Hence, even if you are flying with an airline that has a safety record that ranks amongst the worst (and if you are scared of flying, this is probably not an especially good idea), you are probably going to have to get on an airplane at least a million times to guarantee that your worst fears come true. If you live to be one hundred years old, you are going to enjoy 36,525 days on this earth, so you would need to take quite a few flights every day to reach this target!
Of course this is taking things to an absurd extreme, but it does serve to highlight the fact that being scared of flying per se is pretty absurd in itself. The logic does not however get away from the fact that many people are terrified of flying, so we need to establish why this should be the case and what you can do to get over this fear if you are a bad flyer.
The first thing to understand is what the fear of flying really is, because if you know that there is an far higher chance of getting killed in a car crash than there is on a plane, your fear cannot be based on the fact that a plane is transportation in the same way that a car or bus is.
Some people will suggest that they are scared of flying because the idea of sitting in a metal tube at 35,000 feet above the earth is so unnatural, but that does not make a great deal of sense either. Driving around in your car is no more natural than flying and very few people are scared of being in a car. This is not therefore particularly convincing argument either.
The truth is that the fear of flying has little to do with risk as such because whilst there is a risk of an accident whilst flying, that risk is considerably lower than it would be in a car, and after all, there is a risk attached to everything in life.
What makes a plane different to a car is that in a car, you retain a degree of control (even if we are not driving) and you are on the ground. Once you are in a plane and they shut the doors, that’s it, your trapped and you suddenly feel very vulnerable and threatened. You have no control, because your fate is now 100% in the hands of the crew, and you’ve never even met them!
You are more aware than at perhaps any other time that you are vulnerable and that life is fragile and that whilst moving around on the ground is perfectly normal, flying through the air is not.
In essence, a fear of flying is a type of anxiety disorder, a specific phobia or fear that cannot necessarily be easily overcome by trying not to think about it. As an anxiety, you are scared of the unknown, worrying about what might happen rather than something that will happen or what is happening right at this moment.
For most people, fear of flying is a combination of many factors or fears that they have. For instance, many people are scared of heights, whereas others feel uncomfortable in crowded places or in an enclosed space.
Then there is that fact that a stranger has complete control over your destiny whilst others (ground engineers and the like) could have made one tiny error that has effectively sealed your fate even before the plane taxies out to the runway to take off.
Everyone knows that you cannot control your fate or your future but if you suffer from a fear of flying, this is effectively what you are trying to do on a psychological level. Consequently, worrying about the future will cause physical and emotional upset in exactly the same way as would something genuinely happening.
If for example there was smoke pouring out of the engine and the pilot was attempting an emergency landing, your emotional and physical reaction would probably be the same as the reaction generated by the fear that something like this might happen.
As a general rule, people who suffer from a fear of flying will most commonly suffer one or both of two adverse reactions.
Firstly, they may suffer on a physical level, perhaps feeling sweaty or dizzy, being dry mouthed with a pale or flushed complexion. They might feel abdominal pains, muscle tensions or tremors, have difficulty breathing or feel heart palpitations.
On the other hand or in addition, some people suffer on a psychological level so that they suddenly have poor or misguided judgment, narrowed perceptions or negative expectations.
The key to the fear of flying is that you are trapped on that plane, and that is far too much like being trapped in a coffin which for many people is their worst nightmare.
As anyone who has suffered from a fear of flying knows, once you overcome your fear, this does not mean that you are any less well aware of the small risk involved in getting on the plane – it is just that you have learned to accept those risks as a natural part of life.
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