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On flyingwithoutfear.com we try to compare flying to the ordinary things in life that we take for granted.
I’m always on the lookout for ways to understand your fear of flying and ways to explain the things that happen on a plane. There’s a blog post that I made years ago about my car and mechanics and what I thought was happening and so on. Everything seemed bad but I was completely mistaken. (Last blog on the archive september 2007)
Today I thought that the car needed a good wash bearing in mind that Vivienne my wife had kindly had it valetted two week ends ago and now it was starting to look grubby again. I was in two minds whether to go thru’ the car wash or go home to get on with some work. I chose to wash the car but in my haste didn’t park the car centrally … as the brushes and washers headed towards me I thought the side of the car would be bashed…so when there was a great bump and thumping sound I thought the worst. The car seemed to shake quite severely.
I quickly opened my door to check …and of course everything was fine…the brushes and rollers were well clear of the body work.
In reality the bump and crashing noises were no worse than they are usually, it’s just that I was anxious and fired up to fear the worst…because I was expecting it and prepared for it. This is not a million miles from how you feel in turbulence…you’re fired up ready to make the slightest bump into severe turbulence.
But there was more to it. Because the car was stationary the movements of the car seemed exagerrated …it didn’t bump around in the usual way as it does when it’s moving and the slightest movement seemed much worse. In a plane of course you very rarely have a sense of movement so perhaps our mind says ” If we’re not moving, how come the plane is bumping around so much?
Just a thought… about the fear of flying.
Keith
