Nirmal Purja

“Of course, when you climb, you have to carry your gear and so having a really light-but-strong backpack from Osprey has always been helpful for me.”

“I was head of the Cold Weather Warfare unit within the Special Boat Service. My job was to do extreme climbs, learn about new technology, and create new ideas on how to operate in those conditions.”

“I disagree with it, but people come to Everest carrying a huge financial burden. Not only that, but they have spent more than two months and a lot of effort to be ready. That's why everybody rushes for the top.”

“The biggest thing I learned from being in the special forces is the decision-making process and also the willingness not to give up. You need to have a certain mindset. I call it a positive mindset.”

“We all have fear in life. I don't let that fear control me. I control it, manage it, use it as a positive.”

“Extreme high-altitude mountaineering deserves its place among the world's most extreme sports.”

“It's part of my Special Forces training. You're taught to come up with a solutions, not look for excuses.”

“People are only limited by their imagination. If you don't dream then you won't do it. Human beings are capable of doing amazing things.”

“I wasn't looking too much into my social media when I was on K2, but overall it's been really humbling to see all of the appreciation.”

“We've climbed in 60- to 75-kilometer-an-hour wind conditions without ropes, and yes we put in fixed lines when we can because of the safety. But it's all calculated risk and you have to be so flexible in doing this project, and that's why we've been so successful. We always climb with what we have.”

“Rescuing people from 8,450 meters is way harder than climbing a mountain.”

“I think you should be able to imagine things in a different way. And, you have to dedicate both your physical and mental abilities to that ambition to accomplish it.”

“On the trail from Namche Bazaar, you come up and you see this big mountain, Ama Dablam. Wow! I just started thinking, what would it feel like to be on the top of that mountain? What would you be able to see?”

“But hey, man, if I summited K2 in winter, without oxygen, frost-nipped fingers are a small price to pay. It was worth it. Think about it, things could have been a lot worse.”

“You definitely need a really decent bomb-proof summit suit, because that's what you wear in these extreme conditions and at extreme altitude.”

“I convinced my wife to let me climb Everest. I emptied my savings and took out a loan so I could afford to make the trip. I wanted to do it solo and I pushed myself too hard. I was carrying too much gear and got altitude sickness. I meditated to the point where I was feeling better, but didn't make it up, because I got involved with a rescue.”

“I genuinely feel like, when people climb K2, it's everywhere in the news, everybody covers it.”

“If you compare the number of people who climb Everest to the number who climb Mt. Blanc, it is like only 2 percent. But people don't talk about how crowded Mt. Blanc is.”

“Sherpa were always involved with the setting of the lines, but they never got the platform to tell any story, I think. And so these people have always remained in the shadow. But now obviously with the internet, the whole platform and everything, people can hold a light these days.”

“The hardest climb for me was Kangchenjunga, at 28,169 feet the world's third-highest mountain. The first thing that made this summit difficult was the speed that I climbed and summited two 8,000-er's, back-to-back.”