The Doorstep Mile

If you have enjoyed this book, you could help me a great deal by: Leaving a review on Amazon. This is so helpful. Sharing a photo of the book cover on social media. Use the hashtag #TheDoorstepMile. Giving your copy to someone who might benefit from it.  Thank you.If you'd like to follow me online you can: Sign up for the Living Adventurously and Shouting from the Shed newsletters on my website.  Follow me on social media: @al_humphreys Subscribe on YouTube: search for Alastair Humphreys Visit alastairhumphreys.com/thedoorstepmile for resources About the authorAlastair Humphreys is an English adventurer and author who finds it weird to write about himself in the third person. He has cycled around the world, walked across southern India, rowed across the Atlantic Ocean, run six marathons through the Sahara desert, completed a crossing of Iceland, busked through Spain and participated in an expedition in the Arctic, close to the magnetic North Pole. Alastair has trekked 1000 miles across the Empty Quarter desert and 120 miles round the M25 – one of his pioneering microadventures. He was named as one of National Geographic's Adventurers of the year for 2012.Alastair is a patron of the Youth Adventure Trust, Hope and Homes for Children, Outdoor Swimming Society, Yorkshire Dales Society and the Yorkshire Dales Millennium Trust.★ Support this podcast ★

The Death ClockYou have decided that you want to live more adventurously. You've got a head full of exciting ideas. You even know what your Doorstep Mile action is. But you can't begin it today, because you're tired. Actually, all of this week is pretty busy, so maybe it's best to wait until the first of the month to kick-start it. 'New month, new me!' The trouble is that next month, and the one after that, you will still be tired and busy. This is my final attempt to shake you into action, to remind you that time is ticking and that the harshest deadline of all is looming. Memento mori and all that. I want to finish by sharing with you one of my favourite websites... Check out www.deathclock.com. Death Clock calculates the date of your death. If you're the sort of procrastinating person who needs a deadline to get something done, well, there it is. Your deadline! Stick it in your diary now.We had better get on with life, there's not long enough left, however old we are, and it is later than we think. Those of us reading this book are at the lottery winning end of the human spectrum. We are so lucky. We have a degree of choice over our lives. The course of our life will depend upon the decisions we make and the paths we walk. We can choose our own story and make it happen. Dust off your violin and stand in your plaza. Face the crowd, smile and give it your best shot. You might be surprised by how warmly the world responds. Above the desk in my shed is a quote. I see it every day.'The life that I could still live, I should live and the thoughts that I could still think, I should think.'OVER TO YOU:  What date does the Death Clock predict you'll snuff it? Put it into your diary. What story will you choose to live before then? ★ Support this podcast ★

Beginnings *I felt nervous and longed to change my mind. A clock ticked and tocked on the mantelpiece. The small office smelled of magnolia paint and aftershave. I felt nervous because the first year of my teaching career had gone well, and this dramatic change in direction was not a sensible career decision. That small moment in that everyday setting was the beginning of a radical new trajectory for me.'I am sorry, but I have decided to leave.''Oh dear. Where are you going?''The South Pole.''St. Paul's? Lovely school.' I never did make it to the South Pole. But it has been a fascinating journey to where I've ended up nonetheless. We never know where we will end up, nor even if the destination we aspire to is the best one. All we can do is choose what seems to be the most fulfilling turn in the road, and see where it leads. I walk across the dewy grass to my shed carrying a cup of tea: my morning commute. I'm going to work hard on the writing that I love for a few hours before picking up my kids from school and perhaps going to climb a tree together. *Ahead of me, the sky was huge and empty. A sea sky. The sun was setting. I passed beneath a final row of palm trees and out onto the beach. I took off my pack and walked slowly down the warm sand into the sea. Ending a journey at an ocean was very satisfying. It felt definite. I could go no further. The beach stretched away in both directions, white, straight and washed clean to the high tide line. The heat had ebbed from the sun, but it still shone golden on the water. I stared out to sea, beyond the wooden fishing pirogues and out to the horizon. And I wondered what might lie on the other side.*I feel excited rather than nervous as I stir my tea. The end of an adventure is always filled with relief. I'm in McDonald's, the only place in town still open this late. Hard plastic seats, piped pop music, weak tea, the smell of chips. A very ordinary setting for a small moment that might lead in an intriguing new direction, though I have no idea what. It felt right to return to Maccy D's where this book began to work through my final thoughts. I've already given it all away online for free, and now I am about to click 'go' and publish this book. I don't know how it will be received. But it is time to find out.– The End –★ Support this podcast ★

Dust off your violinAfter many years of cajoling myself towards an adventurous life, I had a pretty solid grasp of what I was looking for. All I needed to do was get on with it. But if adventure is about uncertainty and risk, there comes a point when more of the same no longer counts as living adventurously. I had ended up in a comfort zone, even if it involved deserts and wild places. It was time to change direction.For many years my favourite travel book had been As I Walked Out One Midsummer Morning. Laurie Lee walked through Spain in the 1930s, playing his violin to fund the journey. It is a beautiful story and the idea of recreating it tantalised me. But for 15 years I kept chickening out. I couldn't play any musical instrument. The thought of having to perform or sing or dance in public is my idea of hell. But I could never quite get the idea out of my head. The thought of busking seemed horribly vulnerable. I had never attempted anything like it before. I would probably fail. It was ridiculous. Or, to put it differently: it sounded like an adventure and precisely what I needed.On a whim, I took out my phone, Googled for a local violin teacher and dashed off a quick email. That was my Doorstep Mile action – one email set everything in motion after 15 years of barriers and doubt.I quickly learned that the violin cannot be quickly learned. I had wildly overestimated how much I would be able to learn in seven months. But I worked hard at the infernal instrument, concentrating only on the day's homework rather than the nerve-wracking ultimate challenge of depending upon the violin to earn my next meal.I had to face the sorry fact that I was terrible: nobody would give me any money! The trip was going to be an embarrassment and a disaster. The sensible compromise was to take my wallet and just busk for a bit of fun. More sensible still was to postpone the trip for a year or two until I could actually play the violin.Fortunately in life, however, the only sensible options are not the only options. I turned up in Spain, and I began.I emptied the final coins from my pocket and piled them on a park bench. Then I walked off into Spain one midsummer morning to see whether I could survive for a month with no money.The first time I set up my violin to play was the most scared I had felt since the day I set off to row across the Atlantic. Isn't that crazy? Rowing an ocean is a frightening thing to do. There are storms and salty buttocks. But what was I scared of on that sunny morning in Spain?What I was afraid of was all the vulnerability inside me, the most significant stuff of all. The baggage we hide away and hide behind. The demons that stop us living as adventurously as we dream of. The things that I hope this book has provoked you into exploring within yourself.I stood alone in that plaza, sawing away at the violin. I could hack my way through five terrible songs, each about 30 seconds long. I looped round and round while my heart sank lower and lower. I was embarrassed, sure to fail and dreading having to acknowledge that to myself and the world.An elderly gentleman had been watching me from a bench in the plaza for a long time. Eventually, he stood up and walked over to me, leaning on his walking stick. I thought, ‘Uh-oh, I'm in trouble now. He's going to say, ‘Señor, enough. Clear off. Please, give us back our peace.” But he didn't say that. Instead, the man reached into his pocket. He pulled out a coin, and he gave it to me. I thought my heart was going to explode with delight, relief, amusement and surprise. I'd done it! I had earned a coin from playing the violin. Before the trip, when I was on the verge of backing out of the whole venture, I made myself a deal. ‘Don't worry about the whole trip. Just go out there and earn one Euro. That's all you need to do. With a Euro, you can buy a bag of rice. With a bag of rice, you can walk for a week. After that, we'll talk…'I spent a month hiking cross country through the beautiful landscapes of northern Spain, dropping down into villages every couple of days to earn enough money for the next stage. It was a magical experience. But the hundreds of miles and the nights under the stars were not what made it special. I've done that stuff half my life. The adventure out in Spain was standing in a plaza in front of a handful of people and declaring, ‘here I am. This is all that I have got. This is my best shot.' Play the next song. Earn the next coin. That is all we can ever do. The violin was the adventure. ***I spent most of my 20s and 30s chasing a specific manifestation of an adventurous life. That carefree vagabond dream changed as ‘real life' arrived and I evolved from carefree AdventurerTM to busy Dad. I still try to live adventurously but have had to modify how I do that. Sometimes it works fantastically, at other times it frustrates me. This year I have merely scheduled time in my diary to climb a tree once a month. But that has made a far bigger difference than I could have imagined. So as someone who exchanged ambitious dreams of a life on the open road for a cup of tea up an oak tree, let me finish by saying this. I don't think we should pin our hopes on one adventure of a lifetime. Instead, we should strive for a lifetime of living more adventurously every day. Do something daily that excites you, makes you happier, fulfilled and curious. Something that scares you a little. It is the process that is important, the direction you walk, not the notional outcome at the end of that journey. An email to a violin teacher. A morning text message to your friend about that idea you always dream of late at night, a meeting at work about a new project. However ambitious your ultimate dream, whatever you decide to start with and build into a habit ought to be really small. So small that there is no reason not to do it today. What step will you take right now to get you across the doorstep and set you in motion towards living more adventurously?Good luck. Over to You: What would be your personal equivalent of busking through Spain?  When will you begin it? ★ Support this podcast ★

Ten lessons from the roadWe are amongst the most fortunate people who have ever lived. What excuse do we have not to try to maximise our potential and our opportunities in an adventurous, worthwhile, fulfilling life?The times I have rolled the dice and gone big with my dreams have always turned out to be fascinating, informative experiences. You learn so much about the world and yourself when you step out your front door and dare yourself to have a look around.Here then are ten lessons from the road. Shoot for the moon. Set yourself an outrageous goal.  Just do it. Make it harder to ignore your dream than to overcome the risks and obstacles. Failing is a normal, acceptable and unavoidable fact of life. Giving up easily need not be. Keep taking one more step and you might be surprised how far you travel. You are the only person who controls your potential. Everything is up to you. The choice is yours. A bad day is a good day. Earn the good times. Embrace Type 2 fun. If it were easy, everyone would be doing it. Be brutally honest with yourself. Do you believe your own excuses? Does this year matter? Then use it. Think like a goldfish. Do not think about the end. Focus on the next step to keep you moving forward. Take care of yourself. Physically and mentally. Being fit feels good. Anima sane in corpore sane – a healthy mind in a healthy body.  The world is a good place. Trust. Smile. Boldness and relentless passion will be rewarded.  Over to You:What ten lessons has your road in life taught you?★ Support this podcast ★

The habit calendarBooks about habit forming usually refer to well-worn examples of incremental improvement and compound interest. 'Improve by 1% a day, and in just one year you will be a 3678% samurai ninja hunky millionaire!' There is no denying the power of accumulated marginal gains.Increase your daily run by a minute per day, and you'll soon be running for miles. Save £20 a week, and you'll be able to afford a £1000 adventure in a year. If you have a good idea, write a short blog post every day. You'll eventually have written a book. But it can be hard to remain inspired by a distant goal when you contemplate the number of tiny, tedious sacrifices required before you reach that point. It is helpful then to decide to do a specific thing today, just once. Do it. Tick it off on a piece of paper. Done. Nice and easy. The day after that? Do it again. Tick it off. Done. Deciding to eat healthily today is far more fruitful than a pie in the sky plan (or a no pie plan) to 'lose three stone'. It is the difference between discipline and a mere tweak of your habits. Our idealism is greater than our willpower. A small, specific daily deed is more achievable than vague goals with wiggle room and get out clauses. Eat a carrot, not a carrot cake. Get up tomorrow and repeat. I have used a habit calendar to cajole my lazy ass into 100 consecutive days of doing 50 pull-ups and 100 days of meditating. I'd never have kept those up without the chart. A habit calendar makes things easier, but it does not make it easy. My 'Write this Damned Book' calendar, for example, keeps failing. But every time I fail, I start again, doing my best to string together a longer sequence of X's than I managed last time.Once you build up a streak of daily successes, you'll not only find each one easier, but you will also become increasingly reluctant to break the chain. I like the notion of 'no more zero days': do one tiny thing every day to keep creeping forward. Build your habits, and the big goals will follow along behind them. Our hours become our days. And one day we will stop, look back and realise that those hours became our life.Over to You: What habit would you like to build to help you live more adventurously?  Find on Google, then print out a habit calendar and stick it to the fridge. Do Day 1's task and put a big fat X in the first box. This is now Day One and no longer 'one day'… ★ Support this podcast ★

The accumulation of daily habitsYou might (or you might not!) wake up during a particularly pointless conference call with the bright idea of running a 150-mile ultramarathon in the Sahara Desert. Unfortunately, accomplishing such a feat is a galaxy away considering your current fitness. The idea of a finisher's medal around your neck is ridiculous. That's why it is a 'dream' not a 'plan'.The gulf between where we are now and where we dream of is often too wide to leap in one bound. Because there are no stepping stones the crossing can look impossible.But you remember that you once bought a pair of expensive trainers in a hot-headed and short-lived New Year's Resolution to get fit. Back home that evening you eventually find the trainers, unworn, under a pile of doughnut boxes.Out of curiosity, you tug on the snazzy yellow shoes. You tie the laces snugly and bob up and down tentatively in the living room, flexing your knees and wiggling your toes.You step out outside, lock the front door, hide the key under a plant pot and check nobody is watching. Then you sprint off down the street.By the time you reach the corner, however, you grind to a gasping halt, bent double and retching beneath the streetlamp. What were you thinking? What sort of a daydream was this? How could you have even considered that this was preferable to the blissful ennui of a meeting with far too many attendees and a plate of chocolate biscuits?You turn around and stumble slowly home with a look of bewildered astonishment on your face. You switch on the TV and your heart rate eventually settles to a safe level. That marks the end of your good intentions. But imagine if after the ignominy of Day 1, you wake up on Day 2 and decide to give it another try. You remember that you are middle-aged these days and no longer the King of the Playground. You leave your front door at a more realistic pace.This time you manage two minutes of running before you capitulate. Encouraged, on the third day you run for three minutes. After a week you can run for seven whole minutes.You run to the café to bask in your achievement. Your friends laugh at your sweaty enthusiasm.'Seven minutes?' they scoff. 'That ultramarathon's going to be a piece of cake, mate. Here, have a piece of cake instead.'And yet, despite their mocking, you persevere, adding a minute to your run time every day. After a month of effort – a substantial 1/12th of a year – you can still only wheeze your way through 30 measly minutes of jogging. 'Surely I should be fitter than this by now?' you wonder in despair. Your thumb twitches towards the doughnut delivery hotline number on your phone. This is a familiar hurdle on big projects. You launch with great fanfare and enthusiasm. But, after an initial flurry, progress is paltry. Success is still so far away. The temptation to quit returns. This is where you need to be stubborn and remember only today's Doorstep Mile: get out the door and start running. It is better to measure your trajectory than your current ability. Because if you keep going, if you stubbornly add 30 minutes a month, by the end of the year you will run for 365 minutes. That's a six-hour monster run. You could complete any ultramarathon on the planet with endurance like that!This is the power of accumulating small steps and heeding only the next daily Doorstep Mile. OVER TO YOU: What can you begin today and then improve by one minute or 1% tomorrow?★ Support this podcast ★

To be rather than to seem Esse quam videri is a pithy, challenging phrase from Cicero. It translates as ‘to be, rather than to seem'. It flew on Birdie Bowers' sledging pennant as he trekked to the South Pole with Captain Scott. Birdie was one of the most impressive, genuine humans I have ever read about. I use esse quam videri as an opportunity to turn the mirror on myself from time to time and ask myself some questions.  Am I a runner? But do I actually run? Often and far and fast? Or do I just trot around the park a couple of times a week at the same pace as last year? Am I a cyclist? But do I actually put in the miles? Or do I just own a nice bike or three? When did I last go for a long bike ride that made me proud? Am I a photographer? When was the last time I went out specifically to take photographs, with thought and imagination or learned new techniques to get the most out of my expensive camera? Am I writing a book? Am I actually writing, regularly and with ruthless effort? Or am I just a dilettante who enjoys talking the talk but isn't prepared to sit down and grind out a book rather than grinding coffee beans? Am I doing what I love with my life? Is it fulfilling and worthwhile? Am I happy? Or am I merely dabbling with the important things whilst drowning in excuses, mediocrity and blame? These are the sort of questions I ask myself. When I'm on track, I feel proud of the identity they provide and therefore feel motivated to do more. Yes, I am writing a book. I'm making this thing happen… That feels much better than the times when I'm just pootling about wasting my life.Too often, I don't like my own answers. But I try to be honest with myself and acknowledge this. And then I work hard to get back on track for a while. That is the most I ever manage to achieve – veering back and forth between optimism and procrastination, triumph and disaster. Esse quam videri. What questions should you ask yourself? I dare you to ask them. Don't shirk the uncomfortable question. Don't kid yourself with your answers.Over to You:Esse quam videri. What questions will you ask yourself?★ Support this podcast ★

Type 2 funMud. Up to my knees. And rain. Heavy rain. A long day trudging with a heavy rucksack, head down, shoulders hunched against the cold wind. The only good thing about today was that it would eventually end.I was trekking across the lunar highlands of Iceland towards the Hofsjökull glacier. My friend Chris and I were alone in the wilderness, carrying a month's supplies on our backs. We had endured wading icy rivers and crossing lava fields that bruised our feet, but this evening's mud was the worst. This was the last straw at the very end of a horrible day. All I wanted to do was pitch the tent, escape from the weather and go to sleep. Instead, I was stuck fast and struggling in a soup of mud, stones and boulders. I was filthy and exhausted. ‘This,' I growled to Chris, ‘is definitely Type 2 fun.'Writing this description today in my shed, I looked back at some photos from Iceland to remind me of the details. There's a picture of me, bent double in exhaustion beneath a massive pack. Retrospectively, the memory strikes me as hilarious. It was an experience I am definitely glad to have gone through, despite how furious and miserable I felt at the time. In a similar vein, I found rowing the Atlantic to be mostly a cocktail of nausea, misery, fear and boredom. And yet when the four of us gathered seven years later for a reunion in a small curry house in Cornwall, our recollections were very different. We spent the entire evening convulsed in hysterical laughter, to the bemusement of the other diners. It was one of the happiest gatherings I have ever been to. A gruelling experience had been polished by time into something precious and gleaming. The pursuit of retrospective pleasures is a recurring theme in my life: the warm glow of achievement after icy swims and hot deserts. Sensible people choose to spend their time doing things that are conventionally fun in the here and now. Eating cheese, Morris dancing, listening to the snooker on the radio – the usual stuff. These activities can be labelled as Type 1 Fun. If you smile while you're doing it, you're in the Type 1 zone.Type 2 Fun, by contrast, is not fun. You embark on the quest for Type 2 Fun when you set out to attempt things that are deliberately hard. These often involve suffering, misery, fear, foul language and repeated vows never to do something this stupid ever again. Tremendous amounts of time and effort and commitment disappear into these endeavours. This is something that you are not doing for instant gratification. It is deeper, darker – and ultimately richer and more rewarding. Anyone who has run a marathon or completed a dissertation or assembled flatpack furniture knows about Type 2 Fun. Your version of Type 2 Fun might be very different to mine – appearing on stage in your first play, hosting a street party, coaching the U9s football team…This is the world of doing something hard in the hope that at some unknown point, in an unknowable future, the endeavour will reward you with a sense of achievement, satisfaction, purpose and peace. Type 2 exploits will one day be a pleasure to recount over a poppadom and a pint. (A friendly word of caution: steer away from the pursuit of Type 3 Fun. Such activities are not fun. And they will never appear so in the future, no matter how warm the fireside reminiscences. The vows to never repeat anything so stupid hold firm even years later at last orders.)Type 2 Fun is both an investment and a speculation. And it is often at the heart of the process of trying to live more adventurously. I encourage you – I dare you – to make the effort to toss a little more Type 2 Fun into your life. In my experience, while fun is fun, the more meaningful, enduring sensations of satisfaction and reward come through gritted teeth and Type 2 Fun. Writing this book, I have found it hard to set the tone and expectations appropriately. I am trying to champion small steps – a 5km parkrun before an ultramarathon, your first blog post before demanding a juicy advance from a publisher. But I also do not want this book to be an opt-out, an excuse for settling low or embracing mediocrity. I will always applaud excellence, ambition and ridiculous persistence. Start small, yes, but once you are up and running, you ought to be willing to suffer. Stretching yourself hurts, yes. But that is how you grow.So if these pages have any whiff of elitism to them, let it be here. To champion effort and struggle and those who pour their heart into Type 2 fun, wading doggedly through the mud and storms to accomplish goals far beyond what you thought yourself capable of. Over to You: What time-consuming Type 1 Fun could you swap for something new? What Type 2 Fun activity would you like to try? When will you do this? ★ Support this podcast ★

Push, push, push I'm 15 years old, cycling across England with two school friends. We get lost and end up on the summit of Great Gable (the 10th highest peak in England: stupid lost!). I wipe away tears and carry my heavy bike down what feels like an eternity of scree slopes. It's hard, we're lost, and I'm much slower than the others. I don't think I can do it.I'm 18 years old, driving into a place unlike anything I've seen in all my life. A rough town of shabby homes, bullet holes in the walls and people staring at me. It's my first day in Africa. I cannot imagine living here for an entire year.I'm outside my Mum and Dad's house on a beautiful summer day. I say goodbye, then climb onto my bike. I've told everyone I'm going to cycle around the world. Can I really do this? Absolutely no chance.I'm at the front of the living room facing three rows of people, maybe 30 in all. They have come to hear me give a talk about my travels. I feel sweat trickling from my armpits. Not only do I have to remember what to say, I now need to remember to keep my arms clamped to my side as well! Speaking in public is terrifying. I vow never to do this again.I sit down at my laptop. Open a blank document. Stare at it. It is time to begin writing a book. But how do I turn this blank page into a finished book? I walk to the kitchen to make a cup of tea while I mull over the enormity. The enormity of the blank page has overwhelmed me. I'm about to quit my job. Jack in the salary and the pension and the sensible working hours. 'You're going to do what?' asks my boss.'I'm going to be an adventurer.'No, I'm not. Unless I can earn some money, I'm going to be unemployed.I'm at the cinema. Beer and popcorn. Lights off, film about to start. Comfy chairs. I'm anonymous and surrounded by darkness and people. Strangers who are about to watch my first ever film. What if nobody laughs? What if they laugh in the wrong bits? What if they just fidget, a bit bored? I ought to be happy that my first expedition film has even made it this far. But instead, as always, I'm afraid and out of my depth.At least this time there is beer and popcorn. So perhaps I am making progress, after all…***Living adventurously is about cajoling ourselves to venture beyond what we initially think possible. At each stage in the narrative here, I did not imagine that I would attempt what came next, nor did I give much thought to how many different 'comfort zones' we reside within. There are so many ways to scare ourselves. But each time we dare ourselves to try, we are making progress in the right direction.Time and again, the questions we ask of ourselves come back with positive replies. I have learned, over and over, that I am capable of more than I realised. We all are. This growth mindset is one of the most precious gifts that living adventurously has given me.OVER TO YOU: How has your comfort zone grown over the years? Has it begun to contract with age?★ Support this podcast ★

Progress or successThis final section of the book encourages you not to get going and keep going. It also urges you to aim bigger and bolder than you might naturally be inclined to do. I find it harder to do this when I judge myself against the yardstick of ‘Success' [measured against a goal post or other people] rather than ‘Progress' [measured against my past self].While my ego used to want to compete with other people, I have learned that this is a pointless race, a recipe for resentment and unhappiness. The wise thing is to compete only with myself. To try to make the most of my potential and not let other people dictate what I should or must do in my life.I measure my progress in various ways. Whether I'm earning enough to live. Spending time on what I love. Trying to set a good example and improving the old work-life balance dilemma. I ask whether I feel proud of what I'm doing. Is it of any real use to the world? Am I helping the people I care about feel happy and cared for? Does it allow enough time for me to get out on my bike? If you decide to measure your life by ‘progress against yourself' rather than ‘success compared to others', what criteria would you measure things by? It is essential to be clear about what matters most. It's also good to remember previous benchmarks. These will help you feel better about where you are right now, providing you are progressing. I was so excited when I self-published my first book and could finally say, ‘I wrote this'. (despite the listing on Amazon whose photo was so bad I burst out laughing when I saw it again recently: you could see the flash glare and my blue bedroom carpet.) I felt the same way when I had a book taken on by a publisher. Ditto when I secured a ‘big' publisher. And now I have grown sufficiently blasé about what people think that I am excited to be writing this book via a free email newsletter.Looking back like this helps me appreciate that I am moving forward. I have always been terrible at pausing to celebrate. I permanently berate myself about how far I still have to go. If we don't reflect on the perspective of our younger, less-experienced selves, we deny ourselves the chance to notice that we are progressing.As you become more adventurous, the terrain you tackle will become rockier and the paths to follow fainter and less well-trodden. But you're not actually at the start line any more. You have come a long way to get to the point you are at today. You should draw confidence from this momentum. I'd urge you to pause and reflect like this from time to time. We can all be too hard on ourselves and make the mistake of comparing ourself to other people or imaginary finish lines. But it is progress we ought to measure, not success.OVER TO YOU:  List some ways in which you have progressed over the years. Notice how far you have already come. What is your next step forward? ★ Support this podcast ★

5-to-9 thinkingOne warm summer evening after work, why don't you go on an adventure instead of flopping in front of the TV? When you leave work at 5pm, you have 16 hours of glorious freedom before you need to be back at your desk again. What adventures could you have in that time? My mind instantly turns to open space and the outdoors, but your choice might be very different. What would you go and do?The 9-to-5, convention dictates, imposes a lot of restrictions on us. It prevents us from living as adventurously as we might like. But what if you turn that thinking on its head? The 9-to-5 working day is only eight hours long. What about the other 16 hours? Nobody ever considers that as a solid, priceless entity. Instead of being limited by the 9-to-5, what if we chose to feel liberated by our 5-to-9?I know you have commitments and commutes to deal with and probably work much longer hours. But humour me, please, for this thought experiment. Imagine how different life would be if society regarded the 9-to-5 as a minor hassle, a mere 33% inconvenience on 5 days out of 7. Imagine if everyone's passion was instead focused on the 16 hours of (at least theoretical) daily freedom.It would be a very different society. If you were a bazillionaire what would you swap your 9-to-5 for? How then can you get some of that between 5pm and 9am without the luxury of being loaded?What if you left your office, jumped on the train and headed for the hills? Even from London, you can be in the countryside or by the sea within an hour. I have also made this rush hour escape from cities as sprawling as Barcelona, Hong Kong and Los Angeles. Head out of the office, jump on the train and relax. It takes a bit of guts and oomph to do this for the first time. The strong negativity bias in our personalities means we tend to focus on the bad things that might happen (rain! Sheep attack!), rather than the positive benefits (this might help begin to turn my life around).So if you make it this far, congratulate yourself. You have done the hardest part (unless you get attacked by a sheep. Or it rains.) You have begun.There is no map for ‘living adventurously'. You cannot unfold a map, flatten out the creases, point and say, ‘aha! Look, once I arrive there, I will have succeeded.' Not only does this not work, but it is also a damaging way to think. The times I've assumed the end of an expedition would be the end of my problems have always backfired. All you can do is follow your nose. It is the direction you walk which constitutes living adventurously, not whatever crock of gold you imagine lies at the rainbow's end. Anyway, pause your philosophical musings to get off the train. Look left and right. Then take a punt on the direction less travelled. Give your future self the best chance. Head towards beauty and wildness. Walk up the nearest hill to take in the view.You're out of breath from the hike. You still feel a bit silly. But you smile. You feel your nerves about this step into the unknown seeping away. What an opportunity. What an escape. A burst of freedom in the middle of the working week.To appreciate a painting properly, you often have to take a step back. The same holds true for life. The 5-to-9 is a chance to step back from the hectic rush of work, the clamour of your family and the distractions of the internet. You will look at life with a fresh perspective from the vantage point of a grassy hilltop. Unroll your sleeping bag under the stars and drift off to sleep. In the morning you'll wake at sunrise to the sound of birdsong and the first warm rays of sunshine. (Disclaimer: if it is raining this entire experience will be miserable and will require filing under ‘Character Building'.) If you are a veteran at this camping malarkey, you might have brought along a little camping stove for a cup of coffee with a view. If not, enjoy the novel simplicity of temporary abstinence and delayed gratification.Shove your sleeping bag into your rucksack. Run down the hill and jump into the nearest river. Then hop back on the train into town, ready for another day in the office. A little sleep-deprived, perhaps; twigs in your hair and bleary eyes. When you get to work, and your colleagues ask if you did anything interesting last night, for once you don't have to lie and make something up! They will laugh and think you crazy, of course. But a year from now you will still remember that night under the stars, long after evenings of TV and soft pillows have faded away. Squint a little differently at life. Bemoan the 9-to-5 or celebrate the 5-to-9. What memories will you treasure a year or five from now? That is the important stuff.Over to You: What are your 9-to-5 problems? What are your 5-to-9 opportunities? What will your next 5-to-9 adventure be? Schedule it in your diary now. ★ Support this podcast ★

MicroadventuresAs my own attempts to live adventurously evolved from jumping on planes to distant continents, I began to develop the idea of microadventures. They have been part of my effort to learn to look for the opportunities amongst the constraints of life.I never imagined how helpful the principal would be for me, both in the literal sense of squeezing exercise and fresh air around the margins of my days, but also as a metaphor to help with everything I do.I had become more aware of how many people love the idea of adventure but are not able to have adventures of their own (or think that they cannot). I decided to try to break down some of the barriers getting in the way.You can't afford to cross a continent? What is within reach? You don't have time fora big adventure? What can you do? Still too hard? OK, try this. I kept reducing and simplifying and trying to put a positive spin on every situation. Think smaller and simpler. Look around you. What can you do in your lunch break? Climb a tree, make coffee in the woods, swim in a river… When you're driving, you can use your sat-nav as an adventure guide – look for streams to detour to rather than service stations. You can always do something. A microadventure is no different from an adventure, however you personally define the word ‘adventure'. The only difference is that a microadventure is one that is close to home, cheap, simple, short and therefore more likely to actually happen. Microadventures began as an attempt to capture the spirit, principles and benefits of challenging expeditions. Could I replicate some of this through accessible activities condensed into a weekend away, or even a midweek overnight escape?I began by walking a 120-mile lap of London alongside the M25 but learned that was still too big for most people. So I explored a lap of my own home, walking a circle with a mere 2-mile radius. I discovered places I had never been to before.I built a raft that sank in the Lake District and drifted down a river on tractor inner tubes in Wales.I cycled to the sea to sleep on a beach. I pedalled across the Pennines between the houses where my parents were born.I cooked on campfires, slept on hilltops overlooking cities and motorways and watched meteor showers from my sleeping bag.Sometimes it rained, sometimes the sun shone. Some nights were idyllic, others only reminded me to appreciate my own bed again.I just kept on doing things, learning from my mistakes, building habits, making routine life a little more vivid and memorable. It is not always easy to do, but I am trying to teach myself to approach every day adventurously by embracing curiosity and encouraging excitement. I prefer this approach to trundling along the conveyor belt like an unloved plate of sushi until the next blip of excitement like a summer holiday or weekend away. I am learning to search for the beauty in every landscape. To develop a deeper appreciation by paying attention to details – the first buds of spring, the first swift, the globe's still working. The canvas of my life will be painted by thousands of these small moments, decisions and actions, not by a handful of dramatic splodges or events. I hope that the essence of microadventures is transferable to you. Microadventures is an idea anyone can use, whether you are a potter, a programmer, or a potholer. It offers a way to convert big ideas into small beginnings. If you dream of climbing Everest but can't get round to sleeping on top of your local hill, you need to know there's a glitch in your system. Dream up a massive, complicated, ambitious adventure. And then go do a tiny, simple one instead. This way, you will actually get on and do it. You will build momentum. And once you have momentum, the big adventure dreams take care of themselves. Over to You: What is your big dream? What is a tiny version of this? Schedule a date in your diary to do it.★ Support this podcast ★

The Doorstep Mile revisitedThe Doorstep Mile is so critical that I'm going to end this part with a plea for you not to skim over taking action on it.I firmly believe that the Doorstep Mile is the secret to making something more adventurous happen in your life. It might be buying a plane ticket, buying a map or buying a friend a coffee to chat about an idea. In my case, it often seems to be as mundane as sending an email.Simple, right?Do you agree?Do you now feel that getting started on your plan is easy (or at least feasible)?If not, then you are still thinking too big. Your first step is too large or complicated or emotional, and so it is intimidating. Try deconstructing into an even smaller series of tasks. For example:  Get on your bike this minute and cycle around the planet: Agh! Too scary. OK. You can leave later. But spend £1000 this minute on a new bike and camping gear: Agh! Too scary.  Text your mate, ‘I've had a daft idea. I reckon you might enjoy it. Beer on Friday?': Done. You're on your way… The problem is not that adventures are too big or too hard. It is not that you are too busy or broke. The problem is that we forget that beginning requires just a single step. Once you do that you are on your way and all the world now lies before you. In the next part of the book, we raise our eyes from these first steps to the distant horizon. Over to You: What is your Doorstep Mile action? When will you have done it by? ★ Support this podcast ★

Simple but not easyThe best adventures are simple. Simple but not easy.There is a subtle difference between the words. Writing a book is simple: sit down and write a thousand words every day for several months. Walking across India is simple: keep heading towards the sunset every day. Watching TV every evening is easy.Whatever you are planning, keep it as simple as possible. But don't make it easy. Don't settle.You are invited to the party. Now it is time to show up and dance.OVER TO YOU:  What do you dream of that is simple but not easy?  What is the Doorstep Mile action for that dream? ★ Support this podcast ★

The jumpIt is a hot summer's day. The sparkling river below is enticing. You'd love to take the plunge. It would feel glorious in there – so much better than being stuck here, hot and bothered like everyone else. But rather than leaping in, you remain on the riverbank feeling nervous. Vulnerable. You think to yourself, ‘What if it's cold?' You mop your brow and fret, ‘Oh, respectable people like me shouldn't be doing stuff like this.' You clutch tightly at the towel around your body, unwilling to let go and unleash your lily-white buttocks upon the world. ‘What will people think?' They might laugh at you.You summon up the will to dip your toe in the water. ‘There have to be easier things to do than this…' Sure enough, the first step into the water is shockingly cold. (That never changes, by the way.) ‘I knew this was a terrible idea!' You curse at yourself. The fun you imagined has been suffocated by the immediate discomfort and the worries in your mind. How much easier it would be to stay here where everybody else is.You almost retreat. Your mind whirls with thoughts of the cold and embarrassment, not to mention the monsters surely lurking beneath the surface, ready to drag you down to your doom. ‘They were right all along!' you cry, feeling very sorry for yourself. You shiver with cold and fear and your buttocks wobble. The pebbles in front of you look sharp. The sun beats down and the water sparkles.What happens next? Do you stay where you are – or will you jump? You take one more little step. And somehow, somehow, you persuade yourself to persevere. Little by little, step by tiny step, tiptoeing and yelping, you inch deeper into the water. Eventually, you lose patience, probably about when the cold water reaches your crotch. So you think ‘to hell with it', and you launch forwards. That's it: you've done it. One moment of committing, one small lunge across the point of no return. You're in!Gasp! Shock! Holy £*€%, it's cold! You emerge from under the water wide-eyed and shocked. You draw breath then whoop. And suddenly now you are splashing, grinning and hollering at all those timid souls on the riverbank. Look at them all, their towels clutched around their vulnerable bits. Dreaming of taking the plunge. Stewing and unhappy, unable to muster that one small step, that giant leap of faith. And look a little closer: they are not laughing at you. They are jealous!‘Come on in,' you yell. ‘It's great once you're in. Stop being such a wimp. All you gotta do is jump. Once you start, you won't regret it… God, it feels wonderful in here.'OVER TO YOU: The idea of living adventurously reminds me of skinny dipping. What's a comparative metaphor in your own life? What is your version of flinging off the towel of respectability and leaping in?★ Support this podcast ★

It is as easy as thisMaking the commitment to take the Doorstep Mile is difficult psychologically. But that first step is, practically speaking, almost absurdly easy. Adventure is as easy as this. Leave work. Meet up with friends. Head out of town. Watch the sunset. Sleep under the stars. Swim in a river. Head back to work. Being creative is as easy as this. Work out what you like making, reading, watching or hearing. Make it. Make more of it, but different, better and more personal. Starting a business is as easy as this. Decide what it is that you enjoy making or doing or being. Work out how that can solve someone's problem or make them happier. Make it. Do it. Be it. Start selling that thing. Make some more and sell that too. Make it better than before. OVER TO YOU: Write a version of these summaries for your own life. ‘‘Living adventurously is as easy as this:''★ Support this podcast ★

Sliding doorsAn innocuous decision can set off a ripple effect that changes your life, like the butterfly effect or a sliding doors moment. One choice, two directions for your life. Scene: The kitchen table, rain falling It would be wonderful to take good photographs. I'd love to capture the memories of my daughter growing up and our lovely holidays together.  I can't afford a big camera. I'm not artistic. My photos are always rubbish.  The End. Scene: The kitchen table, windows open and birds singing It would be wonderful to take good photographs. I'd love to capture the memories of my daughter growing up and our lovely holidays together.  I can't afford a big camera. I'm not artistic. My photos are always rubbish. But I do love looking at beautiful photography. I am going to start following more photographers on Instagram. Look! This photographer takes all her photos with the same phone as mine. She doesn't use an expensive camera.  Hmmm… these portraits are fabulous. It's interesting how she fills the frame much more than I do. I need to get closer and make each photo count. The golden hour? Let me Google that. Aha! So that is the secret of glowing landscape photography. I need to get up in the hills for sunrise, rather than snoozing through it. ‘What's that you say? I'm lucky to have such nice photographs of my daughter? That I must be so artistic and have an expensive camera?'  Over to You:  When have you shied away from doing something because it wouldn't be perfect?  Would ‘good' have been a preferable outcome to not done at all? ★ Support this podcast ★

Mojo plus oneI was once part of a team planning, training and fund-raising for an expedition to the South Pole. It was going to be a cracking adventure. I loved the guys I was working with. I was stronger than I had ever been in my life. I would be able to write a fabulous book afterwards. They were exciting times.But the expedition bank account was empty. We failed to secure enough sponsorship, and the expedition had to be postponed. Season after season the funding deadline came and went. After five years I accepted that this season had been my final chance to get to Antarctica. I withdrew from the expedition. I had failed.I spent the next week in the pub feeling sorry for myself. We had poured so much time and effort into the expedition, placed our varied lives and ambitions on hold and come together in pursuit of this one dream. And all for nothing. It felt so unfair. Why wouldn't someone give me piles of their hard-earned money so that I could go on a chilly camping holiday? More pressingly, what was I going to do with my life now that the beautiful blankness of Antarctica stretching off into the distance had been exchanged for the stark emptiness of my calendar stretching off into the distance?Here's what I decided, in a welcome moment of clarity at the bottom of an inappropriately-early-in-the-day pint of lager. I was going to stop feeling sorry for myself. And I was going to stop blaming the world. From now on, I was going to take responsibility for my adventures rather than waiting for mystery angel investors to swoop down and make my dreams come true. I was going to see an empty diary as a wonderful opportunity rather than the mark of a loser. And I was going to make stuff happen. Myself. Now.Six weeks later, instead of hauling a stupidly heavy sledge through the vast, inhospitable wasteland of Antarctica, I began hauling a stupidly heavy cart through the vast, inhospitable wasteland of Arabia instead. Ever since I first read about Wilfred Thesiger a dozen years earlier, I had wanted to make a journey of my own into the Empty Quarter desert. After putting it off for so long, I now made the expedition happen in just a month and a half. Disappointment led to simplicity and action. I planned to walk across a section of the Empty Quarter desert from Oman to Dubai. It was appealingly romantic in concept and simple (though not easy) in execution. The critical act was committing to it. I blocked the dates off in my diary. (See: I was lucky to have an empty diary, not cursed.) Second, for a fiery injection of peer pressure and accountability, I told people what I was going to do. Then I recruited someone to come with me. I didn't really know Leon, though we would become good friends. It was enough that Leon's reputation suggested he was competent to handle what the trip demanded, enthusiastic about making it happen and willing to commit despite neither of us knowing what we needed to commit to. (I prefer not to ruminate on why I need to find a new partner for each big expedition and that nobody comes with me twice…)Finally, we booked our plane tickets. This was a necessary symbolic and financial declaration of intent: a point of no return. Throughout this book, I have chosen to advocate a deliberately gung-ho, flippant approach to planning and to life. I've done this because very few people need urging to be more cautious or pessimistic. The internet and your parents are bursting with sensible advice. I don't have anything of much use to add. Leon and I prepared, trained and learned as much as we could before our too-soon-but-set-in-stone departure date. It certainly was not perfect preparation, but very few things in life require perfection at first. Perfect is splendid, but good enough is usually good enough. And perfect is the enemy of done. Bodge things from what you already have. Scale back your ambition if you are short of time or money. Ask folk to help. Making do feels good.You will never simultaneously have sufficient time, money and mojo. All I ever hope for is 'mojo plus one'.The start of our Empty Quarter expedition was a farce. My favourite ones often are. This is what happens when you get going before you are ready. But the alternative would have seen me still at home two years later, deep in cart research, seeking funding and perfection, and hiding my lack of guts behind excuses. Whether you operate in the worlds of Minimal Viable Products, cajoling your kid away from a screen and into a stream, or merely making a crap cart to haul across a hot desert because it makes you feel alive, the principal remains the same. First, commit. Then, begin. Everything else follows.Our DIY desert adventure was seemingly a world away from the original South Pole journey I was so disappointed to have failed at. There were fewer penguins and less money: two thousand quid of my own cash versus £1,700,000 of corporate sponsorship. There was no glossy website or press release, no social media strategy or 'world first' record. No book deal or swanky speaking gigs.But the new expedition still contained the core ingredients that had enticed me into committing five years trying to get to Antarctica. A hard challenge with a friend, a journey in the footsteps of a hero in a land I would never otherwise have experienced, a good story and great memories. Leon and I successfully completed the trek and made a film, Into the Empty Quarter, that we were both proud of. Do I regret not making it to Antarctica? Hell, yeah! Did I enjoy the journey that transpired in its place? Very much. You can't always get what you want, sang the Rolling Stones, but if you try – sometimes – you get what you need. If you think that your life would be better by making a change, then why wait? The best time is now.Over to You: What are you over-thinking and over-planning?  How can you simplify it?  What would happen if you stopped planning and began immediately? ★ Support this podcast ★

Ready, fire, aimIt took years of dreaming and then eight months of proper planning before I set off on my first adventure. Once I was underway, cycling eastwards into a crisp European autumn, it dawned on me that all I was doing was going for a bike ride and a camping trip. What had all the fuss been about? You need a bike, a tent, a map, a passport and some cash. That's about it. Pedal until you're tired, then camp for the night. Repeat the process 1500 times, and you'll be done.Consider how long you would take to get ready for a weekend bicycle trip. You'd pack your camping gear, a raincoat and toothbrush and check your wallet was in your pocket. Then you pump up the tyres and off you go. Easy. So why my years of protracted fuss getting ready for what was nothing more than a longer bike ride? As I pedalled further away from home, I learned the answer to this question. It offers a counterpoint to my mantra of instant, reckless launches. I came to understand that the importance of the planning was that it gave me the confidence I needed to begin. Preparation and organisation helped me overcome the fear of the unknown and prize myself away from cosy inertia towards a tipping point of commitment. As the ride unfolded, I worked out how to put up my tent more quickly and how to fix punctures at -40 degrees (put the pump down your pants to keep the seals from cracking). I got the hang of communicating without a common language. I learned the knack of organising visas for despotic countries. I developed the resilience to accept that it was up to me to solve every problem myself or else pluck up the nerve to ask a stranger for help. In other words, I learned how to cycle around the world by cycling round the world. Without all the planning beforehand, however, I would not have dared to set off. To know nothing but still toss my life up in the air and go would have demanded a gung-ho boldness far beyond my personality.For many projects, you don't need much more than the confidence to begin. ‘Ready, fire, aim!' is a good mantra (unless you are jumping out of an aeroplane or doing heart surgery). It is more effective than ‘Ready, aim, fire', because that often becomes, ‘Ready, aim – faff, faff, faff, faff – postpone.'It is easy to confuse planning with stalling. Planning must not be an excuse to delay. Planning helped me cast light on the darkness, tack some answers to my concerns and reduce the chances of early failure or capitulation. It reassured those close to me that my scheme was not total madness. In this context, planning was useful, important and necessary. It was the tool that gave me confidence and an exercise in pragmatic recklessness. OVER TO YOU: What practical planning steps do you need to get on with?  List them, rank them, then take action on Number 1. ★ Support this podcast ★

The time will never be perfectWhen you are young, you're too young. When you're old, you are too old. When you are broke, you can't afford it. When you have a little money, you want a little more. Before you begin, you have no idea what you are doing and need to learn more. Before you begin, you have no momentum. And there will always be one more item on the To-Do list before you are ready.Simply put, it is never the perfect time to begin. And so we kick the can of our cherished but elusive dreams down the road until 'the time is right' while simultaneously pushing the wasted years out of our mind. Generally, life pans out like this: there is a period of your youth when you have time and courage but no money. Then come the years when you have enough dosh, but now you have no time. When you finally approach the sunlit uplands of having both cash and spare time, your knees have packed up, you can't get up into the hills any more, and all you want is a blue rinse or a blue passport.Many people look forward to becoming less busy in the future for their adventurous plans. This pains me for two reasons: 1. You and I are both battling a terminal illness with no cure and a 100% fatality rate. It is called Life. We will all be dead within a few decades. Deferring living adventurously is, therefore, madness, albeit a madness that is so prevalent in society as to be regarded as standard. It astonishes me how few people rage against this. The risk of living a life that you do not want in the hope that it might eventually buy you the freedom you yearn for is a hell of a chance to take. 2. Living adventurously is not mutually exclusive to 'real life'. It does not have to be one or the other. You can be both an accountant and live a life bubbling with curiosity and passion.So here is some advice from a wise old man of 42, who recently succumbed to reading glasses and whose beard is now flecked with grey. The best time to begin living adventurously was years ago. The second best time is right now. Whatever time you can spare is better than no time at all. However much money you have is enough to do something. Whatever knowledge you have is enough to get started. Whatever you are capable of is enough for today. Over to You:  If you were ordered to start your dream project today, regardless of the obstructions in your way, what would you do?  How would you make it happen? ★ Support this podcast ★

BeginningsMon, 24 Dec 2007, 21:08From: AlastairTo: BenSubject: SOUTHHi Ben,Having a wonderful time in Hawaii - been out whale watching and running this morning.But I can't stop thinking about my future expeditions. So I decided to write and ask in all seriousness if I can join your SOUTH team? I am writing because I will regret it if I do not, but also because you know me well enough to be able to say 'No!' without embarrassment or worry...! Look forward to chatting in the New Year when I get home. Hope you have a warm, sunny Christmas, like me,Al––––––––––––––Fri, 20 Nov 2015, 11:56From: AlastairTo: Becks ViolinSubject: Can you teach me the violin really quickly?hi Becks,I found your email via Google. I'm looking to learn the violin. But I have a slightly unusual plan...I'm an adventurer and author. My favourite ever travel book is 'As I Walked Out One Midsummer Morning'. Laurie Lee walked across Spain in the 1930s, living from busking. I want to retrace his journey, living entirely from busking. But I cannot play the violin!Can you teach me to play a few cool busking songs so that I don't starve to death on the trip?!I'm 38, I did Grade 2 piano when I was 10.  I'm willing to work hard and we've got until the summer to learn...Are you up for the challenge?Alastair––––––––––––––Thurs, 5 Sep 2012, 16:10From: AlastairTo: LeonSubject: Walkhi Leon,Hypothetically speaking, would you be interested in another long walk?! 6-8 weeks. Desert. Pulling a cart. Nov-Dec. Home for Xmas...AlMany of the best things I have done began with an email. They are so brief, flippant and non-binding. Scribble an email, click send. Worst case scenario? You regret it in the morning and hastily back out. Easy as that. You haven't got much to lose. Hopefully, however, you get up tomorrow and follow this small beginning with another small beginning. And you keep repeating that until those little steps accumulate into something that you look on with surprise and pride. OVER TO YOU: Send someone a brief email that will pique their curiosity about an adventure. CC me in if you like: alastairhumphreys+thedoorstepmile@gmail.com★ Support this podcast ★

Dear Mr WalkerPedalling away my front door was a big moment. But my most pivotal Doorstep Mile, the one where I truly summoned up the nerve to do what I really wanted to do, had come months earlier. The moment I committed to living adventurously happened sitting at a desk. It arrived amongst the rush and noise of Biology lessons and lunchtime duties at a secondary school near Oxford. I was a trainee teacher taking my first steps on an interesting, satisfying career ladder. A respectable job, money enough, shedloads of holidays and a nice pension. My mum would be happy.So I was flattered when the Headmaster offered me a permanent position on the teaching staff. This was it! Acknowledgement that I was good at something. And a meal ticket, road map and safety net for the rest of my life. I thought hard about the offer for a couple of days, then sat down one evening to write my formal letter of reply.'Dear Mr. Walker,I would definitely enjoy working here on a permanent basis…However, there is so much to see and do in the world…If I was to settle into teaching now I am sure that I would enjoy it, but there would always be something gnawing at me…Therefore I have decided that I am going to go ahead with my original plan to take 2 or 3 years cycling around the globe. I believe that my experiences on the road will only serve to improve my teaching skills when I do decide to return to teaching…Deep down I know that [teaching is] probably the sensible option. However, even deeper down I know that if I have the chance to do something now and do not take it, I may always regret it.Yours Sincerely…'Well done, my young me. Well done and thank you!OVER TO YOU: Who do you need to write a letter like this to? Write it now. Dare you send it?★ Support this podcast ★

Going for a bike rideI am often asked, ‘what is the hardest thing you have ever done?'Generally, they want to hear me boast of hauling a heavy cart through the Empty Quarter desert or battling to put up a tent in freezing temperatures. These things are difficult. Uncomfortable, too. But, honestly, they are not life-changingly difficult.There is only one adventurous act which has significantly altered the direction of my life. One warm summer morning, I climbed onto my bicycle and went for a ride, after a long sleep in my soft bed and a large breakfast.I often detect a look of mild disappointment on the questioner's face. ‘Going for a bike ride' is not the answer they wanted.But beginning trying to cycle around the world was the hardest part of all my adventures. Pedalling away in search of uncertainty and the great unknown. Everything interesting in my life has followed on from that.Changing direction is often harder than the new thing you are going to begin. For me, the change of direction was stepping away from the conventional world and sensible progression of work, promotion and bank holidays.To say, ‘I am going a different way' was frightening and isolating.It risked alienating people close to me. It risked being left alone, high and dry if the tide rushed out and everything changed. It risked failing. It risked a great deal.But, at the same time, it also eliminated another risk. The risk of getting old and wondering what might have been. The lesson of that sunny morning has served me well time and again. The hardest part of most things is summoning the nerve to climb onto your bicycle and push off down the street. The rest eventually takes care of itself. OVER TO YOU: What is the hardest thing you have ever begun? Reflecting back, how does it make you feel?★ Support this podcast ★

The Doorstep MileIt is often only a small jump that stands between where we are and where we want to be. Leaping from a high rock into a sunlit river, asking for a pay rise or speaking to the attractive stranger who keeps catching your eye. But it can be so hard to act even when we know that one small step is all it takes. Why do we do this to ourselves? And does everyone struggle the same way? (Short answer: yes.)When I begin an expedition, I do not stand on the start line beating my chest with excitement, raring to go and exuberant at the journey ahead. I am much more likely to be tired from a sleepless night, a bit tearful and full of doubt. I never think, 'Woohoo! Isn't this wonderful?' (Besides, if I ever did, then I would accuse myself of being on a 'holiday' rather than an 'expedition'.)I vow that if I make it home, I will never do something as daft as this again. I will spend the rest of my life sitting on the sofa with the curtains closed, eating ice cream straight from the tub and binge-watching box sets. I will die fat, pale, unloved, lonely… but blissfully happy. 'Never again,' I declare every time.I used to berate myself for being pathetic rather than intrepid. How could I claim to be an AdventurerTM when I found it so hard to begin adventures? Time after time, I questioned whether this was the right life for me. Thankfully, the Norwegians have a phrase that encapsulates this difficulty of starting a journey. Enter the Vikings, striding to my rescue… Picture the scene in Norway. You're all cosy and warm in your lovely log cabin, relaxing on your IKEA furniture, Skyping your pals, playing Minecraft, eating meatballs, sipping Carlsberg and listening to ABBA on Spotify (and any other slanderous Scandinavian stereotypes you can dream up to rile your Norwegian friends…) Snuggled in front of the fire with your beautiful blonde lover, the prospect of stepping out into the swirling snowstorm to start a long and challenging journey is not at all appealing. You shudder. And yet you know you must start. You are, after all, a Viking at heart.The Norwegians refer to this moment as the Dørstokkmila. The Doorstep Mile. Leaving your front door is the longest mile of any journey.I wish I had known about the Doorstep Mile years ago, for it puts a name to the nervy feeling I have experienced so often. I used to think I was lazy or a coward. But actually it was not just me: it is a common enough hurdle to have a name! If you can deal with your Doorstep Mile, then you are in a strong position to accomplish more than you imagine. As simple as that. As enormous as that. Dream big but start small.And this is all that I have to offer you. This is the heart of the entire book and everything I know about coaxing myself to live more adventurously.  When I found it hard to commit to adventures, I should have put the enormity out of my mind, and just climbed into the boat, clipped into the pedals, or taken the first step. Think of the massive thing you dream of accomplishing. Now work out what is the tiniest increment of that, This is what you need to begin with. To remove the emotional baggage of your own dreams, look at these goals and consider what small step you would take towards them.  • You want to climb Everest? Go sleep on a hill. • You want to run a marathon? Put your trainers on and go for a jog. • You want to start a business? Phone a friend to talk about ideas. • You want to ease your money worries a little? Put your loose change in a saving jar by the front door.  • You want to become fluent in French? Eat some brie. The Doorstep Mile action should quicken the pulse, but not so much that you do not dare act. If you still feel overwhelmed or tempted to procrastinate, then you are thinking too big. You do not have to set your trousers on fire straight away. The Doorstep Mile needs to be an action so simple that there is no valid reason not to do it, so small that no plausible obstruction remains in your way. Keep breaking down your Doorstep Mile into smaller and less scary steps. Eventually, you have to either act or accept that the only barrier left in the way is your own wimpishness. Whether you choose to do anything about that is up to you. Over to You: What is an enormous, audacious idea you dream unrealistically about? What is the Doorstep Mile action you can take, right now, that will get you started in that direction? Write it down. Even better, make it public (put it on social media, stick a note on the fridge, CC everyone in an email) and appoint a commitment referee to harass you into action.  When will you have done it by? (Any later than this weekend counts as wimpish procrastination! Most questions in this book encourage thought. This one demands action.) ★ Support this podcast ★

An invitation to the partyA company once invited me to their offices to give a talk about my favourite books. They suggested I talk for half an hour or so about six books I loved. It was a literary version of Desert Island Discs. It sounded interesting as well as a deliciously hard selection to make. I like books. I've read more than six. I'm quite happy about giving talks. I replied, ‘hell yeah!'So why did I feel unusually nervous on my way to the event?I was worried because I was not an expert. I am not a ‘Literary Critic'. I found Ulysses boring and loved the Da Vinci Code. I did not belong in the lofty world of book reviewing. Despite having written several books of my own, I never think of myself as an ‘author'. What right did I have to pontificate about Good Books?I have every right.But I only realised this several minutes into my talk. At first, I felt a fraud as I stood up and clicked into my PowerPoint presentation. I mumbled and avoided catching the boss's eye. If I am ever asked to do a similar event again, I will do a better talk. It would be more concise and articulate. More professional, perhaps, for I fear my ramblings were a little amateur. [A quick detour: the etymology of the word ‘amateur' derives from being a ‘lover of' something. That does not mean it is worse than being a professional. The spirit of the enthusiastic amateur is a vital component of this book. Do what you do because you love it. Or do what you do to the best of your ability and learn to love it. From this love and repetition will stem confidence, competence and momentum. So don't play down the role of the amateur. Indeed, turning ‘pro' – getting paid – can at times take the fun and simplicity out of what you are doing.]Anyway, back to my stuttering PowerPoint. At some point in the talk, I noticed I was no longer nervous and began to relax. The audience was actually interested in what I was saying. They were listening carefully. Most had never read my choices of book or heard about some of the stories. Therefore I was more of an expert than I'd appreciated. I knew more than my audience. I had feared raised eyebrows, but the response was much more positive. At the end of the talk, a cluster of people gathered round to ask questions or thank me for introducing them to new books. And I tucked into the evening's free beer and canapés with gusto. So now let me invite you to the party too.‘Come on in! You're very welcome. Whatever it is you are hesitant about, let me invite you to start. If you're already on the way, I give you permission to continue at full throttle.'It's up to you now to decide if you're going to turn up and shine. Whichever world you want to be a part of, just show up and get dancing.Dithering on the edge of the dance floor looks and feels so awkward (I know that only too well…) But everyone loves the person who thinks ‘to hell with it'. The one dancing under the lights like a loon, with all their heart and soul. Begin to the best of your amateur ability. Work hard at it. Get better at it. Enjoy it. It's going to be a hell of a party. You have a choice. And you have permission. In the next part of the book, it is time to begin.OVER TO YOU:Which party do you want an invitation to?In case you are curious, here are the six books I chose to speak about. The Worst Journey in the World (an example of the historical expeditions that originally got me interested in adventure travel.) As I Walked Out One Midsummer Morning (an example of superb travel writing.) Moondust (the greatest ever adventure and a nod towards the future of expeditions.) Arabian Sands (the inspiration for the first adventure film I made.) Feet in the Clouds (an example of UK endeavour and living adventurously for 'normal' people.) For Whom the Bell Tolls (an example of exemplary adventurous fiction.) ★ Support this podcast ★

The imposter syndrome The majority of bold ideas are extinguished by nothing more than the top two inches of our heads – our brains. The whole world is waiting if only we can overcome the space between our ears and get out there.Often the biggest challenge of all is persuading ourselves to enter the race in the first place. We write ourselves off before we have even tried because we think we do not belong. Welcome to the Imposter Syndrome! This is an excellent time to debunk the myth that writing is only for Writers, adventure is only for Adventurers and that to be an actual ‘Adventurer' you have to be some sort of superhero. (Or, at least have a trust fund.) None of that is me. I quit learning to write after English GCSE. I spent most of my student days watching daytime telly, doing bicycle obstacle courses around our flat, eating deep-fried pizzas and generally mucking about.At some point, I decided that before I settled down, I should try to do something difficult. Just for the hell of it. To see what it would be like and discover how I got on. I enjoyed reading books about adventure. Crazy men and women and their out-of-the-ordinary, life-affirming journeys. The trouble was, those people were amazing. It didn't seem possible that someone like me could do anything like that.If you want to drag a sledge through a frozen wilderness, I thought, you need to be a superb physical specimen. I was [am] not. I have no natural talent. That was my first problem. The second problem was money. Those epic adventures all seemed to cost fat piles of cash. I was a student. I ate value brand baked beans. The third issue was that to cross oceans or scale mountains, you need to be able to tie all sorts of clever knots and know which way round to put on your crampons. I had none of the necessary skills and did not feel as though I belonged to that world. I was an imposter. But I was still curious, so I decided to find out a little more. I visited the Royal Geographical Society in London, the spiritual home of British expeditions. Gazing up at the statue of Shackleton on the front of the austere red brick building, I almost chickened out. Yet once I braved myself to cross the doorstep, I fell instantly in love with its hallowed halls. That continues to this day; I get excited every time I visit. 200 years of history, 2 million maps and artefacts, cheap beer and adventure nerds: this was everything I dreamed of.But my CV read, ‘Alastair Humphreys, wannabe Adventurer, no talent, no skill, not much cash.'This was not a good beginning. Three hefty hurdles in my way.But look a little closer, and you can see the situation differently, like those weird 3D magic eye pictures. Shove your nose up to the page, scrunch up your eyes and look in a new way. With a bit of mental trickery, a new image reveals itself. A unicorn! A vase of flowers! And a dawning realisation that neither talent nor skill nor money were insurmountable problems. It was true enough that my lack of physical prowess was probably going to keep me from the Olympics. I would also be wise to steer clear of a free solo climb in Yosemite for my first challenge. Even money was something I could find a way around through my choice of adventure and a diet of banana sandwiches. What ran much deeper than these obstructions was the worry that I would be shouted down as an imposter. I only wanted to blend in. I faced two choices. I could let out a sigh and go back to reading books about adventure, but treating them as vicarious enjoyment rather than career advice textbooks. (That might well have been the sensible thing to do, by the way.) Or the other option was to think, ‘I don't have much talent, skill, or cash, but what can I do? What adventure does not need much of these things? What is still possible?' And that is when I decided to go for a long bike ride. I already owned a bike and knew how to ride it; I could buy a tent and learn how to put it up. I had a passport and some cash: I had everything you need to cycle all the way around the planet. If you can ride for a day and camp for a night, then you are ready to cross a continent.I only had £7000, which was nowhere near sufficient, but it was enough to give it a good go. So that is what I set off to try to do – to give it a good go. And ever since, that is all I have ever done. After each trip the feeling of not belonging diminished, making it ever easier to begin the next one.What's that I hear? ‘This is all very well for you to say! It was easy for you. You are so handsome and heroic!'What's that? Nobody is shouting that? I'm disappointed. OK, let me try again…What's that I hear? Oh yes, it's the voices in your head shouting again, ‘this is all very well for you to say! It was easy for you. You're an Adventurer. You have so much talent, so much skill, so much cash. But my life is different because…'I do not deny that many factors have eased my journey. I am a well-educated, white, middle-class, able-bodied male with a British passport. I score appallingly on any diversity index or sympathy scale of battling the odds. But my individual situation is not the issue here. The critical point is that we all have the choice to make the most of what we have. The imposter syndrome is not only a scary barrier that can paralyse all of us when we look to change the way we live. It is also a whopping, juicy excuse to hide behind. So be gone with the excuses.Do not eliminate yourself from the race simply because you feel like an imposter.OVER TO YOU: Can you remember an occasion when you felt imposter syndrome? What happened, how did it feel, and how did you resolve it? Do you ever think ‘people like me can't do that'? What is an example? Is it true? Is it an excuse? Is it surmountable? If it is not, what new direction will you choose to try? ★ Support this podcast ★

I choose not to Here are a few things I have said to myself. I can't spare time to head to the hills. I can't afford this adventure. I can't go to the gym. I can't begin writing a book yet. Do these sort of problems sound familiar?If so, here's an experiment to try. Instead of saying, 'I don't have the time to do this', say – out loud – the same phrase but beginning with 'I choose not to'. I choose not to use my time to head to the hills. I choose not to spend my money on this adventure. I choose not to go to the gym. I choose not to begin writing a book yet. OUCH! That small twist in the phrasing puts a totally different emphasis on each sentence. It tips the responsibility onto me, rather than seeing myself at the mercy of the cruel caprices of the universe. It shows me what my priorities truly are. 'I don't prioritise time for heading to the hills. I don't prioritise writing a book.'Of course, there are limits on our lives. The universe does occasionally kick you where it hurts. And few of us have as much time, money or expertise as we'd like to have.So there will be many times when we can't get what we want. Wishing for something will not make it come true. I spent a long time feeling despondent because all my efforts to publish my first book were coming to naught. I have never managed my dream of living in the mountains. I have never won one of the three adventure film prizes I covet. Tough luck, that's life. Dreaming big is not enough. Following a passion or having a fire inside you does not bend the universe to your desires, whatever people on social media say. But often, if you are burning with enthusiasm for something, and decide that it is sufficiently important to graft for, you can find a way to make it happen. The trick of saying out loud that I am choosing not to do something clears my head. It often makes me realise that what I thought was a genuine constraint is actually just a mental block or a convenient excuse. Above all, it makes plain to me where my priorities lie. Perhaps, deep down, I don't want this thing sufficiently to graft for it. I want to be the noun but don't have the stomach to do the verb. On the other hand, it can also put your mind at rest by accepting that an idea is genuinely beyond reach for now, and you should hatch a more pragmatic plan. Either way, you're undoubtedly now a little closer to an honest answer.OVER TO YOU:  List 5 things that you can't so.  Now try re-writing them with an 'I choose not to…' slant instead.  How do they sound now? Unfair? Wrong? Or a little too close to the bone? ★ Support this podcast ★

When Harry met HarryYou probably have a friend like Harry from the last chapter. The one whose life conundrums you have dissected over a thousand bottles of wine. From your side of the table, the changes they should make are so apparent (‘Dump him! Quit! Go blonde!') Yet all your friend ever does is moan, ‘no, but…' (What you might not have considered, incidentally, is that if your friend reads this, there is a good chance that it would be you she was thinking of right now. It is far easier to offer advice to others than heed it ourselves. He says, writing an entire bloody book on the subject…) So if you're struggling like Harry, then try this eccentric exercise. Make a list of all the grumbles and problems you are facing. Before you can move forward, you need to cast light upon what is blocking the way. Feel better for venting all that? Good. Now, get in a fresh round of drinks, swap seats with an imaginary mate. Change hats, and now you become the benevolent-but-firm adviser. Read out the grumbles list and listen to your good-looking friend complaining about all the obstacles in their way. (Wow, they really do naval gaze and feel sorry for themselves, don't they?) When your friend eventually pauses for breath, dispense your advice. Tell them the solutions that are clear with the benefit of not being tied up in emotion and baggage. The reason this thought experiment has power is because, deep down, we generally know the right course to walk in life. We could work things out ourselves. We know why we should do something. We understand how to do it. We can see what the first step should be. But when you have skin in the game, it is hard to get started and much easier to hide behind excuses and a good old grumble in the pub.Our heads are really not our best allies! For example,We know we want to lose a little weight, but still we eat all the delicious crisps.We know we have a large pile of engaging books piled on our bedside table (what the Japanese call ‘tsundoku'), but we scroll vacuously through our phone instead.We know we'd like to be fitter, but we turn on our favourite TV show instead of tying up our trainers.We know how delighted we would be to look back on a life lived adventurously, but instead we…These are the result of present bias (putting more emphasis on ‘me right now' than ‘future me'), and it is a pretty universal curse we all suffer from.This is a simpler version of the wake-up call of writing two obituaries for your life; one that follows your current trajectory and one for the life you wish you dared to live. You might consider scribbling two quick iterations of these on facing pages of a notebook for ease of comparison. If, after all these exercises, you are still undecided about which direction you genuinely want to go, then the tiebreaker comes from tossing a coin to decide. Heads, you get your head down in the office and hope for promotion every couple of years until you're 65. Tails, you quit and start building wooden boats. It's only a game, so there's nothing to fear. Toss the coin and let the universe decide… I'll let you into a secret. This is not about trusting your life to a coin toss. You are not letting the universe decide. When the coin lands you will notice that one outcome leaves you feeling slightly thrilled, the other a little deflated. You now know from deep inside your heart which direction you truly want to go. Whether to honour heads or tails.OVER TO YOU: Write on a piece of paper, ‘I have a choice to do _________ or remain doing ______________'Now toss a coin and let the universe decide.★ Support this podcast ★

I wish I could do what you doA young man approached me at the end of one of my talks. He wore a smart suit and sported a deep tan.'I wish I could do what you do,' he said wistfully. Haven't we all felt this way at one time or another? I wish I could paint, but I have no talent; I wish I could be in a band, but I don't have the skills. I wish, I wish, I wish… Harry introduced himself. He was a management consultant, 23-years-old and earning good money in the City. As we shook hands, I asked, 'What do you mean that you wish you could do what I do?' All I had spoken about that evening were some trips I'd been on. It wasn't as though I'd given a talk about doing life-saving surgery on tiny babies. Harry's answer to my question was revealing, in so much that he did not have an answer. 'Just… all… this!' He waved his arms vaguely at the large screen behind us. It showed the last image from my presentation. Harry was a single young man. He had no mortgage and was physically fit. What could be stopping him from doing whatever he truly wanted with his life?I glanced up at the picture on the screen. A little red tent in Iceland's spectacular wilderness, a smoking volcano in the distance. That had been one helluva trip. Meanwhile, back in London, I was shutting down my laptop and packing up a big box of books. I had not sold as many as I hoped I would. Carrying them home again was both a hassle and an indignity. I needed to hurry if I was to catch the last train. I hadn't eaten yet. Hopefully, I could grab a sandwich at the station. None of this reality was very adventurous or enviable, I thought wryly. But I didn't say that to Harry. 'I wish I could do what you do' is a common reaction coming from the barrier of fear.Instead, I pointed up at the screen and asked a question.'What is stopping you doing that?'Harry umm-ed and ahh-ed and could not articulate what was inhibiting him. Not only was he unsure what he wanted to do, but he also did not know what was stopping him from leading the life of his choice. Harry was stuck. Every idea I suggested he pushed back against with a negative response. 'No, but I don't have time… No, but I don't have enough money… No, but I don't know the right people…'Conscious that I needed to hurry to catch the train, I picked up my heavy box of unsold books and wrapped up the conversation. I suggested that on the way home Harry should write some lists. I often write lists to sort out my head and make things plain when I'm trying to figure my life out (sometimes while listening to a little Années de pèlerinage). Pour yourself a coffee and pour out your thoughts. I listed two lists to begin with. Things Harry was dreaming of doing with his life and why he wanted to do them. All that was holding him back. Afterwards, Harry would face a choice. He could work out a way to make List 1 happen by dealing with List 2. Or he could chuck them away and do his best to become satisfied with the way things were. Both are valid options. Both can lead to happy and fulfilling lives. But only one qualifies as living adventurously. OVER TO YOU: Make two lists, side by side. A list of the things you dream of doing.  A list of all that is holding you back.  What are you going to do about these?★ Support this podcast ★

Where did it all go wrong?When I give talks at primary schools, I sometimes ask, 'who would like to cycle around the world?' Every child flings an arm in the air.Ask the same question to a roomful of adults and the response is very different. You get some chuckles at such a childish question. One or two eye-rolls ('of course I'd love such an adventure, but it's obviously not realistic for me – I'm a normal person, not an AdventurerTM.') And much muttering about pension plans, dodgy knees, or the need to do a lot of research before buying a £10,000 bicycle… The audacity has gone. We have lost our boldness.All people dream, but not equally. Some have their heads filled to the brim with big ideas, crazy dreams, ambitious projects and optimistic hopes. They fizz with energy and curiosity. They answer with 'yes and' rather than 'no but.'All children and a few adults fit in this category.These adults are the ones who consider it lunacy to defer the life they dream of. Not only because the future is uncertain, but also because it's more fun to begin living that way right now.They choose their future and venture into the slipstream. These are the mad ones who launch themselves into projects and watch as they burn, burn, burn into a passion and a life well-lived.The rest of us have had some sense knocked into us.Over time the education system, the people we mix with and the conventions of society have dictated what people like us 'should' be doing with our lives. We watch our kids on the zip wire rather than jumping on ourselves. We rarely wear purple clothes with a red hat that doesn't go. We become, I am sorry to say, dull. Whilst the amount of time and money we have fluctuates over life, for the majority of people fear and inflexibility only increase with age. It never gets easier to start living adventurously. Real life is filled with handicaps, hardships, detours and dead ends. There are unavoidable and pragmatic limits on our wild, youthful declarations. Experience cautions us to become modest with our aspirations. Fear of failing and ridicule makes us downbeat about our potential and our opportunities.As time passes, these traits calcify, forming a protective shell around our vulnerable wishes. It's safer this way, perhaps, as a boat is safe in harbour. But that's not what boats are for, is it? When I began doing microadventures, I remember feeling guilty and childish. What was I doing climbing a hill when I should have been sitting at my desk? Why was a grown adult building a raft on a riverbank? It took time to unlearn this conditioning and re-remember to be childlike again.Nobody wants to look back on life with regret. But so many people do. The Top Five Regrets of the Dying is a poignant book written by Bronnie Ware, a palliative care nurse. Number One on the list was, 'I wish I'd had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.'You used to dance with joy or march in the streets or lose yourself learning about Star Wars. You didn't fret about what you 'should' be doing – you just did it. You didn't care that other kids knew more than you about the Galactic Empire.Can you remember your half-forgotten dreams and hopes? Might you be able to rekindle them within the framework of your busy life before it is too late? They might have to be moderated and amended, of course. But a dream is still a dream…Whatever life bestows on us, nothing need restrict our attitude, our curiosity or our imagination. Whether you are 25 or 52, you can still opt to reclaim the youthful enthusiasm you may have had wrung out of you. OVER TO YOU: What current behaviour or belief would a younger version of yourself view with astonishment or disgust?★ Support this podcast ★

The three stages of flabbinessThere are three stages of flabbiness in life, I realised years ago (and wrote about in There Are Other Rivers). The unsettling epiphany led to me deciding to walk from one coast of southern India to the other, through Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Kerala. Each stage of flabbiness is more restricting and stifling than the one before it. They creep insidiously over me like vines until it takes one hell of a struggle to escape their clutches. If ever I feel the saggy symptoms of flabbiness snuffling up on my life, then I know it is time to make some changes or hit the road. Only once I acknowledge the problems am I able to take the first small step towards fixing them and getting back on track. The first stage of flabbiness, and the easiest to fix, is physical flabbiness. It begins when busy schedules, dark winter days and eating too much win the devil's footrace against the part of me that knows that exercise isn't a waste of time but actually makes me more efficient, alert and happy. Despite knowing this, at times I am still sufficiently idle to let my standards slip and my fitness slide away. Fitness is like chasing a shoal of fish: difficult to get hold of, so easy to lose. If I don't go running for a few days, I feel cooped up and ratty. Leave it a few more, and the habit is broken. I know I need to run. But I can't be bothered. Flabbiness has begun to set in, slowly, invasively, like cataracts. Before I know it, I am easing out my belt buckle and blaming my sloth on the effects of age.The second stage is mental flabbiness. Give up exercising, stop forcing myself out the front door for a run, and inevitably my mind starts to sag too. I used to feel alert and inquisitive. I used to read lots of books. But one evening I come home tired. Flopping down onto the sofa, I reach for the television remote instead. I realise how pleasant life can be if I stop thinking about it. It is much simpler to exist than to live. I've got a dishwasher and a coffee percolator and I can drink at home with the TV on. I flick round and round the channels until I have frittered away enough of my life that it's time to go to bed. If I don't snap out of this quickly, then I'll soon be on a slippery slope towards the third, terminal, stage of flabbiness: moral flabbiness!Each day brings me closer to my death. No matter how aware I am of this, it is sometimes difficult to believe my days are numbered. I burn carelessly through weeks, even months, unable to restart living fully.I don't know when I will die, so putting important things off to an indeterminate date in an un-guaranteed future is pretty daft. There are so many places I still want to see, so many interesting people to meet, so much to do. And there is so little time. Before I know it I'll be dead and what a bloody waste that will be if I've just been arsing around.By the time I have succumbed to the debilitating onslaught of the first two stages of flabbiness, I am already well on the primrose path to moral flabbiness. Not only have I conceded my physical health and settled for candy floss in place of a brain, but I have also accepted that this is good enough for my life. This is ridiculous because I know that I am happiest when I have a sense of purpose. Instead, I have become comfortably numb. I have decided that scrolling through social media with a Chinese takeaway is sufficient return for the privilege of being born – healthy and intelligent enough – in one of the wealthiest, most free countries on the planet. I have a passport to explore the world. I will always be able to find some sort of work. I will never starve to death. It's hard really for me to come up with any decent excuses. The choice is all mine.Life is too brief and too magnificent to tiptoe through half-heartedly, rather than galloping at with whooping excitement and ambition. And so I explode with outrage just in time. I need to get back into the wild. It is time to live deeply once again. It is time to sort my life out. This can be done in two ways. I either jump in the nearest cold river for a bracing swim, or I make a plan, set a start date and, come what may, begin.OVER TO YOU: What are your symptoms of flabbiness that are an early warning of a deeper malaise? Physical Flabbiness: Mental Flabbiness:  Moral Flabbiness? ★ Support this podcast ★

What is failure? Shakespeare wrote 37 plays. Why didn't he write 40? Serena Williams has won 23 Grand Slam titles. But what about the times she lost? Were they failures? Or were they lessons? What if she tried harder or played better during some of those defeats than in her victories: should that not merit applause? Penny Lane, Last Christmas, Wonderwall and Fairytale of New York are well-known songs. But they each failed to reach Number 1. What standard should we measure failure or success by? Commit! Live your best life! All this motivational stuff is easier said than done, of course. It is undoubtedly hard to do. But it is made worse by the looming shame of failure that our society has hoisted overhead. This blocks out half the sun and scares us like rabbits in the headlights. The shame often has more significant aftershocks than the failed venture itself. What the hell is failure anyway?Failure is a powerful beast standing in the way of living more adventurously. I prefer to believe that merely by beginning, by having a go and trying our best, we have succeeded in something meaningful. The only thing that truly counts as failure is not daring to try.Imagine if society applauded endeavour. Consider if we saved the mocking for those who never began, rather than those stout souls who stand out from the crowd, roll up their sleeves and say, 'I'll give it a shot.'Regardless of what happens after that, we have attempted something to be proud of. Living adventurously dares us to lean into the prospect of failure. There is little excitement or challenge in sticking with things we are good at or doing only stuff we know we can accomplish. Excitement, learning and a sense of satisfaction are earned by overcoming the prospect of failure. You have to dare yourself to roll the dice.Every person who reads this is – on a global scale – moderately well-educated and affluent. I hesitate to speak for you, so I'll use myself as an example. If I gambled on an idea that failed and all my work and vanished right this moment, I would still be OK. I could find a job, earn money, buy food and stay alive. I would not die. If I fail, I will not die.What then do I fear about committing to a new project? Losing money? Losing self-respect? The sneers of peers?Money I can get more of.My self-respect should remain intact if I tried my best.Therefore it must be the thought of 'told you so' that scares me the most.In which case, I need to re-read Roosevelt's 'Man in the Arena' speech, stick two fingers up at the doubters and then just crack on with what I am doing.It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.OVER TO YOU:How do you define 'failure'?★ Support this podcast ★

If I had no fearOcean rowing sounds a dangerous business. There's no knowing what could wrong when you venture onto the Atlantic in a 9-metre rowing boat with no motor, sails or support boat. All sorts of fears preoccupied me before we began. You would be a fool not to reflect on the potential hazards of a big adventure (not to mention the endless, too-close proximity of naked, hairy arses covered in salt sores). But providing you keep yourself attached to the boat, keep an eye out for collision hazards and ensure the boat's hatches are always sealed shut, then nothing catastrophic should happen. You won't drown, and you won't sink. You'll probably be fine. Ocean rowing, therefore, provides an excellent example of perceived risk versus real danger. It sounds terrifying, yet most threats remain within your control.Consider this distinction in your own plans. What are you scared of that is holding you back? Are they genuine dangers? They might, perhaps, be financial risks rather than physical ones. These should not be dismissed lightly. How can you mitigate them?Now compare the real dangers with the demons keeping you awake, which are nothing more than worries inside your mind. The uncertainty, the unknown, the prospect of losing control. Before the row, I had lumped all of these things together as ‘failure', and together they scared me. The stigma of failure. What people would think. Feeling like an imposter. These should not be in the same league as losing your house or being eaten by a shark. Yet they often hold an even tighter grip on our actions. I was anxious as we rowed out of the harbour, past cafés full of people relaxing in the sunshine. A boy fishing on the end of the harbour wall did not notice us pass. On the hillside above the town, a farmer in a red shirt ploughed his field. Meanwhile, each stroke of the oars took us closer towards a point of no return. It felt like katabasis, a trembling descent into the Underworld in a quest for heightened knowledge. Or summat like that. This much was clear: we were leaving the safe world behind and gambling it on a monstrosity of big waves, seasickness, pain, exhaustion and anxiety. It felt absurd.For the first few days, the experience was hideous. I was, in so many ways, out of my depth. Between the hours at the oars, the snatched scraps of sleep, the damp loneliness and the endless puking, something monumental began to sink into my thoughts. No matter how much I willed it, there was no way off this boat. A bag stuffed with a million dollars could not have helped me. I would have swapped it for an hour's sleep anyway.(Back on dry land, I find it helpful to compare my worries with being out in a storm in a leaking boat in the middle of the night with raw buttocks, a bucket for a toilet and a diet of disgusting dehydrated food for a month and a half. Perspective is a handy tool.)It is rare to do something where, even if you are desperate, there is no option of quitting and scurrying off to somewhere a little cosier and safer. Out at sea, there was no way to say, ‘Sayonara, punks. I'm done with this.' Our nearest neighbours were the astronauts on the International Space Station. We were truly on our own. There was no escape. We were in this for the long haul now. I found the prospect appallingly bleak. I felt very small.But this also meant that the only thing we could do was keep rowing. Stroke after stroke, day after day, week after week. If we kept rowing and did the key bits correctly (harnesses clipped on, avoid collisions, close hatches) then eventually we would hit land and success. In other words, although the trip seemed brutal at the time, it was almost impossible to fail.This realisation came upon me gradually, in the same way that you row through a long, dark night and dawn creeps up almost imperceptibly. You don't notice it, you don't notice it and then – suddenly – it is light again. The sun broaches the horizon, the doubts and weariness of the night are blasted away, and someone cranks up the tunes and hands you a cup of tea (and some nasty Slovenian porridge).This was a turning point for me. Accepting that there was no way to quit and understanding that we were unlikely to fail was liberating. Being fully committed is exhilarating. I stopped worrying, stopped churning through exhausting negative hypothetical thoughts and set about learning to savour the crazy experience.I admit it is easier to say this than to actually do it – an ocean row is not a typical scenario. But wouldn't it make all our lives and plans so much more enjoyable, unshackled and zippy if we just relaxed a little about the connotations of failure? If you knew that you wouldn't fail, what would you do and when would you begin it? OVER TO YOU: If you had no fear and if you knew that you wouldn't fail, what would you do?When would you begin that thing?★ Support this podcast ★

The inner fearHaving glibly dispatched the tyrannies of money and time in a couple of perfunctory chapters – kerpow – it is time to encounter perhaps the most universal barrier of all: the chattering voices in our head. For simplicity, I've lumped them all together under the label of 'fear'. It is essential to untangle actual barriers from the stuff inside our head that forms the heavy weight of resistance. 'I don't have enough money to buy a spaceship' is a different issue to 'I'm not cool enough to be an astronaut'. Acknowledging the difference is the first step to deciding whether there is actually a solution, or if you need a smaller project to build some momentum (buy a telescope). Many practical obstructions are actually internal dilemmas at their heart. If that is the case, then we can choose to do something about them rather than just feeling sad that we can't afford a spaceship. While researching this book, I asked on Instagram what was stopping people from living more adventurously, apart from money and time. Amongst the hundreds of answers I received, the same themes came up time and time again. (Read them all at www.alastairhumphreys.com/thedoorstepmile)  Illness – a hurdle beyond the remit of these pages. I mention it to remind those of us in good health not to take it for granted and to carpe the hell out of the diem. Family – the challenges generally distilled to either time commitments, money, or incompatibility of dreams. The internal aspects included guilt about being selfish, expectations of the perceived way you should do things and excessive caution.  Pressure – family pressure, social pressure, personal pressure about how you think you should be living, a lack of self-confidence. Expectations – feeling like an imposter or an outsider or a fool, feeling the dice are unfairly loaded, perceptions of exclusivity. Fear – some comments were on practical concerns (women's safety, for example). The vast majority were about anxiety, inadequacy, the unknown, the first step, procrastination, ignorance, choosing the wrong direction, comparisons with others, fearing failure and the difficulties of living adventurously by yourself. There was also the fear of the unknown of what might happen afterwards.  Reading through the reams of comments, I felt three distinct reactions. Gratitude at how fortunate my own life is. I was reminded of how small my stumbling blocks are compared with many people's. A realisation that lots of people worry waaaaaaaaaaaaaaay more than me about life and that concerns which stop others dead never even occur to me. Reassurance that I was not alone with all the crazy stuff rattling around inside my head. Many people share the same fears and bottlenecks. This might help you see that your difficulty is not unique and, perhaps more resolvable. A problem shared is a problem halved and all that…OVER TO YOU: What inner fears are inhibiting you from living adventurously? Which practical problems are actually covers for more deep-seated vulnerabilities? ★ Support this podcast ★

The scourge of time and moneyFor most people reading this, the most significant practical hurdles standing in the way will be either time or money. (I confess to finding them a bit unoriginal. They probably affect everyone except the Queen.) How you overcome these inconveniences is key to making interesting stuff happen. If you are short of both then living adventurously is, for now, going to revolve around simple ideas and your attitude rather than expensive and expansive plans. How to get more money. The 4-step plan from financial guru Alastair Humphreys (written on my yacht in the Caribbean*)  Spend less or earn more. Sell stuff or stop buying stuff. Find a cheaper version of your dream. Put aside £20 a week then begin a grand adventure when you have saved enough (an exercise in starting small, starting today and the cumulative effect of habits). (It is also worth putting things in perspective by having a look at where you stand on the Global Rich List. www.globalrichlist.net)* - Actually my shed… How to get more time. The 4-step plan from time-management guru Alastair Humphreys (written on the loo) Say 'Hell yeah, or no' when deciding what activities to commit to. Ask the 80-year-old version of yourself whether you should be spending your time on this thing. What can you cut out of your life to get more time? Quit each of your distractions for a week and notice how much free time that creates.  Turn off your phone. Over to You:  How can you spend less or earn more?  How can you get more time in your life? ★ Support this podcast ★

Say no moreAbove my desk, written in thick green chalk, are the words ‘Hell Yeah, or No'. It is a useful aide-memoire from the writer and entrepreneur Derek Sivers. Saying ‘yes' to things is an excellent way of opening up your life to serendipity and adventure. But first, you need to carve out enough time to be able to capitalise on those opportunities. You also need time to do the grinding, unglamorous, lonely work that – eventually, possibly – might one day lead to the exciting invitations. To be able to say ‘yes', you first need to say ‘no' a bunch of times.Therefore, whenever I am asked to commit to something, I gauge my initial gut response. If my instinct is anything less than, ‘hell yeah! Sign me up' then I force myself to say, ‘no thank you'. My short term brain protests, ‘but it sounds quite fun… But it pays quite well…' Yet the chalk scrawl reminds me that it has to be a ‘Hell Yeah' otherwise it's a ‘No'.Another trick for resisting stuffing the calendar (like Monty Python's gluttonous Mr Creosote who gorged himself so full that one wafer-thin slice of mint caused him to explode) is to imagine that the thing you are agreeing to is happening tomorrow. Are you excited about jumping out of bed for it, or does it now sound like a hassle? I am terrible at valuing my future time. Bringing the thought into the present helps me get a more accurate feeling for whether I should accept that speaking engagement six months down the line in a village hall in northern Scotland which is paying me a jar of pickled eggs in exchange for eight hours travel on a Rail Replacement Bus Service… or whether I should decline. It is much less painful to offer an immediate, polite ‘no' than to agree to do something and then later regret it. [By the way, if you find it hard to say ‘no' to nice people – as I do – try setting up automated ‘canned responses' for your emails. Having a set text to click saves you having to actually type mean things to friendly people and thus prevents you wavering…*] You can do anything, but you cannot do everything. Hoard and defend your time fanatically. Say no more.  OVER TO YOU: What can you say ‘no' to that will free up time and energy for you to live more adventurously?* - Here are two responses I use a few times a week:Sorry, I can't meet up in person, but I'm happy to help if I can. So email me any question anytime. I'm not good with big general, ‘Here's my entire situation – what do you think of it?' kind of problems, but pretty good with specific questions. There's a list of FAQs plus a Search button on my blog that might help too. Best Wishes, AlastairThank you very much for your kind invitation. Unfortunately, I am trying to buy back a little time in my life by saying ‘no' to exciting things that I'd ordinarily love to say ‘yes' to. Apologies not to be saying ‘yes' this time. I hope you'll understand. Best Wishes, Alastair★ Support this podcast ★

Important or urgentSometimes, like right now, I feel overwhelmed. I'm racing a deadline for finishing this book. But I've got a million and one other things to do and loads of people clamouring for my time (see the previous chapter about busy-boasting…). I came to my shed this morning determined to make inroads into some chapter edits. But then I discovered my website had been hacked and required immediate attention. I responded calmly and maturely by yelling, 'Agggghhhh!' at the top of my voice. This is one of the many advantages of working in an isolated shed.But life is always like this, isn't it? Unless you're living an Instagram existence of hygge, feng shui, green smoothies and yoga poses, then your reality probably involves running for buses, drowning in emails and a bewildered astonishment at how fast the year is flying by. It helps if you can separate what is urgent from what is important. Superficially the two words are similar but extrapolate your life a few decades, and they lead to very different destinations. Urgent shouts more loudly than Important. But Important is, well, important… When I reached a similar crunch point writing my last book, it needed drastic action to escape from the urgent and focus on the important. I took myself and my manuscript off to a mountain hut in the Lake District where there would be no phone signal, no clock and no demands on my time. It was a foggy winter day, but I was soon sweating as I hiked up into the hills. I had a grid reference for the hut's position, but I was a little anxious about finding it in the mist. It is an old miners' shelter, built of grey slate, lying low to the ground on a rocky hillside. I did not spot the building until I was about a hundred metres away from it. I grinned with relief. I pushed open the low, unlocked wooden door. Inside it was cold and dark. I dumped my pack on the stone sleeping platform under the solitary window and rummaged for a candle. The bothy was basic but beautiful and perfect for focusing on what was important. I lit a fire in the wood burner then fetched water from a nearby stream to make coffee. I pulled on a woolly hat and took out my pens and papers. It was time to write.All of a sudden, 24 hours expanded into an abundance. There were more hours available than I could possibly concentrate for. I could clear my brain either by jumping into a deep, cold waterfall or hiking up the hill behind the bothy. I woke when my body told me to wake up, relit the fire, ate breakfast, then worked solidly on my book until I needed a break. Sometimes, I stared out of the little window down the valley towards a distant lake. In three days, I made a month's progress on the book.Heading for the mountains with a rucksack and a back-breaking pile of firewood is perhaps a drastic option. You may not need to go that far if you do some ruthless differentiating between the urgent demands and what is actually important. On the first Tuesday of every month, my calendar pings a reminder at me. That's standard, of course: my life is ruled by a crowded calendar (because I am the King of Busy). But this is one ping that I always enjoy. Indeed, the busier I am, the more I appreciate the interruption. And that is because my calendar tells me to 'Climb a Tree'. It reminds me to step away from the aimless conference calls and the interruptions and spend 20 minutes doing something which I will never regret. It is a pleasant way to measure and notice the seasons as well as to reflect on my past month and contemplate what might lie ahead. I hope that I never deem myself too busy with urgent tasks to do something as important as climbing a tree. OVER TO YOU:1. When did you last climb a tree?2. Do a brain dump of everything in your head, from your life goals to the weekly To-Do list. It will help clarify what you should prioritise and what's best to delegate or delete.★ Support this podcast ★

The epidemic of busynessThis is an era of insanity. We have become lunatics, suffering under an epidemic of busyness. When did anyone last say, ‘gosh, I don't really have anything to do today.'If you're reading this on your phone, I know you've checked social media or email in the past five minutes. If you're listening to my dulcet tones, I bet you've cranked me up to double speed. And if you're reading a paper book, you're probably on the loo. So much for my beloved literary masterpiece…We are all too frantic to be able to savour life or focus on the important things. And we live in a society that applauds the wildest ball jugglers. ‘Yowzers, I'm so busy,' we boast, pretending not to be gleeful if we win the busiest person contest. At its heart, being busy makes us feel important and necessary. Most of us (except for those who are saving lives or cleaning streets) are not really either of those things. But it is nicer to think that we are.When I ran a poll on Twitter asking why people don't leave the office at 5pm, 45% answered ‘because nobody else does'. But everyone wants to go home then, even the boss. It's bonkers. (28% said they'd be reprimanded. But this is all a topic for a different book. I'll get back to minding my own business…)An hour spent at work is equivalent to trading an hour of your life for some cash. It is worth pausing occasionally to consider that exchange (ideally at work when you might get paid for the pause). Do you enjoy your work? Or is it a pragmatic necessity that you must accept and make the best of?How much would you pay for an hour of life? How much do you earn per hour?Is this a fair/good/unavoidable swap? Could you earn more for that hour of your life? Could you work fewer hours? We face demands on our time outside of work as well: the things we have to do, those we ought to, and hopefully some things that we want to do. Throw in additional family commitments or partners with different priorities, and this can all tighten into nooses of resentment. I am surprised how many emails I receive along those lines. How can we claw back some time to live a little more adventurously every day? A good starting point is to work out where the time goes. We all begin each day with the same 24 hours to spend. Once we pay attention to the breakdown of our days, we can look for opportunities to cut out the junk and live a bit more adventurously.For example, which of these do you deem acceptable ways of being busy? Saving the world? Changing the world? Getting rich? Chasing dreams? Raising a family? Keeping your boss happy? Not letting people down? Having fun? Here are some other questions I have asked myself at various times. If you wish you can think of it as The Acme Busyness Scale, by busyness guru Alastair Humphreys. Am I too busy to move to Africa for a year? Am I too busy to cross Iceland for a month? Am I too busy to go biking in Scotland for a week? Am I too busy to camp out this weekend? Am I too busy to climb a small hill with somebody I love and watch the sunset? Am I too busy to go for a run at lunchtime? Am I too busy to swim in a river before breakfast? Am I too busy to climb a tree for ten minutes? Am I too busy to read my kids a bedtime story? Am I too busy for life? Which number are you on an equivalent list in your own life? Which level is acceptable, necessary, desirable or dutiful? Which level suggests priorities gone wrong and a heartbreaking waste? Inevitably, the packed nature of our lives means that pursuing your individual passion demands compromise or cutbacks somewhere else. Many of us – me very much included – feel guilty and selfish about this. We worry that it is not fair on our family to crave some space for ourselves. It is a very individual conundrum. All I will say as a generalisation is that it is important to invest in yourself as well as everybody else. Making the most of your own life can also make you a better role model for those around you.There are a mere 168 hours in a week. This used to scare, sadden and infuriate me, even back when I could pour 70, 80, 90 hours directly into the stuff I loved. I used to chase the clock and rage and grasp at the altar of getting things done. It drove me to the brink of madness. We certainly should use our time wisely. But we also need to accept that we cannot do everything. The way you choose to spend your time will be different from me. The percentage of time you dedicate to trying new things and stretching yourself will differ. There is no magic number. But there is probably a realistic golden mean to aspire to somewhere between excess and deficiency.  At long, long, long last – thank goodness – I have learned that if ever I think I am too busy to climb a hill and watch the sunset, or too busy to go for a bike ride in the woods, then what I really need to do is climb a hill and watch the sunset or go for a bike ride in the woods. And to hell with the emails. What are the equivalent tipping points in your own life that ought to be non-negotiable?Life is busy. But it is also for living. You'll never have a life as good as this one again: make the most of it.Over to You: Mark up a table with how you use the 168 hours in a typical week. Each square represents one hour. ★ Support this podcast ★

What stops usI am sure much is preventing you from living as adventurously as you'd like to be doing (and if not, why the heck are you still reading?).There are probably two distinct aspects to the barriers. One will be practical, perhaps a lack of either time or money. The second aspect is more intangible. These are the mental barriers inside our heads. This might be something you're shy to admit. You may have not even acknowledged it yet. But I'm convinced that every one of us struggles with them. If I had to guess, I reckon you feel like an imposter or worry what people think or are saddled with guilt for being selfish. (They're my usual three, anyway! I have plenty more where they come from if you need more…) I wrote extensively about overcoming the obstructions that get in the way of literal adventures (travel and expeditions) in my books Microadventures and Grand Adventures. Whilst researching them, I asked my website readers what they struggled with. From around 2,000 responses, the most frequent issues were time, money, family and commitments, fear, pressure, or having nobody to go with.I was fascinated that not one person mentioned the hurdles of falling down a crevasse or getting eaten by a tiger. The greatest hindrances to everyone's adventures all lay before their journeys began. So whatever you dream of attempting, it is wise to push the problems you may face later on to one side. That does not mean ignoring them. Just park them for now in order to give your mind as much space as possible to be brave about getting started. Allow yourself a long run up before tackling distant dramas. The most pressing obstacles are concerned with getting you on your way. If you don't solve those first, nothing will happen. The next chapters will help you try to identify the bumps in your own road. They will remind you that you are probably not the only one facing them. And then they will help you choose whether to solve the problem or opt for another route. The first task is for you to work out what is stopping you from living more adventurously. After all, this is a self-help book…Only by answering this honestly and thoughtfully is there any point continuing to read this book and be able to take the first steps towards making good things happen.OVER TO YOU:  What practical barriers stand in your way? What mental barriers have you built up? Which concerns can be shunted further down the line? Think of the most significant thing blocking you from living adventurously. Now ask these questions, known as the Dickens Process: What has that barrier cost you in your life so far?  What is that barrier costing you right now? What will that barrier cost you 10 years from now if it persists? ★ Support this podcast ★

Tea and biscuitsAll adventures have several distinct phases. The first is my favourite because it is enjoyable, exhilarating and very easy. This is the unrolling of a big map and your blossoming daydreams. It can take place by yourself with a mug of tea and a packet of biscuits, or with a beer in the pub where the volume and audacity rises with every empty glass.This dreaming stage is where I pour all the vague reasons for why I want to do something into an actual, real idea. A dream becomes a plan. From the comfort of my kitchen, I picture my life changing as I trace the route of my adventure across the map. It is fun to dream happy thoughts without the struggle of actually doing anything. This is the point we have reached in our journey together. I'm afraid that the next phase is more gruelling. Because ahead of us lies the arrival of doubt and the onslaught of negative barriers.This is the stage when most people fall by the wayside. You might not even have finished your biscuit before your own doubts arise. It is a jagged landscape crowded with dreamers, and few persevere long enough to enjoy the glorious views on the other side. It is time brush off the crumbs, fold away the map and roll up your sleeves. If your mission of living more adventurously is to succeed, you need to make through the rocky patch ahead. OVER TO YOU:  Why do you want to live more adventurously? How are you going to live more adventurously? What are you going to begin? ★ Support this podcast ★

Dream big, start smallWhat would you do if… You were a millionaire? You were given a year off? You were a bunch of years younger (or older)? You had no responsibilities? Nobody would find out? You wanted a corker of an obituary? Are any of your answers achievable right now? If so, what are you waiting for?If your dreams look unrealistic, try to work out how you can start walking in that direction or come up with a smaller version of the goal that you can begin today? The idea of this is to turn 'that sounds cool but unfeasible' into 'what's the first step I need to take to make something happen?'★ Support this podcast ★

Follow your dreams, slowlyFollow your dreams – the nafforism that launched a thousand soft-focus Instagram posts and made a million people feel bad about themselves.There is a core of truth to it though. Given all the meandering paths and turning points that make up a life, it is tragic not to at least try to move in the direction of your dreams. One day too soon, we will be dead. So why do we persevere with things that suck our soul? If you must do the job, then fair enough. But if the motivation is to save up for a bigger car and a new telly, I think you're mad. If your house burned down today, how much stuff would you bother paying to replace?So I am in the 'follow your dreams' camp. But I urge pragmatic dreaming. I'm wary of the relentless positivity myth that peddles the dogma of 'everything you want to achieve is possible! You too can be extraordinary!' It is often preached from an altar of privilege and therefore not very helpful at all.If you are considering a significant shift towards doing something you love, I recommend you keep it as a hobby for as long as possible. Start small and build your expertise rather than quitting your life and leaping in at the deep end. I have written about my own decision to step off the career conveyor belt, to turn down Mr Walker's job offer and try to cycle around the world instead. But that skipped the previous years I had spent accidentally gathering momentum. The school camping trips, the bookshelves of expedition literature, the adventures in my university holidays, the mountain marathons and the weekends training with the Territorial Army. It took me years before I was ready to leap. Keep your day job. Pay the bills. Fill what free time remains with following your dreams. You could do a thousand press-ups a year simply by getting up a minute earlier each morning and boshing out three a day. The standard British worker has 112 days off each year. If you work a 40-hour week, that leaves 128 hours spare, if only in theory. You could listen to the War and Peace audiobook twice in that time. Use your evenings and weekends to write a book, tweak a recipe, keep your bees. Start making, doing and learning. One day you might earn a little bit of money from it. Then repeat the whole process, but better. When you get so busy that you haven't been to sleep for a week, consider decreasing your work hours a little. The squeeze should hurt you but not break you. This is your livelihood and future security we're talking about. Be wary of hurling it up in the air on the encouragement of the social media 'follow your dreams' candyfloss. Only once you are in a financial position to be able to survive on your new income would I encourage you to ditch the day job and go full time on working at your dreams. It takes a long time to become an overnight success. And then, once the safety net and the veneer of respectability of the day job has gone, the real hard work can begin.OVER TO YOU: What should you work on more slowly than your impatient side wants you to? ★ Support this podcast ★

Say yes moreOnce I started going on adventures, I fell deeply in love with the world of travel, expeditions and endeavour. The more I learned, the more I wanted to know. As I travelled further, I realised how little I had seen and how much there was to do in life. Would I like to go there? Yes! Am I up for this challenge? Yes! Every journey gave me ideas for new ones. Life was exciting!Mountains, deserts, jungles, cities, savannah: whatever it was, I wanted it all. I was greedy. I was never interested in becoming a specialist in one region or an expert at one sport. My appetite has always been for the new: I enjoy being a beginner. However, there was one type of adventure that never appealed. I had read plenty of books about ocean rowing, and the concept struck me as stupid. You go backwards for thousands of miles. It is simultaneously claustrophobic and agoraphobic. You face sharks, storms, capsize and seasickness. You are trapped in a tiny, home-made boat for so long that you end up with nothing left to talk about except whose buttocks hurt the most. And boy, do those buttocks hurt. You get boils on your bottom and salt sores everywhere else. It is a venture both tedious and terrifying: not a good combination.Then I opened an email.Hello Alastair...Are you interested in rowing the E-W Atlantic in January? ...Sounds fun, right? :)Bye, Marin No, I thought to myself. I am not interested in rowing the Atlantic Ocean – or any other ocean for that matter. I certainly don't want to do it with you, weird bloke from Slovenia who I've never met. Rowing an ocean with people you don't know is foolhardy. And leaving in six weeks? Well, that's just daft. I can't get ready to row the Atlantic by then. I'm busy. You're an idiot. And no, it doesn't sound fun at all. The only sensible answer to the question was ‘no'. So I clicked reply and answered, ‘yes!'I flew out to the Canary Isles, met Marin and my other two crewmates – Simon and Steve – and off we went, rowing out onto thousands of miles of empty ocean. And I was right: rowing the Atlantic was a mostly unpleasant experience. Why on earth did I say yes to Marin? I did so because it was clear that this was a rare opportunity. One of my missions in life is to make the most of my opportunities. By nature, I am a cautious, pessimistic person, but I have worked hard to teach myself not to be like that. An excellent way to do that is to say ‘yes' more often. You might sensibly say, ‘you thought it would be miserable, did it anyway and then it was miserable. I'm not sure that sounds very smart.' But now that sufficient time has passed, I look back on the trip with great fondness and pride. (I explain this concept of ‘Type 2 Fun' later in the book.)  On the day that Marin's email arrived, I was busy. But I imagined myself as an old man looking back on my life. 50 years from now, how many urgent chores would I remember? Zero, of course. But I would be chuffed to regale my grandchildren with tales of high adventure and chafed buttocks. And that was why I should say yes to the opportunity.OVER TO YOU: - What is an example of a time you said a bold ‘yes' to an opportunity and were glad of it? - Are there any occasions when you regret not having said yes? - Think of examples in your work life and your home life.★ Support this podcast ★

Back to the futureInterviews often ask, 'what advice would you offer to your younger self?' A more useful question is to ask what advice an older version of yourself would offer to you now. Our actions today have a direct bearing on our future selves, hence why we have savings accounts and plant apple trees.Sometimes when I'm sitting on a train, I like to look at everyone around me and make guesses about their lives. Each person acts as either a warning or an inspiration for the direction I want my life to go. So heed some encouragement and caveats from your 80-year-old self. Write a letter from 'future you' to 'current you'. What would they tell you to do with your life? What will they think about where you are right now? What would they plead with you to change? This is the idea of 'backcasting': if I want to end up there, what direction must I walk and how quickly? If I continue on my current path, where will that put me when I'm 80? A similar but opposite exercise is to write a letter to your future self. Picture where you want to be in a year or five. What are your hopes and dreams for that person? Declare what you will do today to try to make them happen. This is the less epic equivalent of Ulysses lashing himself to the mast. He wanted to listen to the Sirens' song but first commanded that his men must not change course under any circumstance. Try this exercise in self-accountability on www.futureme.org. The website emails the message to yourself at a chosen point in the future. It is an opportunity to hold yourself to account. You can also opt to make the letter public if you really want to be held to task.OVER TO YOU: - Write a letter of advice from your 80-year-old self to you today.- Send a message to your future self.★ Support this podcast ★

Focus, choose, doYou have dreamed about living more adventurously, reflected on why it matters and come up with some practical steps for getting underway. The final piece of the puzzle is to decide what you are going to do. Remember: you can do anything in life, but you cannot do everything. Here we encounter the agony of decision, the abundance of choice, analysis paralysis and FOMO – our Facebook-era curse of the Fear Of Missing Out.To ease the anxiety of picking wrong, it is worth considering the long term risk of doing nothing. That would be far worse. But we tend to undervalue that distant consideration. Humans are terrible at weighing up long term benefits versus immediate fears and the easy option. We want a six-pack, but instead we eat six packs of crisps. Our immediate emotions cloud our decisions on the future.There is so much good stuff out there that we agonise over anticipated regrets. The sheer abundance of choice can be so overwhelming that you might end up doing nothing. Imagine being offered every flavour of ice cream that you don't eat any because you fear making the wrong choice or can't bear the thought of missing out on all the others. Perhaps you have decided what adventure you want to do. You may even have begun saving and allocated time in your calendar. Your family and boss are on board. Nothing is standing in your way. (You have permission to smile smugly at this point, give this book away and get on with it.)For many of us, the yearning for change comes well before having a clear idea of what we want to do. The paradox of choice was a challenge for me when I first started dreaming of adventure. The world was so big, and there was too much choice. I didn't really care what I did: I just wanted to do everything. I didn't know how to make things happen or what was the best option. I didn't know very much at all.How do you narrow down your choices when the whole world is beckoning? I knew only that I wanted to head far away from everything familiar and do something physically strenuous, though I had no specific skills to rely on. Wild places appealed to me more than cities. And it needed to be cheap. Oh, and nice food would be a welcome bonus. I said I was clueless, but if you read that previous paragraph again, I already had quite a few parameters in place without realising. It is easier than you might think to narrow down your options to a level where you can start to make decisions.I wanted to head far away from everything familiar: this ruled out exploring the UK or Europe.I had no specific skills. No climbing technical mountains then.I wanted to do something physically demanding. So no vehicles or hitch-hiking.Wild places appealed to me more than cities.It needed to be cheap. That eliminated ocean and polar journeys. It also made sense not to do the trip in expensive countries.Eliminating what you can't do or don't want to do is helpful. Far from making me sad, this simplification brings a lightness and enthusiasm for what is still available. I could now write down my thoughts more clearly than I realised.I wanted to do something difficult, but non-technical, in Africa, Asia or South America.It probably would be on foot or by bicycle. Cycling sounded preferable to walking.I'd already been to Africa. Asia has better food than South America.From having no idea what to do, I had quickly narrowed down the infinity of choice to going for a long bike ride in Asia. This led to me riding the Karakoram Highway from Pakistan to China. Until now, my unimaginative, more conventional assumption had been that I might go on a cycling holiday in Italy. Of course, I could have gone to Papua instead of Pakistan. Maybe life would have worked out better if I had studied for an Outdoor Education certificate instead. I should have taken more time over the ride rather than treating it as a challenge to be conquered. But I will settle for the choices I did make over the unsatisfactory world of coulda, woulda, shoulda… It is time to sift through the galaxies of options and ‘what ifs' and pick one adventurous thing. Lay aside the bajillion other ideas and get on with it. Choose your flavour and enjoy it. You can return later and choose another. But for now, you need to stop hiding behind the reading and the pondering, the research and the dithering. Pick a path rather than waiting for a lightning bolt epiphany. It is time to make a specific choice of which direction you will go (at least for now). Reassure yourself that all paths run out of sight beyond the horizon. They twist and fork beyond our knowledge or control. The best thing you can do then is plump for an interesting-looking direction and get moving. OVER TO YOU: Write down a bunch of gut feeling, top-of-the-head parameters and see where they lead. Use them to draw up a list of plausible projects. Rank these by preference. Select one specific project that you will take into the rest of this book and turn into action. Slash a line through all the other ideas on your list. You can return to them later, but you must discount them for now and focus on one thing. What will be your ‘late-night McDonald's idea'? Write it down.★ Support this podcast ★

Case studyThis case study involves me, not because I'm particularly interesting but because I'm lazy. I have been writing books for a quarter of my life now. It is my job. Like most people, I occasionally wonder if I'm doing the right thing with my life. When writer's block strikes and I can't stomach any more tea or toast procrastination, I fantasise about becoming a carpenter, a tree surgeon, an advertising guru or a postman in the Shetlands. They are my usual four. The last time this career-angst happened, I asked myself the three why-how-what questions. This book is the result of my scribbled answers.1. ‘Bearing in mind the spirit of living adventurously, why am I still writing books after so many years doing the same thing?'It makes me think differently.I'm still learning to become a better writer.It's a mental struggle.I can make a positive impact. It is satisfying.I learn a lot.I can walk my own path.2. ‘OK, I'm satisfied with that. I'll hold off applying to Royal Mail for a while. How can I approach my writing to better encompass trying to live adventurously?'Take more risks.Try something new.Write and publish differently.Make the process more exciting.Force deadlines on myself.Work with interesting people.Learn new skills.Teach something.Speed up.Simplify.3. ‘Gadzooks! That list flowed out quickly. Seems I should make some of this happen. What shall I do next that focuses on living – and writing – adventurously?'Ask questions on social media to see if I'm alone in this or if other people are interested in the same stuff.Write a series of articles about living adventurously so that I can figure some stuff out for myself.Experiment with giving them away in an automated email series.Launch the mailing list with only a few articles written, thereby lighting a small fire under my ass to hurry up before the readers catch up with me!Turn it all into the skeleton of a book.Return to self-publishing to give myself complete freedom and responsibility.Knock up a mock front cover of the book. Stick it online and make the book available for sale, promising delivery of the book before the end of the year. Thereby lighting a blooming big rocket beneath my butt to get this written and to make it good enough for paying customers to be happy.The next thing I know, I am in a late-night McDonald's, drinking tea and launching this whole daft idea into the world before I have time to see sense and wimp out.We have lift off.★ Support this podcast ★

Start with whyWhen we stumble upon something that captures our interest, we think, ‘Yes! That is what I want to do.' Then we figure out how to make it happen, hopefully before the early enthusiasm wanes.What we do is visible and tangible (golf, gardening, gymkhana…). But the deeper motives of why we choose them are harder to pin down and therefore neglected, or only vaguely assumed. This is a mistake. It can lead to us flitting from one fad to the next, from job to job, not inspired enough to fully commit and never quite satisfied. If we do not uncover why we are out there searching. We risk ending up with nothing of substance. Chase too many rabbits and you catch none at all. Riding around the planet was the what and how of expressing my youthful, adventurous urges. But I only fully excavated the reason why I wanted to do it after the Yukon forest fire. I should have processed things the other way round.‘Start with why' is a popular TED talk by Simon Sinek. He speaks in a business context, but I have found the idea useful for persuading myself to summon the effort needed to make interesting stuff happen. We can only spend our time once. It is foolish to not consider why we should take this path and not another. Being clear about why you choose to do something is an under-appreciated first step to living adventurously.It makes sense to have some idea about what matters most in order to illuminate our stumbling, fumbling journey through life. It serves as a keel to keep you on course, however foggy the conditions, and gives you more confidence to explore, dream and discover. The destination you end up in is likely to be a good one, even if it is not what you imagined when you first set sail from the safe harbour. (Another way to help with this is to pay attention to the people you spend time with. We tend to walk the same way as those around us.) The Japanese, as they often do, have a nifty word that encapsulates this essence of what gets you out of bed in the morning. Ikigai is the overlap of what you want to do, what you ought to do, and what you have to do. If you can find something that ticks all three boxes, then you have discovered your ikigai – and perhaps even the purpose of your adventurous life.Starting with why helps quieten our self-defeating noise and deters procrastination. For example, this is the sort of thought process that rattles around my tiny brain from time to time.‘My life sucks. I'm bored. I want to change things.' Why? ‘So that I get back some purpose and direction. I want to feel healthier, happier and more alive.'These reasons are so compelling that I am motivated to actually make something happen, rather than just more late-night grazing on clickbait lifehack blogs.How will I go about that?‘I must re-evaluate the way I spend my spare time. I will figure out if I have sufficient money to skew my work-life balance a bit more towards life, family and exploration. Perhaps I'll meet a few friends in the pub and make a plan. That way, we can hold each other to account. I sometimes need a mate to push me into boldness.'By this point, I should be bouncing around with eagerness. I'm clear about why I want to make changes and how I will go about it. Finally comes the easy part: deciding what to do. Because I've thought hard about the why and the how, I appreciate this is really important. Therefore the daunting act of signing up for a mountain marathon, turning up to a book club or asking my boss about cutting down my hours becomes more straightforward. Indeed it is now apparent how daft I would be not to do these things. Compare this approach to starting from a standing start. All the negative voices shouting inside my head: how unfit I am for a mountain marathon, how scary it would be to turn up at a book club where I know nobody, or assuming there is no way my boss would countenance any time off. He'll probably fire me instead! Far safer to just keep hiding away behind my excuses and not begin anything… Over to You: Why do you want to live more adventurously?- Brainstorm or discuss (but don't procrastinate) until things become clear. Bonus challenge: ‘Five Whys' is a technique for getting deeper into the root causes and effects of something. Look at an answer and ask again, ‘why?' Repeat the exercise five times (like an inquisitive toddler) and you'll get a clearer insight into what drives you.- How can you begin living more adventurously? - What specific action can you take to put the ‘hows' into action? ★ Support this podcast ★

Ask whyA hazy dimness had hung in the air all week. The northern sky darkened. I woke to grey ash falling soft as snow on my tent. Later that day, I smelled smoke. And then, finally, the route ahead was blocked by flames. This was a forest fire, Canadian style: it was enormous.The only road through the Yukon was now cut off and would remain so for several weeks, at least. Winter was approaching. I needed to cycle north to Alaska before the season changed. Hundreds of miles of blazing fir and spruce blocked my way. It was an exasperating situation. For three years, I had been obsessed with pedalling around the world. Literally every day had been building towards that goal. Yet suddenly the way ahead was impassable. And there was nothing I could do about it. Was this where it all fell apart? Was this the end after so much stubborn focus and purpose? Would I have to resort to taking an aeroplane? I thought of the word with disgust. You can't really call it cycling around the world if you travel by plane, can you? Whatever happened next, the tyre tracks that stretched behind me for thousands of miles were about to be broken by the consequences of this vast forest fire. I filled page after page of my diary with ideas (and plenty of self-pity). What this angst-filled, caffeine-fuelled brain dump eventually revealed astonished me.Why was I so obsessed with crossing the swathe of burning forest ahead of me? The unbroken nature of my ride had crumbled long ago. An enforced armed police convoy in Egypt; some blatant cheating to get to a TV in time to watch a football match in Tanzania; another escort through a long tunnel high in the Andes. So I could not claim that the ride's purity was why I felt compelled to keep pedalling. I poured more coffee and kept writing.My scribblings eventually teased out an epiphany from the depths of my Neanderthal brain. I was out here in the Yukon – thousands of miles from home, pretty much broke, years without seeing my family – in pursuit of something hard and meaningful (if only to me). That was what felt important. That was why I was doing this. I was not cycling around the world in order to cycle around the world. I was cycling around the world to live adventurously. I had not appreciated the subtle difference until now.This clarification made my situation much clearer and opened up possibilities. The question I needed to ask was no longer, ‘how can I keep cycling around the world?' The vital question was, ‘How can I keep living adventurously?' Snaking through the burning wilderness was the Yukon River. Perhaps that could offer my solution? Maybe, I mused, I could travel by river rather than road?Before bulldozers and tarmac ever reached this part of the world, the rivers had been the road. For hundreds of years, local people had paddled the rivers in summer or walked them as frozen highways in winter. An idea began to take shape. It was time to borrow a canoe. I was in the Yukon with a friend. David and I laughed and wobbled as the current took hold of our new transport and whisked us away downstream. Paddling was far more fun than pedalling. Our canoe sat low in the water, piled high with two bicycles and supplies for 10 days. The locals waved goodbye, nervously. They were worried that we were inexperienced at canoeing, that we knew nothing about bears and that we were heading into a wilderness that was on fire. All these things were true.But the best way to learn is to do. David and I dipped our paddles into the cold, clear water and began 500 miles of learning how to canoe.When I think back now to the four years I spent cycling around the world, I do not regret those 500 missing miles in the saddle. Instead, I remember our time on the river as a magnificent addition to the overall experience. David and I still talk about it fondly whenever we meet up to drink beer or plant trees. And we always daydream of continuing down the river to the sea one day.Our Yukon adventure taught me three useful lessons. (Four if you include the discovery that spicy sausage doesn't work as bait for catching salmon.)It is important to pause from time to time and think about why you are actually doing something. The answer might surprise you. It might also be different from your motivations when you first hatched your plan. These core values should influence every subsequent decision you make.I learned to concentrate on what I could control rather than on all that I could not. There was little point getting angry at millions of acres of blazing forest and a squillion mosquitoes. All I was able to do was deal with the situation in front of me and keep moving forwards. Accepting (and ideally embracing) uncertainty is liberating. If you set out on a long journey, things will go wrong. If they do not – if everything goes perfectly to plan – that does not mean you are a genius. It means your goal was too modest. You will encounter forest fires and have to gamble on climbing into a wobbly canoe and seeing what happens. Mishaps turn a project into an adventure. In the long run, they often make the best memories and lessons.  OVER TO YOU: Think of something you have been doing for a long time. (It could relate to your job, outside work or with your family.) Ask yourself, ‘why do I do this thing?' Has the answer changed over time? Is it still valid?★ Support this podcast ★

Yes, butLiving more adventurously might appeal to you if: You have a yearning to live a more extraordinary life, but don't know how to get started.  You enjoy stories of adventure but don't believe they're realistic for someone like you. Everything is fine, but you'd like to rekindle a few dreams and that childlike audacity you lost somewhere along the way. You wake up on Monday mornings with a sigh. You spend more time looking at your phone than making memories. Your most interesting anecdote from the past year involves office life, your kids' potty training, the Christmas party, or something you saw on TV. The prospect of looking back on your life with regrets fills you with sadness and urgency. Now, I know what you are thinking. In fact, I can already hear you shouting loudly and angrily at me right now. ‘It's all very well for you to say! It is easy for you. But my life is different because…' I don't have enough time! (54% of people said this in a Living Adventurously newsletter poll. www.alastairhumphreys.com/living-adventurously) I feel guilty/selfish/it's not fair on my family! (49%) I don't have enough money! (38%) I've got nobody to do adventurous stuff with! (37%) I worry about making the wrong choice! (29%) I don't know how to begin! (24%) I feel like an imposter! I'll fail! (23%) I'm scared! (22%) I know you are shouting this because it is what everyone shouts – including me when I read other people's stuff. So I will cut you off, politely but firmly, at this point. An essential task of this book is to make you aware of this voice in your head. The loud voice that is always ready, at the slightest opportunity, to leap up and shout, ‘I can't do this because…' After all, if we cry for too long about our limitations, then we get to keep them. I know there are hurdles. Of course I do. Time, money, family, illness, bills, Jaws the hamster: there are a million and one things holding us back from galloping off into the sunset and changing the course of our lives. We are all in the same boat. I recently learned a word that sums this up. Sonder is ‘the realisation that each random passerby is living a life as vivid and complex as your own – populated with their own ambitions, friends, routines, worries and inherited craziness.' I want to try to make you accept that the voice in your head is not really shouting at the random author of a book you're reading. It is you shouting at you. Yelling an endless, hard-to-ignore stream of objections, excuses, self-pity, blame and To-Do lists. The same thing is happening in my head: Who the hell am I to write a self-help book? I can't sort my own life out.I am not pretending to provide solutions with a handy 7-Step-Plan-To-Adventure-Greatness. Only you can do that. What I will try to do is help you notice the noise, feel the fear and then do stuff anyway.OVER TO YOU: List all the ‘no buts' you were shouting at me.★ Support this podcast ★

Living adventurously changes with timeEveryone's definition of living adventurously is unique. I love that. It could be crossing a desert or cross-dressing, running a marathon or running a non-profit.Not only that, our own answers change over time. When I first got a taste for adventure as a teenager, it was simply for the fun of it. Climbing hills and looking around at the view, leaning hard in a heeling dinghy. These things are enjoyable. We should not make the mistake of seeing fun as flippant or something to save for the weekend. The world would be a better place with more fun in it.By the time I was in my 20s, however, my relationship with adventure had changed. ‘It doesn't have to be fun to be fun' was my mantra. Miles not smiles. Adventure became about the challenge. Pushing my body. Striving to be tough. Seeking an identity. Exploring what I was capable of. I was fortunate to have a comfortable, happy upbringing. So adventure served as the grit in my oyster. It helped toughen me up and taught me to appreciate things I habitually took for granted. Adventure gave me the momentum to try to do something interesting with my life.After that came curiosity. I wonder if it's possible to hitch a lift on a yacht across the Atlantic? Could I run an ultramarathon in the Sahara? What happens if I don't stop when my body tells me to stop? The answers were exciting. I began to see the stars rather than the mud when I looked out of the window.The trouble with learning to think this way, however, is that it becomes hard to remain satisfied with the ordinary. Pandora's box had been flung open.I began to realise that if I wished to continue chasing adventure, then just repeating the same types of expedition was not the way to go. Sure, I could do things on a more epic level, push myself harder and take more risks. But a dog will never catch its tail, and Sisyphus never gets to sit down, have a nice cup of tea and feel the satisfaction of completion.  And so my motivation changed again. Still drawn to scaring myself and trying new things, I began learning the violin. I decided to walk through Spain, busking to survive. The idea frightened me, amused me, challenged me and intrigued me: I was living adventurously once again.These days adventure needs to fit in around the happy chaos of raising a family. Whenever routine winds me up and grinds me down, wears me out and keeps me in, I am aware enough of the symptoms to bust out briefly and press reset.So I cycle to the sea or climb a tree. I carve out occasional free days to run in the hills of the Lake District by driving through the night (once my children are in bed) in time to greet the sunrise in the uplands. I sleep on starry hilltops rather than soulless hotels the night before speaking at conferences.On the way to a talk in the Netherlands recently, I persuaded my taxi driver to join me in jumping off a bridge into the canal with the local kids. He thought I was mad but never stopped laughing afterwards.These ‘microadventures' are how I keep the embers of my big, selfish, carefree adventure dreams aglow amidst the busy-ness of everyday life. I do what I can, when I can, where I am. What more can we do than that? Adventure has evolved from fun to machismo to curiosity to scaring myself to seizing the moment. I have laid all this out to help you relax about any decisions you take about changing something in your life. They are important choices, and they are urgent, but they are not binding. You once yearned for Spiderman pyjamas, didn't you? The peak of your ambition was once to wheelie down the street. (OK, some things never change – bad examples.) I hope this reassures you that whatever definition and direction you plump for today is unlikely to be your path for the rest of your life. You don't have to stress that you'll be shackled to it forever.This choice or that choice could both be the right one if they lead to opportunities for you to pursue a more adventurous, rewarding, fulfilling life. Make the best decision you can with the knowledge that you have then stick to it until you can make a better decision. You do not have an accurate idea of who you will be twenty years down the line. This is epitomised by the existence of tattoo removal services. It is a mistake to defer living adventurously until you are clear about a masterplan or until the time is perfect. Neither exists. There is an old Chinese saying that ‘the best time to plant a tree is 20 years ago. The second best time is now.'I might get that done as a tattoo.OVER TO YOU: - What did ‘living adventurously' mean to you ten years ago?- What does it mean today?- If you continue living the way you are, where will it put you ten years from now? Is that a place you want to be?★ Support this podcast ★