‘I DON’T CRY ENOUGH’
Bear Grylls has built a career on his tough image — but he has a vulnerable side
Every morning, Bear Grylls wakes not to an alarm clock but the sweet sound of an “opportunity clock”. They are, of course, one and the same, but choosing positive terminology to describe a device that has negative associations has, he says, psychological and physiological benefits. “My family takes the mick out of me a lot for the ‘opportunity clock’, but language is important,” explains Grylls. “How we speak to each other and ourselves is important. Words have power. It’s a choice to speak kindly and positively.”
When that opportunity clock goes off, Edward Michael “Bear” Grylls OBE swaps inside for out.
“First thing, I take the dogs out for 15 minutes and, whatever the weather, there’s something about breathing fresh air and feeling wet grass on your feet that really helps me,” he says, adding how exposure to cold water also provides a daily emotional boost. “I’m always finding lakes and rivers to swim in, but a cold shower works, too. It’s so well proven. Even just 30 seconds at the end of your shower – whack it down to full-cold to get that blast – gives your whole system a brilliant reset. It’s like nature’s defrag.”
He should know. At the start of his professional life, Grylls served for six years in the forces, first in the Territorial Army then the SAS, operating in some of the planet’s harshest environments. At 23 he became the youngest Brit to climb Mount Everest and then, in his second career as a TV adventurer, he became famous for taking on epic challenges in the wild.
Even his home is an Atlantic-exposed, off-grid island off the Welsh coast where, for the best part of the year, he lives with his wife Shara and their three sons. But St Tudwal’s Island West is,
enthuses Grylls, “a beautiful place” where the rain itself – opportunity clock-style – is viewed through rose-tinted glasses. “Ironically, it can be brilliantly healing. So many humans have an aversion to rain, but I’ve learnt that as long as you’re not in a suit, there’s something amazing about being out for five minutes in rain. Nature’s always our best teacher.”
Now Grylls has packed his greatest lessons from the wild into a book to help people protect their mental health and build what he dubs their “mental fitness”. Mind Fuel, which he penned with emotional health expert, priest and pal of 25 years Will Van Der Hart, inspires daily selfreflection. There are almost 200 mental fitness topics to hone resilience, reduce stress and build confidence, and every page was examined by psychologists and psychiatrists aplenty to ensure the tone was right.
“You might go to the gym [for your body], but doing something for your mental fitness is important as well. And little things go a long way,” says Grylls. “It doesn’t have to be hours of meditation, but five minutes of practical, simple things. Then you steadily build up robustness and strength over time.”
On Day 97, in a section titled The Meaning of Tears, Grylls explains how tears that are produced because of emotion contain more protein-based hormones than eye-cleaning
‘irritant’ tears. They are also slower and more sticky, making them more visible – biology’s way of attracting comfort during pain. Hiding tears, Grylls explains, is akin to “avoiding rescue”.
So does he sob frequently? “Gosh, not enough. I’ve got so much old-school angst going on that it’s hard,” admits Grylls, adding that he recently wept watching Roadrunner, a documentary about the chef-turned-cultural-explorer Anthony Bourdain who took his own life in the summer of 2018. Despite professional success, Bourdain was deeply vulnerable and, Grylls points out, “fame just made everything worse”.
To that, he can relate. “I struggle with people expecting me to be super-strong and brilliant all the time,” says Grylls. “Life’s definitely not like that. The truth is, I’m not always strong and I’m not always great at stuff. I think it’s probably why I have anxiety about meeting lots of people. I don’t really enjoy the attention. I struggle with that. I’m ever more aware of one’s frailties and failings.”
Over Grylls’s lifetime, he cites “a few key moments” when he felt “under the weight” emotionally: after the death of his father (“I wish I’d known some of this stuff then”), breaking his back, aged 21, when his parachute failed during an SAS training exercise in Zambia (“definitely a dark time”) and being a parent of teenagers.
“Parenting doesn’t end when they’re 16. In a way, the challenges our kids face get ever bigger and you’re in that with them,” he says.
The Grylls family do not forsake technology completely on their remote island home, but Grylls believes everyone’s emotional health improves by having more physical contact with loved ones instead of conducting relationships over a screen. “Make the time to go for a walk with the people you really love,” he urges. “Share struggles, be honest, be vulnerable.” Even better, of course, if it’s in the rain. GEMMA CALVERT
‘I struggle with people expecting me to be super strong and brilliant all the time’