Kit Birks: Walking 5,000 Miles Across Europe to Save Lives | Extraordinary Life Stories

0:00Your team just added its 67th AI tool and also your 67th security blind spot. The good news? The Vanta agent works like a GRC engineer in the background, finding every app your team uses, scoring the risk, and drafting fixes for you. Vanta is the platform used by over 16 ,000 fast-moving companies like Ramp, Cursor, and Harvey, who are shaping the future with AI and staying ahead of AI risk. Get started at vanta.com. But it was completely different to what I thought it would be. Both harder, more beautiful, surprising and just overall pretty crazy actually. Genuinely brutal few days it's been.

0:39Who is Kit Burks? I'm an adventurer, author and activist. Always becoming, always changing and I think that's quite exciting. Always curious. I've been back in England for three and a half weeks after completing 343 day expedition where I became the first person to walk the entire length of Europe and raised over£100 ,000 for cyber prevention charities Calm and James' Place. You have ultimately tried to take your own life. There's a real difference that we don't talk about between someone wanting to take their life and someone actually taking their life. And I think this is the bit that we need to open up the conversation more about.

1:18I just want to know how it's unravelled, from what your perception of how it might be to the actual reality. Everyone was asking me these questions. Oh, you're about to walk the entire length of Europe. And I was like, yeah, no, I am. I don't think I really knew what that meant or what it would have in store. And when I got to the start line, which is all the way up in Nordkap, Norway, it was a real shot.

1:55sorry to interrupt i've never asked this before but if you can subscribe and follow that will allow me to keep bringing extraordinary guests onto the show now let's get back to it

2:08kit welcome thank you so much it's so good to be here you kept me waiting for this yeah doing a long trek every year i know and we'll get to that but firstly who is kit burkes um i guess from a noun perspective uh i'm an adventurer uh author and activist um but i guess i think we all we get hung up on the uh nouns as people but i feel like i'm just i don't really know who i am most of the time always becoming always changing and i think that's quite exciting always curious always good i love that that's why that's why we're so aligned and you have done a lot more of finding yourself since we were together a year ago yes and maybe we go straight to that which will then honor kind of the why you did it because you just completed a world record yeah congratulations so tell tell us more yeah so I've been back in England for three and a half weeks after completing 343 day expedition where I became the first person to walk the entire length of Europe in the end it It was 4 ,989 miles.

3:18I climbed the equivalent of 13 Everest's and raised over£100 ,000 for suicide prevention charities Calm and James's Place. Huge congratulations. Thank you. Thank you. That's been quite a whirlwind. Quite emotional when you say that because I remember carrying your backpack June last year and now June, June this year and it was so heavy and it was all maybe a little bit intimidating to you and not overwhelming but just that whole like and it was upcoming and there was a focus you were training you'd walked to the studio that day yeah to get the steps in the exercise and i just want to know how how it's unraveled you know from what your perception of how it might be yeah to the actual reality i know there's a lot there but let's let's unpick it um i don't think it actually had sunk in what i was doing everyone was asking me these questions oh you're about to walked the entire length of Europe and I was like yeah no I am I don't think I really knew what that meant or what it would have in store and when I got to the start line which is all the way up in Nordkap Norway um it was a real shock you know it was super remote arctic circle arctic wilderness there were no trails there were no trail markers so I was completely trusting in gpx files that I had made myself um and I cried for the first 10 days every night in my tent alone um miles away from civilization no phone signal uh no running water no electricity it was just me I didn't see anyone for six days so um yeah I didn't really know what I was getting myself into and I still don't know how I got to the end but I did but it was completely different to what I thought it would be both harder more beautiful surprising and just overall pretty pretty crazy actually yeah I think it only sunk in when I was halfway down Sweden which is a really big country by the way you would die so big i was like wow i'm only halfway through sweden um and i was like wow okay i really am walking the entire length of europe so yeah it took a while to think in what i was doing yeah i mean you told me off camera a minute ago that you are not someone that had done any camping you weren't someone that was savvy with you know setting up camp and all that self-sufficiency and that would be uh something you need to learn if you were going to go to the Lake District to go and do some hiking you're now in extreme conditions crying yourself to sleep was there was there a moment where you were like I've this isn't possible I've I've over committed no I think um I definitely doubted myself a lot I definitely thought like I don't know if you can do this but you can do it and you will do it um quitting is never an option and that was partly because I'm extremely stubborn and partly because the alternative seemed worse the alternative was okay you can quit right now find a train find whatever you can go to an airport go back home and where are you going to go back to you're going to go sit in your parents kitchen and you'll be sat with a cup of tea and it might feel like safety for a second but then you're just there going well I really should be back in the arctic circle right now actually and um I just yeah quitting was not an option it was only if I was in a gonna die I was like okay I'll quit then but otherwise it was just never an option for me in my head no matter how hard it got yeah huge respect for you there's two things there there was a that determined girl that I met a year ago that had prepared the challenge had got herself mentally physically ready to do it and there's different reasons for kit to need to do that challenge but also then you had committed to raising much needed funds for charity did you feel that was almost a positive force for you as well whether it's bigger than you you're doing this for more than just yourself yeah I think actually having the cause pulled me forward on most days and I had constant reminders everywhere I mean even when I didn't have signal I had my flag so I had the flag with me that had the names of people lost to suicide on it so those people were the only people that did every single step with me from start to finish and those names on the flag became not names on the flag they really were people that I would speak to they were only my only source of company so I had constant reminders of why I was doing it and that was the thing that kept me going and then when I did get moments of signal seeing messages come through from family friends strangers on the internet that constantly pulled me forward as well yeah i want to open that up because that version of you that girl crying herself to sleep for those first 10 days completely on your own i think it's so important to make the point that you know we'll see bear grills or someone who's um doing an adventure who looks like he's there's a whole film crew there there's a whole load of choreography and there's a there's a sort of pool called to get him out if he needs to you were on your own yeah and you had a small number I forget the number of people on your socials if you like but your brilliant skills and they really are of creating content that feel like it's just me watching it like you're talking to me it's a real skill and being completely vulnerable and letting me know exactly how whether it's going well or whether it's not how it's going and what I what I then realized quite quickly you were doing was building this community of engaged people that were so invested in what you did I want to know if you felt that early on and you were almost trying to do that or if it just happened organically um I think it happened organically because uh I just decided I'm gonna go and be myself whatever that might look like in any capacity I'm gonna keep your people informed on what's going on and I'm gonna show how I'm feeling that this is the whole point you know there's no don't hide don't pretend to be braver than you are and actually be braver by being vulnerable like that's I think the bravest thing we can all be um and I realized actually that means it was easier to make content because I didn't have to put on an act I didn't have to force anything like this is how it is and that's I'm sorry if I haven't got anything to give or this is something beautiful this is something sad this is what happened today and i always say vulnerability bleeds vulnerability and i think when when i was vulnerable i got people being vulnerable back and without me knowing sometimes this this community did start to build the engagement was always fantastic not always i mean i started with i think 3 000 followers on instagram and now have just under 200 000 but it did people started to come together not just for me for each other as well and I didn't have the time whilst I was on the move to read all the messages that were coming through.

10:18There are generally tens of thousands. I thought there was just a thousands, but there's tens of thousands. And so I went all the way back to the beginning of when I started. And I've been going through these messages. And so far, I've got back to 400 people. And I was a mess. I did this all over the weekend. You know, people reaching out and telling me about their loved ones, that they've lost a suicide, telling me stories, you know, about them. Just completely opening up. nowhere to hide and then people saying you know you've saved my life I've I've carried on going because of you um this is where my life is now this is where I was when I first started watching your content you know another person saved because of you and I was just I couldn't stop crying because I thought amazing that I raised this money for charity not just me but everyone that's donated but just seeing the the one-to-one with these people that it was just it's just been incredible and it's just it generally has been it's just blown blown me away and i still got quite a few more messages to get back to as well gosh so there's probably some kind of cathartic element to the fact that i know that something that uh probably drove you was the challenge element so every day was a challenge um and i want to kind of get to the point where you you know i'm not skipping past what becomes the end of the challenge but you are sitting here right now three and a half weeks post what was an everyday challenge and then there's an element of being able to reflect and take in stuff that was happening so quick yeah you're probably concentrating on the next obstacle the next milestone the next meal um but that on that reflection in context of the scale if you like of people that perhaps are suffering that are not necessarily haven't hadn't found a way of them being able to express their feelings and then found you to be able to do that is that on a pretty big magnitude yes yeah yeah yeah huge and i think more than you thought because you're quite well dialed into this and I want to open that up I know you've got stats and they but is it is it more than you'd even thought just on that sort of how people are just masking and yeah so yeah yeah I think there's a lot more going on than we realize and I think the thing is is that sometimes people there's there's a real difference that we don't talk about between someone wanting to take their take their life and someone actually taking their life and I think this is the bit that we need to open up the conversation more about because I've been someone that's had loads of years of suicidal ideation but there's only been a few occasions where I actually wanted to follow through with it and I think there's quite a big difference and I know that doesn't sound like it but it really is but people are scared to say that first bit I want to take my life I think I want to take my life because of how suffocating that can be to bring into a room or to say out loud and actually sometimes that's not what you mean it's just that that feels like the only alternative to to living the life that you're currently living right now and you know one I think it's one in five of us will have thoughts about suicide in our lifetime lots of people have these suicidal ideation and I think being able to say out loud you know I do even now with my bipolar I have moments where taking my life seems like the best option even now even though i don't actually want to take my life so by saying these kind of things out loud and having room to have conversations with it without it being it is dramatic but it's not actually dramatic and i think people get scared about saying these things out loud so when people can have those open conversations with you about how they're feeling um it's really beautiful because you're like okay oh we can talk about this without fear and without shame without worry that we're gonna like basically bring bring other people down and they're gonna start fretting because sometimes it's sometimes as simple as just saying saying those words and having someone listen to you to sort of take take the air out of it really i know when we got to speak uh for a memorable conversation a year ago which is very much focused around adhd but it covered your if you like your backstory which i'd love to bring into someone that has suffered with your mental health and go to a point where you have ultimately tried to take your own life to then do so much now to help other people.

14:26You're coming from a place of empathy. You're coming from a place of lived experience. And you made a conscious decision to seek help. And I remember learning so much during that conversation about the fact that people just need to be listened to. But it's providing that safe space. It's providing a medium. And it feels like you do that. And I also think it's really powerful that you recognize that. Where can you go with this kit? You're someone that people can come to that you openly have people message you saying what you're doing, what you said, you listening has saved my life, stopped me from doing the worst.

15:00How do you amplify, Kit? What can you do to help more people? When you need to build up your team to handle the growing chaos at work, use Indeed Sponsored Jobs. It gives your job post the boost it needs to be seen and helps reach people with the right skills, certifications and more. Spend less time searching and more time actually interviewing candidates who check all your boxes. Listeners of this show will get a$75 sponsored job credit at Indeed.com slash podcast. That's Indeed.com slash podcast. Terms and conditions apply. Need a hiring hero? This is a job for Indeed sponsored jobs. And we're live from the living room as Doug eyes up the match day spread.

15:39He's reaching for the Buffalo wing. Perfect. Hang on. What's this? Oh, he's gone for a can of Pepsi too. Incredible. What a finish. Sensational combination. Look at the delight on his face. There's no doubt about it. It just tastes better. Match days deserve Pepsi. Food deserves Pepsi. Grab a pack of Pepsi Zero Sugar for today's match. It's poetry in motion. Keep on speaking about it. I think, Jen, keep on speaking about it to keep on basically growing what I've already started. and to try and get to more people. I mean, getting those plans, you know, have more outdoor communities where people can come together and go out walking with me or anything like that because it's really easy to say to people, oh, go and speak to someone.

16:26If you're feeling like this, speak to me or speak to someone. You know, I can't always speak to everyone, but not everybody has a someone. You know, not everyone has family, not everyone has friends. So how can we get more communities going, how we can get more people realising that there are amazing charities like James's Place or Calm Out There that people will understand and listen to you and know what what you've been through um because yeah i think a lot of people from what i've seen just from the messages online feel like there was nowhere to go or feel like there was no one that actually felt the same way that they did um that's the thing there's that's relatability so intently there is samaritans and not think that the work they do is phenomenal but there's there are actually places set up but there's something relatable about you there's something that has drawn people that perhaps were not getting the answers or felt they could go anywhere else saying that they've come to you so it's just how you experience i think yeah uh completely understanding i mean i hated i i started going to therapy when i was 13 12 13 um my mental illnesses started when i was 11 uh depression anxiety, insomnia and then eating disorders and then drug addiction for a decade.

17:43But that was to try and mask, you turned to drugs because it was a way of trying to escape all the things that were happening. Yeah and then I got found recovery for a drug and alcohol addiction after it spiralled me all the way to homelessness and suicide and then I celebrated four years clean and sober on the mission and have since been diagnosed with ADHD and bipolar disorder. You know, everything starts to make sense and you go, oh, okay, fantastic. And the reason why I do what I do now is because growing up, I didn't have anyone. I had no comparison. No one to, I mean, how do you know what's going on in your head if there's no one else explaining what's going on in their head?

18:25It's completely invisible. You can go into a hospital and see someone else with a broken leg and go, oh, I've got the same as you and that makes sense. and then what are you doing about it and how are you getting better and what are you overcoming? You don't have that with someone else's brain. You go into a room, I have no idea if you have the same thing as I do. And it was so hard growing up because, one, I was always told to look for the problem. So I was going to therapy for my eating disorders and they were convinced something must have happened to me in my childhood. There must have been some trauma and there must have been something that went severely wrong.

18:58There wasn't. I had a really happy childhood. But it made me fixated on that fact. there has to be something wrong with me and so lies started because if I lied about something happening then it would make sense to other people but actually I had ADHD and bipolar disorder I had chemical imbalances within my brain that were not caused by anything that just happens to be there so maybe if someone else was speaking the same way I I do now I could be like oh they have this and they have that maybe I have that and it's okay to say that out loud and it's there's no shame behind it there's no guilt it's very open conversations again going back to the suffocation in a room with all the conversations with me growing up it felt like I was taking the air out to a room because it was always so serious let's talk about her mental illness let's talk about her mental health but in a way that was kind of like we had to sit down put everything else to the side and talk about it and actually sometimes you just want to have conversations that where you can get things off your chest and you feel like people are just listening and they're there and maybe they understand and maybe they don't but at least you'll be able to get it out without feeling like you're killing everything else in the room with you yeah yeah that's why i started talking about it it's so it's powerful i mean there's so many stories i hear of people that are now adults that have been so misunderstood and felt like they've been a bad badly behaved kid at school and being punished for it as well to then find out they've got adhd or you know in in context of maybe autism or something that's meant that the neurodivergence piece has meant that one size doesn't fit all in the school yeah and then the mental health downstream the drugs or something else that masks yeah uh then trying to feel different you know how do we head that off early kick because i can only imagine how inspirational you would be going into a school and talking to your kids and some of those kids thinking that feels like me i'm a bit like this and look at you now, you're glowing and you've just done this world record.

20:53And I know you'll be plotting something else will come to that, but you get my point. It's like, I can thrive. I can be like her, which makes you a role model. And is that part of something you might do now? Because kids in schools don't have that benefit, right? Unless they get to meet someone like you. Yeah, hugely. I think it's just changing conversations around the fact that we've believed that there's one way of being as a child, that you're supposed to sit down in a classroom and focus and study and then keep on studying to do exams you know not everyone's brain works like that and actually if your brain doesn't work like that does that mean you're broken absolutely not but you're fed that i was fed that you know you're broken there's something wrong with you you're stupid you can't listen you know you're always away with the fairies actually there's just sometimes there's a different way of doing things and if you do feel like this or your brain works this way doesn't mean you're broken at all in fact it means that maybe you're going to be achieving something completely new and different and fantastic and it shouldn't be a limitation bipolar shouldn't be a limitation ADHD shouldn't be a limitation autism shouldn't be a limitation um they aren't they none of them should be called disorders either no you know that it just it just feels very very silly but I think yeah I think it'll be really good to go and speak to to younger people you'd be you'd be amazing um away with the fairies creativity curiosity your your creativity is so inspiring it's phenomenal and you've just walked across europe your imagination the stimulation the things you've seen yeah must have been so incredible for you i mean you know sweden you mentioned it's the most stunning country what's that been like because the challenge the challenge the purpose is the purpose but at times you must have been pinched me like because certain people go to certain destinations viewpoint and so on you've seen so much yeah there's been a lot to take in along the way but your camera's full right i mean yeah absolutely yeah um yeah it's been it's been absolutely fantastically beautiful and i think it stands out is there any particular areas that just blew you away were like this is incredible arctic circle up up and up and then really northern parts of scandinavia it was just so remote and so wild and so rugged and i said like days on end where i would not see a single person and so and then no signals you're not calling anyone and i think the beautiful thing about being out there was that there was zero distraction so you had you couldn't hide even from yourself you know you had random thoughts whether it was good bad whatever and you just had to feel that in its totality you couldn't hide from it which was so scary but so beautiful and you felt so can i felt so connected to everything around me because the bugs had to become my friends you know for some reason three days in a row i had a beetle same kind of beast not the exact same beast so that would be a bit crazy um it's a lot of steps yes yeah i'll be like well done buddy um come and sit on my sit on my knee whilst i was having my porridge in the morning so that you know you start speaking to the animals and you kind of really start to appreciate every single thing around you um both big and small and I mean it was just so beautiful up there and I really even though at the beginning it was so hard to be so remote I then absolutely loved it it was just so such a freeing experience and because as I said quitting wasn't an option so many hard things happen just within your day river crossings that have been really swollen so it's really high rivers or snow fields or i nearly fell to my death in sweden and you have these things and you're like well i have to the other option is to turn back so you just have to go through um so you realize how capable you are and you realize actually when you don't have enough time to sit on the edge of fear and they normally sit right on the edge of it and it gets scarier you just have to go straight through it that you're like i can really do these hard things and that's not just me my friend pete came out and he was terrified about the things i was saying to him like okay we're going to have to do this 12 miles of snow fields we're going to go up to 3 000 meters whatever it was but he did it you know and it really is that amazing experience that you're like okay well i can i can really do hard things and i can overcome anything that that comes my way um in a in a calm and calculated and you know you've got to keep your head on and make good decisions but yeah so northern scandinavia and bosnia bosnia blew me away that was really unexpected i just saw it as a three country i did six days of of walking through bosnia and it was unbelievably beautiful the the the nature it was almost amazonian with these huge waterfalls that kind of came out of nowhere and really thick with vegetation the people were so kind i had truck drivers stopping and giving me fizzy drinks and checking that i was okay and there's a real togetherness and I don't know whether that's because of the the war that ended in 1995 maybe you go through so much sorrow that it brings you together as a country but they were so so kind really really kind people so yeah those are like the really standout countries yeah I could skip Germany and Austria but that that's unfair because it was winter so that was horrendous that was really really hard months of snow sleeping in my tent in minus 15 degrees it was horrible i would not do that again i wrote a little song to remind you choice hotels get you more of the experiences you value the cambia hotels got it all a rooftop bar have a ball bring a date your squad or even your mom book direct at choicehotels.com and that i mean you must you must have changed so much as a person that the character building the whole uh resilience piece and you were already, you know, the first interview I met a year ago was already a really strong woman and was preparing to, but sitting here now, there's a calmness to you.

26:49I can feel it off you. I feel like you can do anything now. Not in an arrogant way. But like, just like, you know, there's a really inspiring vibe from you that you just, you know, you nearly fell to your death in Sweden. I think if I remember there was some uncomfortable moments, uncomfortable probably, a very mild word to use for the fact that there was some threatening behavior that you experienced and you know there's all sorts of dangers that you faced along the way yeah but you're here you know you did it and you did it within the timeline yeah you set out to do yeah i could have done it quicker um because of the the two times that where my safety well the big time that my safety was compromised in in hungary um i i stayed in a place called graz in austria in the end for over three nearly three weeks trying to rebuild a plan and rebuild myself because I that plummeted my mental health I think it was the end of this really long winter and then that happened I was kind of I keep on saying it's the store that broke the camel's back and everything sort of came crumbling down um and there were a few other times where I took an extended tiny bit more of a break because of of just needing to to reboot myself so I'm really glad I did it in the time um definitely did it in the in the time frame there's a lesson there as well you set yourself a challenge it was far greater than you thought it was going to be but you still made time that the ego didn't get in the way of anything where he was like he took three weeks out when you could have that voice could have said just take a week out and get going you may not have been ready to then complete the challenge that's quite an important important message and maturity there from you yeah i thought well i can keep them going but i'm gonna hate every single second and i'm going to be because i was so scared i was so scared i've been approached on on multiple occasions within a 24 hour time frame in this one place in hungary not saying anything bad against hungary it's just a fact and this could happen anywhere over the world um uh by by some men and then they'd come up to me and i'd try and ask them in hungary do they speak english and they wouldn't reply in english and then they would actively follow me for for many many kilometers um I thought once was a bit weird didn't really like that and then again I thought well what's there's what is going on here this is really bizarre behavior um and it was really scary you know you're very vulnerable when you're walking you've got your legs to get you out of any situation um is that it there's no pull cord you've obviously got your phone and you've got did you have people on standby so like someone that could in any one way a close friend that been known when you're in danger and just always be available for it did you have that kind of setup no no wow it was just me all the time until the last six weeks when i had my cameraman come out and join me for the last six weeks and that was put in place because of the compromise to my safety but then then we had to get funding in place because suddenly it was going to be a big injection of funding to get a camera guy full-time support crew and a vehicle out um but then i couldn't wait along any longer so i did continue and actually luckily i started to go into croatia and the sun came out and the people were fine and I kind of which I think was good because it did rebuild that trust in humanity again and I felt much calmer and much better um but yeah throughout the whole 10 and a half months it was just me and no one else and nothing else and I actually calculated in the end that it was 343 day mission and I walked 308 of those days totally by myself with not even a stranger for company.

30:18So it was a lot of time of being totally alone. How does it feel three and a half weeks back? And I know there's been a few bits of TV, other podcasts. You were around people now intensely compared to the last few months. Obviously, there was life before, but you build habits, right? So that solitude that probably helped you find yourself and you got used to it and so on. I mean, talk to me about the feelings towards getting to the end of the challenge, completing it, and then literally flipping that whole narrative to that being around people constantly. Yeah, it's quite strange. Yeah. I think when my cameraman, Kai, bless him, he's a great guy, came and joined me and we were in this tin can together, which was the camper van.

31:04I mean, I went into it thinking it was, you know, the Ritz because I'd been living in a tent for months. and I was like wow look at the space and he'd come from his really lovely home with his girlfriend and suddenly he was in this tin can with this insane woman um and he was like wow you really haven't been around people have you and I was like realized that kind of the filters had gone there was not an element of mystery and when you chat chat chat were you almost silent because you got used to I'm wondering whether you suddenly were like bloop or whether you actually were a bit locked up with your own feelings no I was very chatty but also had my moments of calm and quiet but i mean it kind of it was very we're very lucky that we got on so well and but i realized you know there was i was just instantly sort of probably how i would be if i was by myself which might be a bit weird and i talked to the bugs and the birds and bees and whatever it might be um you do that anyway though yeah that's true i mean nothing's really changed um and then coming back i think it was really weird getting to this finish line so the finish line was on gabados island in the southernmost point which is quite a trek for anyone to get to you have to get into crete and then you have to there's only one ferry that goes to this island a day both there and back um and it's a four-hour ferry and then it's a tiny tiny island it's 16 kilometers long and there's really not much on there at all and so I think there was a group of 12 of us at the at the finish line and you kind of get this stool as you'd have seen and I had no idea what I said because you know I think people might have been expecting this big speech like well thank you everyone for this year and I went I guess that's it then because it was just so such a weird moment because you know what do after that you've got to this chair that's the finish line it's not like there's nowhere else to go so it's like that's it and that was it and how did you feel because you know i've in that chair spoken to people that have won the world cup and that was their dream that was their goal every training session every game to get to the final and then they've won the world cup and it's like a euphoric moment for seconds and it's different with you uh that the challenge uh accepted met completed boom but there was also that element of like it was um a stepping stone to having raised money and then doing other things but at that moment where you haven't got another day of walking that's all you've been doing did you have a hollowness did you have an element of like what do i do now or are you already thinking you aren't i think a bit of both a bit of both i think even now i feel like i'm either in a state of overwhelm and i'm really enjoying the overwhelm or state of underwhelm because it's like i i did everything for this mission i did all the planning all the logistics everything about safety the route uh you know i wasn't running around an athletic walking around an athletics pitch you know there was variables constantly like wild dogs or things going wrong your route and their bridges not being there so there's always problem solving and always things to do on top of the walking and the filming and putting the content together and so there was always a this purpose and there's always so much so it was really weird when that stopped and it was like a switch just completely stopped um and it's also hard for other people to understand what you're feeling like and what you've just been through for this year where so much has happened that even you can't make sense of that so at the end of the finish line we go over back to the ferry port at this taverna and we're just you know this big thing in my life has just happened but you can't you can't keep on talking about it can you so before you know you're going oh so what do you think we should have for for dinner and then i remember being in the car on Crete going to this villa because I stayed out in Crete with my family for five days and my mum and dad having a conversation in the front and me and my sister in the back and they were going oh yeah no I don't think the fish was that good at the restaurant you know just these little conversations you're like I really am I'm back back to these sort of like little but do you think we should get some crisps from the show yeah we should probably get some crisps from the show all these little mundane conversations again and you're like this is so weird like to be back you're just thrown straight into the where you were yeah i've got to ask you this what you did was so extreme there'll be plenty of people that plan to do a challenge a hike three peaks challenge and so what are the things that you now look back on as like perhaps you hadn't planned for essentials on something like that the right shoes equipment um something like uh i'm making up wd-40 what are the things that you now look back on is like I would never ever go without this or this is so important um so footwear I think that's like that I didn't get a single injury I had one problem with my back at one point but that was I went and saw an osteopath in Denmark and he fixed it I was just out of line I was misaligned um and I'm I'm convinced I'm convinced it was my footwear I was in uh hockers speed goats I don't know they're really good um and basically because you're you're in a shoe and it's really close to the floor you're feeling the ground constantly and therefore you're moving with the ground so you're you're training all these muscles up and you're training your ankle up so you could flip your ankle and it wouldn't hurt because your your ankle's getting more stable whereas when you're in a boot it's restricted it's in this boot and you're not really doing anything to train that up at all so you flip it and it's really painful um it also means that you're constantly using a different and a wider range of of muscles and ligaments so you're not getting as much repetitive strain because you're constantly changing things around um and you can walk through rivers and they dry really quickly and it means your feet cool down which means you're less likely to develop blisters so i'm really convinced that the my foot my footwear had a lot to do with the the lack of injury um sewing kit i don't you need a sewing kit just a tiny little sewing kit because that will fix everything holes in your tent holes in your gear if you want to pop a blister with it you thread you can thread a blister with a with a bit of with a thread so definitely you have a sewing kit um and then yeah good sleeping bag a really good sleeping bag other than that and and walking poles i think people think that you need to be a bat people have a misconception that you only need walking poles if you're a there's something wrong with you almost like it's a mobility aid or like you know you can't do something right so you need it but it's probably the most vital bit of equipment that you could have if you're doing a lot of hiking yeah because it's it helps your balance so it's like an extra pair of legs so it can also prevent injury and and falling over really good for river crossings it's again keeping you grounded and stable and it takes it's like a it's taking pressure off your legs as well so you're putting weight through your arms you're not putting so much pressure on your legs that's really interesting you just successfully completed a world record you set out to do creating the opportunity from scratch there's all sorts of people that could could associate um you with success on that basis sitting here now how do you define success as hard as it is to do i think let go of comparison and do what makes you truly truly happy and what gives you passion if that could be working at a post office that could be becoming a CEO of a big company that could be going out to the countryside and owning a farm whatever makes you happy I think we compare our lives to everyone and thinking oh they've got it better this they've got it better doesn't really matter just do what makes you happy there's no such thing as a timeline so just chase chase that chase the happiness love that I know you have a challenge yeah and you just you're three and a half weeks from finishing on but you've had you'd have been 100 % thinking about what else you're going to do in and so on.

39:11Have you got another challenge coming? Yes. Yeah, I knew you would. Definitely, definitely. Cool. Well, you'll have to let me know about that one. I will. I'll get behind you any way possible. I'd love to, I so enjoyed this conversation. We're going to have to wrap up now just purely from a time point of view, but I just want to end with all these comments you're reading from those people that have been reaching out to you and supporting you and sharing information with you and the fact that we now know there is there are so many people that are in any one way suffering from their mental health what's that what's that message to them from you um i i always like to say that um don't make a permanent decision out of the temporary voice so everything else can change and everything else is changing constantly you know we never stand in the same bit of water twice so even though it's painful and it can feel desperate and dark and like nothing's ever going to get better again it really really really really does um it might not change tomorrow it might not change next week or next month but it will eventually change death is permanent so please don't take your life please keep holding on and and from someone that has been there i can tell you that life does get good again it gets extremely beautiful so please stick around to see Yeah.

40:32It's beautiful, Kit. Thank you so much for making time to come and talk to me. Did you enjoy it? Yeah, I loved it. I've been looking forward to this, so thank you. You're a rock star. Thanks. Thanks, Kit. Thank you.