Fear of Flying

The utter irrationality of it still confounds me. Perhaps 15 years ago I had a good friend who was a vastly accomplished pilot, and at the time he owned a stunt plane. He took me on several trips in his plane during which, as far as I knew, he wrung it out: barrel rolls, loops, inverted flight, stalls, you name it. I loved it, in the same way some people love horror movies or roller coasters that scare them. 

And then, one day, in the back of a commercial airliner enroute to someplace I don’t remember, the plane began to chatter and chop. We’d hit a mild patch of turbulence, and as I anxiously watched the rest of the passengers -- all of whom seemed unconcerned -- my fear instead grew into a full-blown phobia. My absolute worst flight ever was a couple years later on a trip to Los Angeles, where a patch of severe turbulence almost had me ready to open the emergency exit and jump out. That’s an exaggeration, but not much. I was terrified beyond anything I can ever recall feeling. 

I didn’t understand a single thing about any of this. For god’s sake, I’d flown in aerobatic stunt planes. Why was this suddenly happening to me? But what I learned is that why it was happening wasn’t as important as figuring a way out. 

I read everything I could find on phobias, particularly fear of flight. And eventually I hatched a plan. The first line of defense was a vial of tranquilizers from my doctor. The second was learning a series of calm, deliberate breathing exercises, something I already knew how to do through the meditation I was practicing. And slowly, over time, it worked. Today I haven’t taken the tranquilizers in a couple years, although I wouldn’t hesitate to use them again if I needed them. And slow, deliberate breathing really does work, just like all those weird-looking yogis say it does. 

More important, perhaps, is that I gained a new understanding of the endless permutations of human phobias. Terrified of mice? Spiders? Grizzly bears? Okay, now I get it. 

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