Ordinary to Extraordinary - The Podcast
Oct 5, 2026 · 1 hr 40 min · 13 segments
Mark Wood is a Polar explorer, expedition leader, professional speaker and educator. After serving in the British Army, and then as a firefighter, he moved into full-time expedition leadership. He was…
David HindleHost
Neil JeffersHost
We're gonna very shortly jump into some of your expeditions to really sort of l- learn about where you've been and what happens, but I'm really interested in one little extra to put on th- that layer to what you've just said, which is as an explorer, so much of what you do, at least possibly in my mind, is going into the unknown.
Like, you're gonna go to places to explore, and maybe others have been there, maybe they haven't.
Obviously, you did this solo South Pole to North Pole, were the first person to do that, so there's very little resource for you to go and dive into to understand what you need, uh, to be safe and to excel.
A- and so really what I'm getting at here is there's a lot of unknown, and potentially maybe anxiety or fear of the unknown if it's not controlled or managed.
Um, so I'm really interested how you structure your preparation and how you manage that potential fear of the unknown with risk, right? A lot of these places, when we just listed those five things, all have an element of risk, and some of it really high.
How do you manage that? Because I think those lessons potentially are translatable to us all.
You know, um, when I was a kid, my mother always used to say I just worry about things that haven't happened yet because, you know, the mind-
I was selfishly asking this question because I'm intrigued as to how someone like yourself goes to such austere places and manages that.
Um, I think, and, and you guys know from your, your work, uh, your past work, preparation is everything.
We're gonna very shortly jump into some of your expeditions to really sort of l- learn about where you've been and what happens, but I'm really interested in one little extra to put on th- that layer to what you've just said, which is as an explorer, so much of what you do, at least possibly in my mind, is going into the unknown.
Like, you're gonna go to places to explore, and maybe others have been there, maybe they haven't.
Obviously, you did this solo South Pole to North Pole, were the first person to do that, so there's very little resource for you to go and dive into to understand what you need, uh, to be safe and to excel.
A- and so really what I'm getting at here is there's a lot of unknown, and potentially maybe anxiety or fear of the unknown if it's not controlled or managed.
Um, so I'm really interested how you structure your preparation and how you manage that potential fear of the unknown with risk, right? A lot of these places, when we just listed those five things, all have an element of risk, and some of it really high.
How do you manage that? Because I think those lessons potentially are translatable to us all.
You know, um, when I was a kid, my mother always used to say I just worry about things that haven't happened yet because, you know, the mind-
I was selfishly asking this question because I'm intrigued as to how someone like yourself goes to such austere places and manages that.
Um, I think, and, and you guys know from your, your work, uh, your past work, preparation is everything.
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