How to Get Out of Your Comfort Zone Through Travel (and Why it Changes Everything)
Alone UK Winner Tom Williams on Fear and Travel
Tom Williams, winner of survival series, Alone UK
Most of us have a trip we keep putting off.
Maybe it's somewhere that feels too far, too unfamiliar, too complicated. Maybe it's a style of travel that sounds incredible in theory but makes your stomach drop a little when you actually think about booking it. Maybe you've been sitting on it for months, waiting until the timing is right or the fear gets smaller.
I recently sat down with Tom Williams, founder of Desert Island Survival and winner of Alone UK Season 1 on the latest episode of the Type 2 Travel podcast, and here’s what he would tell you about that fear: it's not a stop sign. It's a green light.
The Kid Nobody Bet On
Tom didn't grow up with confidence.
He was the heaviest kid in his school, bottom of every class, and bullied relentlessly. His business studies teacher once told his classmates that the only way Tom Williams would ever get to university was if he climbed through the bathroom window — and even then, he'd probably get stuck.
He believed it. When you hear something enough times, you do.
Then, at 18, he went to Honduras to map coral reefs. It was the first time in his life he'd been pulled completely out of the context that had defined him — away from the labels, the town, the people who'd decided who he was. And something unexpected happened. He was good at it. He became a dive master. He learned species after species. For the first time, the story he'd been told about himself didn't hold up.
That one trip didn't just change his plans. It dismantled a lifetime of limiting beliefs.
The Rule He Lives By
Tom has a personal rule that has guided almost every major decision he's made since Honduras: if his gut reaction to something is resistance — if his first instinct is I don't want to do that — that's exactly what he needs to do.
He hates public speaking. He recently agreed to give a talk in Rome and described himself as terrified. He did it anyway, because in his experience, the things that scare you the most are the ones that move you the furthest.
This isn't motivational poster stuff. It's something he's tested repeatedly, in extreme conditions, over decades...
Walking 370 miles to the North Pole.
Building a business from scratch with no roadmap.
Spending 35 days completely alone in the Canadian wilderness with ten items and no crew.
Every single time, the fear was bigger than the reality. Every single time, the reward on the other side was worth the price of admission.
What 35 Days Alone in the Wilderness Actually Teaches You
When Tom won Alone UK in 2023, he came out of the experience physically transformed (he lost 40 pounds in 35 days), but the mental shift was even more significant.
Stripped of his phone, his routines, his creature comforts, and virtually all stimulation, something unexpected happened. He felt happier than he ever had. His inflammation disappeared. His nervous system, which he hadn't realized was constantly running hot, finally settled. He meditated without trying to, simply because there was nothing else competing for his attention.
He also got very clear on something that he believes most of us are walking around missing: our fear is almost always dramatically larger than the reality we're afraid of. We catastrophize. We rehearse the worst version of events so many times that we talk ourselves out of things before we've even started.
And in doing so, we shrink.
The Comfort Zone Is Not Static
One of the most important things Tom said in our conversation on the Type 2 Travel podcast was this:
Your comfort zone doesn't stay the same size if you stop pushing it. It gets smaller.
He's watched it happen. People who stop taking long flights. People who stop trying new things. People who, slowly and without noticing, stop saying yes — until the world they're willing to inhabit gets smaller and smaller.
The antidote, in his view, is to keep inoculating yourself with challenges. Not necessarily extreme ones. Not everyone needs to survive alone in the wilderness for a month. But something. Regularly. Intentionally.
Go out of your comfort zone. Come back. Go out again. Think of it like a muscle — if you don't use it, it atrophies.
What This Has to Do With Travel
Here's where it gets personal for me, because this is exactly why I started leading group trips.
The people who resist the uncomfortable parts of travel the most — the unfamiliar food, the language barrier, the moments where nothing goes to plan — are usually the people who need it most. And they're also, in my experience, the ones who come back the most transformed.
Perfectly curated, pre-scripted travel experiences are fine. They're comfortable. But comfort doesn't change you. The friction does. The moment you navigate something hard in a foreign country. The moment you realize you can handle more than you thought. The moment you come home and an eight-hour flight delay genuinely doesn't bother you anymore because you have perspective now.
Tom put it better than I could: because we've paid the price of a little discomfort and a bit of courage, those tickets pay off.
He's right. They do.
The Gratitude Reset Is Real
One of the things Tom described after his 35 days alone was what he called a gratitude reset. Running water felt miraculous. A piece of fruit made him emotional. Everything that had faded into background noise in his regular life suddenly came back into sharp focus.
You don't have to spend 35 days alone in the wilderness to experience a version of this. Travel does it too, especially travel that asks something of you. I watch it happen on every trip I lead. People come home and they stop sweating the small stuff. They stop catastrophizing. They have a reference point now for what actually hard looks like, and most of life's daily frustrations don't clear that bar anymore.
That shift — that recalibration — is what travel is for. Not just the photos. Not just the stamps in the passport. The actual, internal, permanent shift in how you see yourself and what you're capable of.
The Thing You Keep Putting Off
So back to that trip you've been sitting on.
The one that makes your stomach drop a little. The one where the first instinct is I don't know if I can do that.
Tom Williams walked to the North Pole because his friend mentioned a race over beers one night and he said yes before he talked himself out of it. He built a survival business with no bushcraft experience because he refused to let fear make the decision for him. He went on a TV show that put his entire professional reputation on the line because the discomfort of not doing it was greater than the discomfort of trying.
He is living proof that fear and capability have almost nothing to do with each other.
The only thing standing between you and the version of yourself that exists on the other side of that trip is the decision to book it.
Life, as Tom reminded me, is not a dress rehearsal.
Ready to Stop Playing It Safe?
Listen to my full conversation with Tom Williams on the Type 2 Travel podcast, where Tom and I go deep on his 35 days alone in the Canadian wilderness, what winning Alone UK actually taught him about happiness and fear, and why the trips that scare you a little are the ones that change you the most.
Want to try a Desert Island Survival expedition? Visit desertislandsurvival.com, and use code DIS150 for £150 off.
Follow Tom’s Adventures:
Instagram: @tomwilliamsalone
Facebook: @twilliamsb
Website: tomwilliams.tv
Want to take the leap yourself? Check out our upcoming group trips, and find the one that makes your stomach drop just a little (that's how you know it's the right one).
Related blogs:
