Fear Of Flying

Fear of flying is a common phobia and those who suffer from a fear of flying basically fall into three groups. The first group has some other sort of phobia such as claustrophobic which is a fear of confined space. Others have a fear of heights or an obsessive fear of dying.

The second group that suffers from fear of flying is composed of people whose life situation has precipitated the fear of flying phobia. There were OK but suddenly things combined to overwhelm them. People in this group often develop their fear of flying after a divorce or the death of a family member. Women often experience fear of flying after they've had children. For this group, there's some sort of a buildup of environmental stress or a combination of events - divorce, losing a job, or some other stressful event - any one of which they could cope with on its own. But in combination, these events are the straw that breaks the camel's back. The person goes into stress overload. And it just happens that they have to take a flight at that inopportune time.

The third group suffering from a fear of flying consists of people who have had some sort of frightening or disturbing incident involving flying. They've been in an emergency landing, have experienced severe turbulence, or have had a relative die in a plane crash. They feel the fear of flying as a result of a real-life incident involving a degree of a real threat, and they need help to overcome their fear of flying.

The expression "fear of flying" is really a misnomer. Fear is a realistic reaction to a real-life threat, which, in almost every case, the fear of flying is not. Fear of flying is really a phobia, an irrational fearful reaction to an imagined or anticipated threat. No doubt there are risks involved with flying, but as we say in the course, the risks in traveling across the city in a car are so much greater than taking a dozen flights anywhere in the world. The statistics confirm that we're safer in the air than in a car.

Some who suffer from fear of flying fail to put the facts in the proper perspective. They think nothing of driving in their cars despite the thousands of accidents that happen daily but when it comes time to fly, their fear of flying emerges as they focus on the relatively few flying accidents that happen and all the media attention these accidents receive.

Other who suffer from the fear of flying are chronic worriers. In all situations, not just flying, they tend to anticipate the worst possible outcome as a probability which it generally isn't. Others have overactive imaginations and play the "what if" game. They fill their minds with all the possible things that could possibly go wrong despite the fact that these things rarely happen.

The best way to overcome the fear of flying is to deal with every moment and try to do whatever you can to feel comfortable. You can cope with anything when and if it happens, but you don't have to try to do it all at once. People who worry about the past or anticipate the future inevitably end up spoiling the present, and that applies to flying as well as anything else.