The Man Who Cycled to Bhutan

In October 2017 I left my academic job researching happiness and began cycling to Bhutan, a country famed for its national focus on happiness. Ironically I wasn’t very happy in my job. I had grown dissatisfied and weary and I wanted to do something that felt more meaningful, would bring me more happiness, and also deepen my understanding of happiness.  A cycling journey to Bhutan began…

I eventually arrived in Bhutan on March 2019, 18 months after leaving my job and twice as long as I anticipated. It was an epic journey focused around happiness and took me to 25 countries, covering around 20,000kms by bicycle. It changed my life and I returned happy.

Once I got back to the UK, I wrote a book about the journey, which I self-published after a successful crowdfund supported by many of the people I met along the way. The book became a physical reality in March 2022. A Journey For Happiness: The Man Who Cycled to Bhutan can be ordered here.

You can get a glimpse of the journey via links below to blog articles I wrote and some of the media coverage of the journey. I am always happy to talk about my journey – interviews, public talks, etc., so if you’re interested get in touch.

Media

Along the way I picked up some media attention for my journey. For example, The Times wrote a piece about my journey just at the point when I was about to give up on my destination. My Spanish got a real test when I encountered Mexican journalists earlier that year in August. There were also a few other local and national news items along the way, as well as in Bhutan when I finally arrived there.

Since I returned there have also been some other interesting pieces on the journey, such as on this BBC radio show called “People Fixing the World.”

I have written various articles about my journey – this article picked up a lot of recent attention and I’ve given numerous talks and contributed to podcasts.

The Route

map 1

Below is a map of the route I took – it was not a direct route because on the way to Bhutan I wanted to pass through places that are just as inspiring as Bhutan when it comes to happiness and wellbeing. Costa Rica and Canada, for example. An animation of my route can be found by clicking on the map.

Blogging

As I journeyed I wrote about my experiences and how they enriched my academic understanding of happiness. Most of the articles I wrote can be found here, but below are links to some of the most popular ones:

My journey involved a lot of happiness, but I also encountered deep personal struggle. Here are a few posts about some of that struggle:

  • Resentment, hostility, and hatred arise… (only three months in to the journey I got bitten by a street dog. It was a difficult time and I wrote several blog posts about the experience and got through it in the end – this post highlights an important insight I obtained from the experience)
  • Vegas and the desperate hunt for an improbable happiness! (Las Vegas stands out as being the most difficult places to be – exuberance and destitution – a recipe for unhappiness. This post depicts some of my experience there)
  • The ultimate lesson in happiness: Self-acceptance (100 miles away from the Bhutanese border and I had the most serious bike mechanical issue of my journey making it unlikely I’d be able to cycle those last miles. This post explores the issue of self-acceptance)

These blog posts and others have been weaved into a book and you can get a copy here.