British explorer Ed Stafford believes a common man's everyday struggles, especially during the coronavirus pandemic, is akin to being in a survival television show where one must learn to adapt to overcome the difficulties.
Stafford has been part of a number of survival shows such as "Ed Stafford: First Man Out" and "Ed Stafford: Left For Dead" and he can understand what it feels like to live under a lockdown with strict rules that must be followed.
"I think lockdown and dealing with coronavirus is very much like being thrown into a survival show. Suddenly there are new parameters and rules, suddenly you have to adapt to overcome new difficulties.
"I think being resourceful, resilient and optimistic are traits that serve me well when I'm racing through remote parts of the world but they are also the things that make you a proactive and a positive person to be locked down with during a pandemic. Its more relevant than ever," Stafford told PTI.
In his brand new documentary "Ed Stafford: Man Woman Child Wild", which premiered on Discovery, Discovery HD and Discovery Plus App on May 11, the adventurer lives off-grid on a remote uninhabited island in Indonesia for one month.
However, this time, he will be joined by his wife Laura Bingham and their 20-month-old son Ran.
Stafford said that though having his wife and child with him made things a little bit difficult for him, he still would like to top this experience with another such adventure.
"Sure it was exhausting to stay alert enough in the month away to protect Ran (son), keep himsafe, and try and provide for us all, but I'm glad we did it and if there were opportunity in the future, we would love to do a far bigger experiment in more adverse conditions and for much longer so that we could really settle intothe new life."
Stafford has gone into the wild a number of times for his shows but he believes he always comes back as a better person.
"I think if you do the same thing every day then you stagnate. You don't learn and you don't expand your horizons. To me, these challenges make me grow as a person - I'm often humbled by not having all the answers to a certain problem and I think its having to think outside of the box and come up with new solutions that is critical to this being an amazing tool for personal growth.
"That's why I'm such an advocate of outdoor organisations like the Scouts as they encourage people to take controlled risks that will allow them to evolve as human beings," he added.
Besides "Man Woman Child Wild", the explorer is also back with the second season of his hit survival series "First Man Out", where he goes up against various experts from around the world in a battle to be the ultimate survivor.
Stafford said such a show with strong competitive elements has pushed him to better his skills as a survivalist.
"I think if you conduct a survival experiment where you have nowhere to go and no time pressure, is not really realistic. You would want to get out and find help / safety. So there would be time pressure and I think the competitive element assists in making the challenges more like real life escapes from adverse experiences.
"I've certainly felt that it has pushed me further to become a better survivalist and person as a result of the stiff competition," he said.
The second season of "Ed Stafford: First Man Out" started airing on Discovery, Discovery HD and Discovery Plus App from May 16.
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