This year was the year, the year after the nightmare before. 2021, it is safe to say, hasn’t quite reached the sparkling heights of our expectations. Not yet anyway.

The pandemic has made plenty of events, gatherings and projects untenable. It will probably not come as a surprise to you, then, that the North Pole season for 2021 has also fallen to the list of cancelled events.
Now, when you have been dreaming about something since you were 8 and working on it daily for over two-and-a-half years, the first emotion you feel when it is cancelled is, undoubtedly, disappointment.

However, I’m a big believer that changing your perspective on an event drastically alters the impact it has on your life.

Allow me to share a story I was recently told with you; two Dublin based gym owners had similar sized businesses in similar parts of the city. 2020 hits and with it comes COVID-19, both enter lockdown at the same time with similar concerns, financial situations and infrastructures.

One despairs, doesn’t see how a gym can survive a lockdown where it has to close and all members are confined to their homes. They sit, watch This Morning and slip into stagnation.

The other buys more equipment so as to equip every member with at least something, resistance bands, kettlebells, dumbbells etc. They also set up one-to-one zoom sessions and group classes almost immediately.

Now, one owner has a business double the size as that they had in March 2020. The other, well, isn’t doing quite as well. The same event, the same business type, two very different perceptions and actions leads to two very different outcomes.

There is nothing wrong with feeling low, sad or depressed. We can’t always control that aspect of our lives and emotions. However, we can control how we react in the long term; let’s not let these events take hold of our lives.

My expedition is on hold, not cancelled. There are a huge amount of positives to come from this, one of which is cementing my data collection research methods to ensure they are as robust as possible.

I am now heading to Greenland in April to take on the Arctic Circle Trail giving me the chance to really test myself in Arctic conditions.
An event is what you make of it. Something initially disappointing does not have to create overall disappointment in your life. Change how you perceive an event and this will change the outcome.

In any case, Greenland was on the bucket list anyway so this is a chance to tick it off a year or so earlier!

Stay positive and keep on moving forward.

‘Tomorrow will be a better day’ - Captain Sir Tom Moore