One thing I have come to appreciate over the years is that I prepare differently now than I did a decade ago.
When I first started these long journeys, particularly Big Birthday Bash, I packed for the plan. Now I pack for the failure of the plan.
Nearly ten years ago, evening before the start of Actif Epica in Winnipeg, Canada, Scott Kummer said something in passing while talking about his Tuscobia Winter Ultra finish. A fling in conversation. “In a race, we carry the weight of our insecurities.”
I’ve gone back to those words a thousand times since. My insecurity has always been the same — failing. Quitting. Not finishing.
So I pack for that. I pack for the failure I’m most afraid of. Not pessimistically. But honestly. Because when you pack for your deepest fear, you stop running from it. Every item in my backpack becomes an answer to the question my insecurity keeps asking. What if I fail?
Every item I carry represents a question I no longer have to ask later. What if the rain lasts twelve hours instead of two? What if the next village has no food? What if I cannot dry my feet tonight? What if I have to continue into darkness and my headlamp malfunctions? What if I have to stop unexpectedly? The answers sit quietly in my backpack.
They weigh a few hundred grams each, but together they remove an astonishing amount of uncertainty.
People occasionally joke that I carry too much. Sometimes they are probably right. I smile because I understand how it looks. A spare pair of socks seems unnecessary until the first pair has been wet for two days. A spare headlamp seems excessive until sunset arrives later than expected when there is no exit. Extra food appears wasteful until the shop you planned to reach has already closed.
Preparedness has become less about equipment and more about preserving options.
I have found that this way of thinking extends far beyond the contents of my backpack. I prepare mentally in exactly the same way. I try not to become attached to any single outcome. The route may change. The pace may change. The destination for the day may change. Success is no longer reaching the point I imagined three months ago. Success is adapting well to whatever the expedition becomes.
Every expedition eventually diverges from the original plan. That is almost guaranteed. Roads close. Weather changes. The body changes. Timelines collapse. The expedition begins asking questions that nobody anticipated while standing at the start line. Preparation is simply my way of answering those questions before they are asked.
Preparedness is not carrying the most gear. It is reducing the number of future problems that will require difficult decisions when your body and mind are already exhausted. The backpack is heavier at the start. The mind is lighter when it matters most.
This is why I can enter what I call expedition mode at all. The physical and mental preparation—packing for plan failure, accepting that outcomes will change, reducing attachment to any single path—creates the space for something else to happen. It removes the decisions that would paralyze me later. It frees my mind for the transformation that occurs when plans dissolve and certainty disappears.
Now that I am home, warm, dry, and finally beginning to catch up on sleep, I have found myself thinking less about the distance I covered and more about the person I become when an expedition stretches beyond comfort and into uncertainty.
It is an interesting transformation because it happens so gradually that I rarely notice while it is taking place. Only afterwards, sitting quietly with a cup of coffee instead of a flask of electrolytes, do I realise that I spent several days thinking in a completely different way.
People often imagine ultras as a battle against pain. Pain is certainly there, sometimes overwhelming, but I have come to realise that it is only one variable among many. The greater challenge is adapting to an environment that changes continuously while making thousands of small decisions, each of which seems insignificant on its own, yet together determine whether you finish safely.
But this Big Birthday Bash taught me something about decisions that goes deeper than logistics.
Expedition mode, at least for me, is not about becoming stronger. It is about becoming simpler.
Long before my muscles begin to fail, my world begins to shrink. The future, which occupies so much of our everyday lives, slowly disappears. I stop thinking in terms of destinations and start thinking in terms of constraints.
How much water do I have?
What is the weather doing?
Where is the next place to eat?
Can my current stride continue for another kilometre?
How much daylight remains?
If this pain becomes worse, what are my options?
Everything else quietly fades into the background.
I have noticed something else over the years. I become quieter. Not because I am unhappy. Not because I do not enjoy company. But because conversation itself becomes another task. Every sentence requires attention. Every discussion competes with the dozens of calculations already running silently in my head. The silence is not empty. It is full of observations.
I find myself listening to the rhythm of my footsteps, noticing subtle changes in breathing, scanning the road surface without consciously thinking about it, feeling the first hint of dehydration before thirst appears, or recognising that a small discomfort in my hip is about to become night’s major problem if I ignore it for too long.
There is an economy to thought that develops after many hours on the road. Every unnecessary idea feels expensive.
This journey also reminded me how quickly cognitive fatigue can exceed physical fatigue. People often ask about sore muscles. They rarely ask about decision fatigue. Yet by the third or fourth day I think that becomes the greater challenge.
Every intersection requires judgement. Every approaching cloud demands attention. Every village becomes a question about food, shelter or water. Every dog on the roadside requires a rapid assessment. Every discomfort has to be classified.
Ignore? Monitor? Treat immediately?
The number of decisions becomes astonishing. Eventually the brain begins to crave simplicity. Perhaps that is another reason I become quiet. Silence reduces decisions. Silence creates space. Silence allows the environment to speak more clearly.
Perhaps the biggest change in how I approach expeditions is that optimism becomes less useful than realism. In everyday life we celebrate ambitious goals. We speak about dreams, finish lines and achievements. On an expedition, those things matter surprisingly little.
The mountain does not care what I hoped to achieve. Neither does the weather. Nor does my body. Reality is remarkably indifferent to ambition.
That is why I have gradually stopped asking, “How far can I go today?” Instead I ask, “Given everything I know right now, what is the next sensible decision?” I used to imagine the finish constantly. I would calculate arrival times, predict tomorrow’s mileage and mentally celebrate victories that had not yet happened.
Now I rarely do. The future has become strangely unimportant. There is only the next kilometre. And then another.
From the outside, long expeditions appear to require enormous motivation. In reality, they require something much quieter. Acceptance.
Acceptance that the weather will probably ignore your plans. Acceptance that pain is inevitable. Acceptance that progress will sometimes be embarrassingly slow. Acceptance that expectations made yesterday may have no relevance today. Acceptance that guilt offered by someone else’s failure does not belong to you.
The expedition teaches humility remarkably quickly.
One thing I realised during this journey is that I no longer negotiate much with pain. There was a point where my pelvis settled into a single stride that it seemed willing to tolerate. Every variation hurt more. Longer strides hurt. Shorter strides hurt. Sudden accelerations hurt. Repeated stopping and restarting hurt.
So I stopped trying to outsmart it. I simply accepted that this was now the stride. This is how we move.
Oddly enough, accepting that constraint made the decision-making easier. The expedition ceased to be about finding a painless way forward. It became about protecting the one movement pattern that still worked.
I think expedition mode is really an exercise in reducing complexity. Over time I notice myself removing decisions rather than adding them. The route becomes simpler. Food becomes simpler. Clothing becomes simpler. The objective becomes simpler. The mind gradually strips away everything that does not directly contribute to forward progress. There is an elegance in that simplicity that I rarely find elsewhere in life.
When I travel with others, which is rare, I naturally assume that each person is navigating their own expedition. That does not mean travelling alone. It means travelling together while remaining individually self-sufficient. The distinction is subtle but important.
Expeditions are dynamic. People become separated. One person reaches a shop first. Another stops to adjust shoes. Someone walks a climb while another keeps running. Weather forces unexpected decisions. Partnership on an expedition means accepting that each person will face circumstances the other cannot solve for them.
To me, these are not signs that the expedition has failed. They are normal features of moving through uncertain environments with other people.
Perhaps that assumption has been shaped by years of travelling alone. When I am alone there is no one else to solve the problem. The map belongs to me. The weather belongs to me. The mistake belongs to me. The solution belongs to me. Responsibility is absolute.
That responsibility has gradually become comfortable. Not because it is easy. Because it is clear.
Neither approach to partnership is inherently better. They simply represent different philosophies of movement.
The most beautiful part of these journeys is that, despite all this internal focus, they constantly remind me that endurance is never purely individual.
People appear unexpectedly. Someone waves from a passing truck. Someone offers water. Someone points towards shelter before the rain arrives. Someone stops, smiles and ask if they could drop you somewhere. Sometimes, when everything feels uncertain, someone reaches out and reminds you that you are not alone.
Those moments matter far more than I realise while they are happening. When I look back, I rarely remember the pain first. I remember the people. I remember kindness. I remember generosity offered without expectation of return.
Perhaps that is why I continue doing these expeditions. The landscapes are magnificent, but they are only part of the story. The human landscape is equally remarkable.
Finally, this journey taught me something about adaptation. Adaptation is not always dramatic. Sometimes it is almost invisible. A slightly shorter stride. A quieter mind. One fewer unnecessary decision. One more moment spent observing rather than predicting.
As an oceanographer, I spend my professional life studying systems that constantly adjust to changing forcing. The ocean does not stubbornly insist on following yesterday’s circulation simply because that was the original plan. It responds continuously to the conditions it experiences.
Perhaps expeditions demand something similar. The best plans are valuable. But reality always gets the final vote. The expedition does not reward those who cling most tightly to their expectations. It rewards those who adapt without resentment.
That may be the greatest lesson I carry home.
The finish line is never the most important part of the journey. The interesting part is discovering who you become when plans dissolve, certainty disappears, and the only question left is whether you can keep making good decisions despite uncertainty.
I think that is what expedition mode really is. Not toughness. Not suffering. Not even endurance.
It is the gradual replacement of ambition with awareness. The quieter I become, the more I notice. The more I notice, the better I adapt. And perhaps, in the end, adaptation is the truest measure of endurance.
