Fear of Flying-Uncheck
Traveling to New Orleans alone was an act out of my comfort zone-my personal four hour work week comfort challenge. I have my fears. One is of flying. It was time to uncheck that box. It’s funny, but fear is fear. So many people fly alone daily, but I never have. I think that flying is scary for me because frankly I just can’t imagine something so big being able to fly through the air. To me a plane seems destined to crash regardless of how many improvements made since the days of the Wright Bros. While in flight I’m usually thinking this thought. My requested seat is the window, and my only reason for that is to watch the wings, waiting for something to go wrong. Not a good way to fly –or live.
So, knowing that one of my roads less traveled is to roam internationally on a regular basis, it’s always been a realization that I must get over this fear of flying. I want to fly comfortably and I want to do this without someone holding my hand. Last week a sudden change in planned travel left me disappointed but still jonesing for the road. A perfect time to take care of this fear thing once and for all. Following my promise from a previous post, I pulled New Orleans out of a hat and set off early one morning with no plans, a back pack, and intently focused on the flight. It was the right choice to drive myself to the park and ride. Less drama at the gate you know? The night before, I fought to keep the wheels of my paranoia from running off the tracks of reality. Every time I would think of crashes and wings falling off, I would spend as much time saying to myself that this was but one perspective, and not a good one for me. I kept telling myself that just as much as it could be bad, it could also be good. I focused on imagining good scenarios.
I tell you, it turned out to be a great experience. I’ll be blogging on my adventures in New Orleans, but for now I do feel that I faced my flight fear with confidence. Yes, I was nervous but I was prepared. Serendipity came in the form of my seat mate. He was a former pilot who upon hearing what I was doing, spent a great deal of time talking to me about the way planes fly. This was perfect for my intellectual side. As my fear was partially based in not understanding how a plane could stay in the air, his mini flight school helped assure me of how this works. He pulled out the emergency card packets and patiently folded them to form wings and explained to me the flight concepts of drag, yaw, roll, and pitch. Even suggested that I take a couple of flying lessons– an amazing thought that I actually entertained.
Fear of flying…uncheck. As Southwest Airlines says, “You are now free to move about the county.”
[...] even know that’s what I was doing. Can’t say I’m a savvy flyer. This was my first flight alone, and I was pretty preoccupied with fighting my flight fear. When I got to the security check, [...]