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Throughout history, people raced to be the first at Mount Everest or the North and South Poles. In 1914, Ernest Shackleton wanted to be the first to cross the Antarctic from west to east. He failed. Along with his crew, their story is one of the greatest survival and adventure stories of all time.

Shackleton had a crew of twenty-seven men. Aboard the ship, Endurance, the plan was to go to the edge of the Antarctic by sea, cross the land mass by dogs, and board another ship. Things went bad when they found themselves stuck in big ice floes of the Antarctic. The Endurance was crushed with immense pressures and they had to abandon ship.

Shackleton and crew camped in ice floes for months and lived off their rations and seals around the area. When their supplies started to deplete they had to shoot their dogs also. Without any sail, they were at the mercy of the ice floe. Wherever it went, they drifted with it. After some time, the ice began to show cracks and it could no longer support them.

They jumped into lifeboats and spent weeks in terrible conditions. For the last couple days, they ate nothing. They rowed until they reached Elephant Island, only to find it uninhabited with little-to-no resources. If they stayed there, they would perish. Shackleton had to get help.

Leaving a majority of his crew, Shackleton sailed with five men to a whaling station 600 miles away. For those left at Elephant Island, life went on for months holding on to the promise of their leader coming back. Meanwhile, Shackleton braved storms and huge waves. They arrived at the wrong side of South George Island and three of his five men no longer had strength to move.

With no manpower to sail by boat, Shackleton and two others traversed through mountains and glaciers. At one point they slid thousands of miles of elevation with no gear.

When they arrived at the whaling station; they immediately got help and went to the remaining crew at the other side of the island. Shackleton made good on his promise and came back for his men at Elephant Island. All of them survived.

By this point, I felt nothing but relief.

Why read Endurance?

Where would we be if there weren’t any explorers? Why did they have to go through all those? The explorers know.

They inspired legacies of future pioneers; Apollo 11 and the race to the moon, even Elon Musk racing to Mars.

How can you use this information?

Explore. Endure. And continue pushing what’s possible.