minds are so powerful and we think that we live in this world here. But we actually live in the world that our mind creates, and you know the thoughts, everything that happens to us in our life. It creates the thoughts and the beliefs that we have, and those thoughts and beliefs create the world that we live in. So, for me, I wanted to figure out how to get my mind and body to work together, how to actually, you know, because physically I was I, you know, I was like, okay, this is the physical challenge, but I was fully aware that it was my mind that was going to either enable me or prevent me from from doing it.
Speaker 2:And so, putting myself in that situation, day after day, where I was cycling from one country to the next, climbing a mountain, for 32 days, I got to practice those tools over and over and over again, and I got to put myself in situations where I was like, okay, this is what's happening, what happens if I do this. And I had a whole bunch of different tools, from mantras to distraction, to um, to you know just, you know just visualization, to so many different things. But I wanted to be able to call on that part of myself which I call courage, like I would call on a best friend, you know, so that I know that for the rest of my life I can say I got through, that I can get through this and you talk about.
Speaker 1:There's a quote on Instagram. You talk about challenge your beliefs and believe in the challenge, yeah, and I think that resonates so much to people that are watching today, people that are listening today, that don't want to get on that bike today or don't want to go through that door today. How would what would you say to people out there, because that's something you live by?
Speaker 2:right, absolutely. Yeah, you know, we've talked to you know, the alpine, coast to coast obviously is, is it is a huge, huge challenge that I did, but it absolutely didn't start there. You know, I come from a background of being very non-athletic, non-adventurous. Um, at school, I was really into sports, but we were really terrible at sports. Um, my school was, and we used to lose all the. I was really into sports, but we were really terrible at sports, my school was, and we used to lose all the time. I was just like very uncoordinated and found it really difficult and stuff like this.
Speaker 2:But I think that when you know nobody, none of us want to feel pain or face our fears, it's not like we wake up saying like, oh, that's what I'll do today, that will be great, you know.
Speaker 2:But I think once you start to do it and you start to realize what you can gain from it and the reality is, as human beings, none of us are going to get through life without facing adversity, without feeling fear, without feeling pain, without facing failure.
Speaker 2:So what I, my mission, is to inspire and empower people to be to, to practice that before it comes as a curve ball from from life that's unexpected, you know, to take control of that process and think who do I want to be as a human being, how do I want to conduct myself, what are my values? You know what's really important to me and how do I want to be able to navigate life. And I think that when we put ourselves in situations, when we face adversity, we learn the most interesting things about ourselves, and it changes us on the inside. It changes the conversations that we're having with ourselves on a daily basis. It changes what you see when you look at yourself in the mirror. It changes how you conduct yourself the next time you have to put yourself forward for something, the next time you deal with a crisis in your life, the next time that you deal with anything that's unexpected. It changes all of that and that is so incredibly powerful, and that's what I'm really passionate about.
Speaker 1:And I know you're passionate about mentors as well. And you have many mentors in your life. You talk about your mum, Amanda. Yes, being one of your super mentors and I know you set up, you set up. How many years now is the London to Paris?
Speaker 2:cycle ride. Oh gosh, yeah, that was. Yeah, it's been nine years so far, Wow.
Speaker 1:And every year you have to keep doing it. Yeah, I know, because you've built a community there now that want to do it. But why do they mainly want to do it? What's the end goal for everyone? At the end, they want the hug off Amanda, don't they? Yes, they want the hug from my mum when they get to Paris. Yes, but that mentorship is key, isn't it?
Speaker 1:And I find it um, when I've tracked you over the years. Um, and the fact that you didn't have sport in your sort of your education. You're growing up. You think all the things that you're doing now the cycle rise, the adventuring, the you know that everything that you're doing is so and we'll. We will get into the free diving in Bahamas as well in a short while. But that would seem in people I can't see the connect between. You'd assume that that's what you were doing. You were always that sort of burning adrenaline by doing all this sport, but it it wasn't. It wasn't. Then one day you you were at the tech start company and you end up in Borneo. But what part do those mentors have to play in your life to make you that, have made you believe that you can do everything and go without the plan?
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah. I think it's incredibly powerful when somebody believes in you, and especially if they see something in you that you don't see in yourself. And I think that is the power of mentors. And throughout my journey I've just met people being dropped into my life at a certain point, met them through all kinds of different ways, but I've maintained that connection with them and they've all served an incredible purpose in helping me along my journey, but mainly in expanding my vision of what's possible. And especially when mentors are people that you admire, that you respect and you think, wow, if that person is in this position in their life, but they're seeing this in me, you know, again, it expands you, it opens you up, it makes you think, well, then they must see that and I just think it's so powerful.
Speaker 1:And equally the thing I see about you, as well as this real passion to pay it forward. Yeah, and pass that on. Tell us about Trailblazers yeah, it's.
Speaker 2:I was just thinking that when I was um, when we were just having that conversation, trailblazers is basically born from that in you know, in me recognizing what have been the most pivotal parts of my journey and the most pivotal people that I've met and you know how valuable is support and belief, and you know I basically created this. It's a youth empowerment project to build confidence and courage in teenage girls and specifically girls from underprivileged schools and backgrounds, privileged schools and backgrounds. And essentially I go I've taken everything from my whole journey that I've learned and taken that to to go and deliver workshops and talks and taking them on sailing trips and adventures and stuff like that um, to really empower them, but also to to just show them, like, what it can do for you when you've got someone who really does have your back and really believes in you and also creates that vision of you, for you, of what's possible, and helps you chart that that journey forward and you talk about the invisible girls don't you?
Speaker 1:because often it's the um, the our young people either that are, I think, playing truant or a very high potential that will get those opportunities. But you've targeted a particular area, haven't you? To make sure that everyone has an opportunity?
Speaker 2:Yeah, a lot of these girls.
Speaker 2:They are sort of labelled invisible by their teachers and their parents because, exactly as you said, they're not the ones who are causing trouble or playing truant or failing their exams.
Speaker 2:Their strategy in life is just to exist invisibly, to reduce the amount of criticism or potential criticism that can come their way. And what I realized, you know, is that the world is constantly telling every single one of us who we should be, how we should look, how we should act, what we should do with our lives the should, the should, the should, the should, the should and it's exhausting. And if you are a teenage girl, that perhaps is also not getting you know whether you're getting great support from home or you're not getting great support from home. You've got social media, you've got school, you've got so many expectations and so many pressures that what I wanted to do was just literally bring them together like block out all the noise from the outside world and create these exercises and these opportunities for them to figure out who they actually are and support them in that process and and really make them feel really loved and accepted and powerful in their own voice and in who they actually are how do you make time for you to kind of reflect?
Speaker 1:you know um, or is that? Where the pandemic came in, there was you can't go out adventuring, uh, and doing and having your um, big travels when the pandemic was on. How did you deal with that situation? Because it was so different. We're all in it together in some respects in a global pandemic, but but how did you navigate that?
Speaker 2:Yeah, the pandemic was challenging for everybody, considering that my whole business involves people and places. It was like and I was at the very pinnacle of it it was like a balloon that someone just put a pin in and it went, you know, just immediately. So it was challenging, but, like anything, I just kind of you know, I don't like to waste energy, and this is a huge thing that I've learned from my challenges. Like, when something difficult happens, we have two choices. We, you know, we all got to have a pity party, right, like we're human beings, aren't we? We've got to allow ourselves to, you know, grieve something and lick our wounds. But then we've got two choices Either you get, you pick yourself up and you get on with it and you move forward, or you're going to stay in that negative spiral of what I think is, you know, can be like victim mindset, like why me, this is so bad? You know, this is all these kinds of things.
Speaker 2:And so I I just kind of approached the situation, um, like, like a challenge, and was like, well, what opportunities is this offering me? And I used it as an opportunity to retrain myself. So I became a qualified personal trainer, I became qualified in mental health first aid and I retrained as a mindset and flow coach and I always you know these adventures and these challenges that I've done. They were it. Like I said before, it's been my, my arena for transformation and, um, that's been absolutely incredible, but I always wanted to take everything that I've learned and and and transform that into tools and programs and coaching and opportunities that can help people in a very tangible way, and that's what the, the pandemic, gave me an opportunity to do, and I wonder what is?
Speaker 1:kind of building up, because I I know you'll never be done. There's always an adventure, there's always give back, and I think that's something that's really struck me as I've kind of followed your success and progress is I first met you when you were doing your TED Talk, which was absolutely amazing. Now there has to be another one in there. I'm sure there's another one building up. But what is at the forefront of your mind right now? What is your next on your path you're going to chart?
Speaker 2:So I'm writing a book which is, incredibly, you've got nothing else to do right.
Speaker 2:It's so exciting for me because it feels like this pivot, this new opportunity for me to really well, the vision that I've got is what I want to put into the world and what I think will be the next you know thing that I'll do with my life for the foreseeable future. Um, it's really, really exciting and um, yeah, so that's that's the kind of next thing for me. But I would say that, you know, when I was in the throes of Challenge Sophie, you know, as you said, like there was a lot of travel and adventure and change and, you know, dealing with uncertainty and just going everywhere and doing all these things and I'm so incredibly grateful for that chapter of my life. But on a personal level and professional level, I'm creating something different for myself now, so something that is has more you know that's, that's just more grounded and and I'm really excited about that- I will be watching that space.
Speaker 1:Now tell us I cannot leave this recording without you telling us what it was like to free dive in the Bahamas.
Speaker 2:Well, free diving is wild. I mean, we've all kind of dived underneath the surface when you're on holiday, of the water, right, and you can probably do a couple of seconds, kind of thing. So free diving is essentially diving into. We dive into this big, deep blue hole in the Bahamas and you, you hold your breath for as long as you can and you, you know, you go underneath the water.
Speaker 2:I think I went down to like 15 meters, which is crazy, and you know, the hardest part is actually learning how to equalize your ears. And then you know it's just wild, what your body can do. Like the people who are teaching us, I think they do like 140 meters or something which is minutes, minutes, it's like it's so nuts. So, yeah, I, I, you know, I wanted to try a sport where I could use the physical and mental tools that I've got, but in a different way. And free diving it's very different to the endurance stuff I've done, which is, you know, mindset and pushing and striving and stuff like that. Free diving is very Zen, zen, it's like the more zen you can be, the more relaxed you can be, the more you know you spend about five minutes just doing very deep, meditative, slow breathing before you actually go under um, so the more relaxed you are. You know, there's no forcing, there's no like anything like that. It's not really, it's not mind over matter at all is there anything you wouldn't?
Speaker 2:do again. Yes, two things actually, and this might come as a surprise, but one of them is, uh, and they're both kind of similar skydiving and bungee jumping. Why so? Yeah, both of them I just actually hated.
Speaker 2:Um, I'm not, I'm not an adrenaline junkie, I'm not interested in that, you know, adrenaline for the sake of adrenaline. And both of them are inherently dangerous and I just felt like why am I risking my life, like I've done things that are dangerous and felt, you know, my life's been at risk, but it's been a calculated risk. It's to get me from A to B, you know, as part, and it's like there's no way over this, this risk. I haven't just volunteered to just like create this risk in my life on an idle Saturday, and both of them were part of work opportunities and you know I said yes to them, as I do, but I didn't enjoy either of them and I would never do them again.
Speaker 2:And what would you do again in a heartbeat? Um, you know, the first thing that came to mind when you said that was was this connecting with people, sharing stories, like supporting other people and being part of you know, that amalgamation between what you're doing, what I'm doing, and people out there in the world and you know these connections, these, these conversations. I think this is beautiful and powerful and this is what I love doing and the power of that.
Speaker 1:People talk about networking. It's not just about flinging business cards out there, isn't it? It's about those intentional conversations. We were having that conversation in the green room today. That's massively important, isn't it? That networking piece as an action, not just a go have a coffee.
Speaker 2:Yes, I think you know making yourself useful to what other people are doing. So it's not just hey, I met you. Here's my information, this is what I do. It's, you know, really actually making that bridge between what you're doing, what I'm doing. Here's how we can do something together and here's how we can support each other. You know, and I think it is a living and breathing thing and it needs to be nurtured in that way. And I would say, for anyone listening, you know, the one thing that I've learned from my business development background you know that I didn't enjoy starting my career in sales, but it's definitely helped.
Speaker 2:For sure is that when you send an email and someone doesn't reply, that is 100%, not a no. You know people are really busy and we need to find. You know you send them a message on LinkedIn or Twitter or find something to send them, like talking earlier about an article or something that resonated with your conversation. But just, you know you've got to be like a street fighter. Really, if you want to make something happen and you want to build your life or put yourself out there, you have to go and do it. Never give up. Yeah, never give up.
Speaker 1:Never give up. Sophie. It has been a delight to have you back. I cannot wait for the book. I love the fact he's talking about the arena for transformation. I love that. I cannot wait to see what happens next. I cannot wait for the next TED Talk. I will be there in the front row cheering you on, because I remember that from all those years ago. I think inspiration is often such an overused word, but I think you constantly inspire. You inspire others, you take and you're also, you are. You inspire others and they inspire you as well, and you let that in. Yeah, I think you let that into that mindset, and and so I thank you so much for being our guest today on the we Are Power podcast. It's so amazing to see you and I cannot wait to keep following, keep following this magnificent course across the oceans. It's been so wonderful to be you and I cannot wait to keep following, keep following this magnificent course across the oceans.
Speaker 2:It's been so wonderful to be here and I just love to share one thing on the arena for transformation is that my arena for transformation was adventure sports, but for other people, listening, it could be creativity, it could be music, it could be dance, it could be entrepreneurship, it could be raising a family. You know, whatever it is like we can take, we can make decisions on a daily basis to challenge ourselves and to take action and move our lives forward in the way that we want to do that, in big and small ways. So, yeah, I think you know you don't all need to go and climb mountains and do triathlons and all the wild stuff that I've done, but if you do, then you know 100%, get in touch and let me know what you're up to.
Speaker 1:Absolutely, and you can stay connected with Sophie on all of her socials, because that's one thing she is. She's out there in her socials. We'll put the details in the show notes. Thank you so much, sophie, for joining us. Thank all of you. Please do stay connected on all of our socials. We love to hear from you. We love an old school review or even an old school email as well, so please do stay connected on all of our socials. We are wearepower underscore net on Insta, twitter and TikTok, and we are power on all of the others. My name is Simone. This is the we Are Power podcast, and we have been delighted to welcome you into our studio today.
