A Life Lived in Full
Nadia didn’t arrive at financial planning through a straight line. She arrived through English Literature at university, a stint in online advertising, seven years as cabin crew flying long-haul to Singapore, Sydney and Japan, a beauty salon in Edinburgh, marriage, two babies thirteen months apart, a pandemic, a divorce, and a season of depression she now talks about without flinching.
That’s not a career path. That’s a life fully lived.
What emerges from their conversation at Sizergh Castle is not a woman who has everything figured out, it’s a woman who decided to figure it out anyway.
“2021 was probably my lowest,” Nadia says plainly. “I didn’t know who I was anymore.”
She describes the particular cruelty of going through a divorce whilst being the sole caregiver to two babies under one, having no space, time, or breathing room to process any of it.
And yet, she did pick herself off the floor. First with a job at Mercedes-Benz in Carlisle that gave her confidence back. Then a LinkedIn message she initially thought was a scam, it wasn’t. It was the beginning of something.
The Money Conversation We’re Not Having
Nadia is a Financial Planner at St. James’s Place, with a particular focus on women and financial independence, and she brings the so much energy to that subject that it makes you want to cancel every subscription you forgot you had and finally open your pension statement.
She is passionate about dismantling the cultural taboo around women and money.
“If a man has displayed wealth, it’s seen as powerful and attractive. When a woman wants it, she’s a gold digger. It’s not fair.”
She talks about the staggering fact that it wasn’t until within our own lifetimes that women in this country could hold an independent bank account, and she connects it directly to why financial autonomy is crucial for us all.
Her advice is practical, personal, and grounded in lived experience. Start with protection, life insurance, income protection, critical illness cover. Sort your debt. Then think about investments and retirement planning. But before any of that, understand your own relationship with money, because as she’s discovered through the work she’s been doing on herself: a lot of our money blocks begin long before we’re old enough to have a bank account.
Nadia also goes into schools. She’s completing an accreditation to teach financial literacy to key stage one and two children, because she believes this should be in the curriculum, and she’s not waiting for the system to catch up.
The Diagnosis That Changed Perspective
Midway through their walk, Nadia shares something few people know. In June of the previous year, just before she joined the Academy, she was diagnosed with a form of blood cancer called Essential Thrombocythemia, caught through routine blood tests she was having for anaemia. Please don’t worry, or flood Nadia’s inbox, it is a manageable condition, and she has it firmly in check.
She tells this story not for sympathy, but with intent. At the time of her diagnosis, she had no critical illness cover, no life insurance, no protection of any kind. Now she can’t get it, or if she can, it costs double.
“Get your critical illness cover,” she says. “Get your life insurance. Because once you’ve been diagnosed with an illness, the door closes.”
She says it without drama, without self-pity. She says it because she wants people to act before they need to.
On Being Seen in the Industry
Nadia notes that women remain a minority in financial advice, and she believes representation matters.
“You need to see yourself in someone to think: I could do that.”
Most of her clients are women, not because she markets exclusively to them, but because they find her, recognise something in her story, and feel safe.
She is was a finalist in the 2025 She Inspires Awards for Women in Networking, Events and Hospitality, and in the 2025 Women in Financial Advice Awards in two categories: Rising Star and Financial Adviser of the Year (North West). She accepts the nominations with characteristic grounded-ness:
“At this stage of my career, it’s honestly not about winning. It’s the recognition.”
The Takeaway
As the walk drew to a close, Sukanya asked Nadia, if there’s one thing people can do today for their finances, what would it be?
Nadia didn’t give a product recommendation. She talked about mindset, about connecting with your purpose before you chase a number. About the domino effect of small decisions made with intention.
“From rock bottom in 2021 to building and growing to where I am now,” she says, “it all started with my mindset. What do you want? Connect with your life plan. Then the rest will come.”
She also said: think before you spend. She may have been partly looking at a vintage dress on Vinted at the time.
Final Thoughts
Nadia Enver’s story is what happens when someone decides to turn their pain into their purpose, not in a performative way, but in a genuinely useful, fierce way. She talks about money the way a good friend would: honestly, without jargon, and without making you feel like you should already know this stuff. She’s redefining what financial advice looks like, and she’s doing it in Carlisle, in the rain, at a castle where the sheep are very nosy and the colours are absolutely stunning.
Your story might be just what someone needs to hear. Nadia’s certainly is.
Resources & Connect
Nadia’s story is one of quiet, fierce determination. Starting out with a life that took her across the world as cabin crew, Singapore, Sydney, Japan; she built businesses, a family, and a future, before finding herself starting over with two babies under one and a world turned upside down. Where others might have stayed down, Nadia got back up. Now a fully qualified Financial Planner at St. James’s Place, she has turned her own experience of financial vulnerability into a mission: to help women take control of their money, their choices, and their futures. Nominated in 2025 in not one but two prestigious awards, the She Inspires Awards and the Women in Financial Advice Awards, Nadia is proof that rock bottom is not the end of the story. It’s where the reset begins.
Links:
partnership.sjp.co.uk/partner/nadiaenver- Instagram: @nadia_enver_fp
- Facebook: Nadia Enver Financial Planning
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nadiaenverfp/
Sizergh Castle sits in the heart of the Cumbrian countryside, surrounded by sweeping grounds, ancient woodland. The walking routes around the estate offer a mix of open parkland and sheltered paths, beautiful in any season, and breath-taking in autumn when the colours are doing their thing. There’s a timelessness to Sizergh that feels the perfect setting for the chat Nadia and Sukanya had here, unhurried, honest, and inspiring. A medieval tower in the background, the Lakeland fells on the horizon, and two women talking about money, motherhood, and what it means to start again. Not a bad backdrop, all things considered.
