The extremes of jungles, mountains, and deserts are inherently dangerous places.
Our achievements are generally limited only by the beliefs we impose on ourselves.
All worthwhile journeys have big obstacles. It’s the way of the world. The rewards go to those who can push through those trying moments and still manage to keep a smile on their face.
The special forces gave me the self-confidence to do some extraordinary things in my life. Climbing Everest then cemented my belief in myself.
To get ready to climb Everest, I did a lot of hill running with a daypack on and a lot of underwater swimming. I would swim a couple of lengths underwater and then a couple above. It gets your body going with limited oxygen.
When I’m filming, survival requires movement. You need your energy, and you’ve got to eat the bad stuff, and survival food is rarely pretty, but you kind of do it. I get in that zone, and I eat the nasty stuff, but I’m not like that when I’m back home.
Textbook survival tells you to stay put. Stop. Wait for rescue. Don’t take any risks. But there’d been a whole host of survival shows like that and I didn’t really want to do that.
Some of the greatest survivors have been women. Look at the courage so many women have shown after surviving earthquakes in the rubble for days on end.
I had many opportunities to get behind products in the past, and I was always careful to evaluate all of them. I will not put my name to shoddy items.
Americans are cool; if you show just a chink of vulnerability, they respond so much. They’ll pat you on the arm and say, ‘Hey kid, you’re all right.’ Brits will respond but they are much more cynical.
Many great people over the centuries have depended on their faith- it is a sign of great strength to need Jesus in your life.
Well, wolves will pretty rarely hunt. You’re vulnerable if you’re on your own or injured. But for lone wolves, get up high, show them that you’re not injured, face ’em off, be authoritarian with it, and look ’em in the eye.
The SAS Reserve tends to be made up of former paratroopers and commandos who still want a challenge, but it is open to civilians.
To me, adventure has always been to me the connections and bounds you create with people when you’re there. And you can have that anywhere.
You only get one chance at life and you have to grab it boldly.
A friend once asked me what qualities were needed for SAS. I would say to be self-motivated and resilient; to be calm, yet have the ability to smile when it is grim; to be unflappable, be able to react fast and to have an ‘improvise, adapt and overcome’ mentality.
Adventure should be 80 percent ‘I think this is manageable,’ but it’s good to have that last 20 percent where you’re right outside your comfort zone. Still safe, but outside your comfort zone.
I train five days a week hard – but it is short and sharp – 30 to 40 minutes of functional and pretty dynamic body-strength circuits, then I do a good yoga session on the sixth day, then I rest.
One killer exercise that’s really great is pull-ups with your legs out level. That’s my favourite. It’s such functional core strength, and that’s why I can climb up trees and down vines.
Sometimes an ember is all we need.