Bear Grylls wanted to spy for MI5 when he was younger, according to his best selling book “Mud, Sweat and Tears”.
In his best selling book: “Mud, Sweat and Tears” Bear Grylls admitted he sought employment with MI5.
MI5 is a secret counter espionage service in Britain (source: https://www.mi5.gov.uk/).
Bear explains it this way:
“I spent three days in the month leading up to the start of university year sitting in a foyer of MI5, the British counterespionage service, asking to interview for a job. I had initially written to MI5, and had received a succinct reply saying thank you for my letter, but there were no posts currently available for me. The letter was signed off by a Miss Deborah Maldives.”
“I made up my mind to go and offer myself in person”, said Grylls.
“Miss (or Mr.) Deborah Maldives sat me down in an interview room and told me that there were proper channels to apply for MI5, and sitting in each foyer’s entrance, day after day was not one of them. He then smiled. He admitted that I had shown the sort of spirit that was required for counterespionage work and suggested I reapply direct to him, when I had a university degree. I took the card, shook his (her) hairy hand and scarpered. So there is some better motivation to go to university, after all, I thought” (source: “Mud, Sweat and Tears”, pg 114-115).
Bear would later apply for the Special Air Service and be accepted into their Selection program (see article: SAS teach soldiers in a whole new way”, says Bear Grylls https://groundreport.com/sas-teach-soldier-in-a-whole-new-way-says-bear-grylls/).
See related video: Secret live of an MI5 spy http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MtwcRTP0gwo.
See also: Inside MI5 – the Real spooks http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c9frEE_HZE4