With the advent of summer, millions of Americans begin their perennial ritual of planning for their vacation in hopes of recharging their depleted psychic batteries for yet another year. Unfortunately, for many people the bucolic vision of basking in the Caribbean sunshine, trekking through Yellowstone, or strolling through Ghirardelli Square is preceded by anticipatory dread and anxiety--fear of flying! Since 911, people’s fears, frustrations, and worries have understandably been heightened by increased security at airports. It doesn’t help seeing armed soldiers whose camouflaged uniforms contrast obscenely with the shorts and tee shirted travelers. Or the no-nonsense TSA officials who scrutinize you, “wand” you, and invade your personal space with blue, latexed-hands that pat down areas of your body typically reserved for your most intimate relationships. What we used to call fear of flying, now has a new look--it’s called terrorism!

In the good old days before security checks, fear of flying was confined to the usual plane-related phenomena such as turbulence, delays, germs, and questions like, “How can I survive not having a cigarette for five hours?” If you’re a “white-knuckler,” no one has to remind you of the reasons why you’d rather drive or walk to your vacation destination than fly—and many people do just that. If you can’t avoid flying, before you plan to anesthetize yourself with alcohol or Xanax this summer, I can suggest a simple shift in perspective that might reduce (and possibly eliminate) your fear of flying.

First, know that your fear of flying has nothing to do with flying. As one patient quipped to me, “It’s not the flying; it’s the crashing that scares me.” Joking aside, if fear of flying isn’t about flying—or about crashing—then what else is there? The answer has to do with control. Control with a capital “C.” In order to understand how wanting to be in control can generate uncontrollable fear, let me offer you some background.

I learned in high school biology that all organisms try to avoid pain and find pleasure. Makes sense, right? In my thirty-plus years of private practice I’ve come to recognize that we humans have another instinctual imperative—we abhor being out of control and will do just about anything in our power to stay in control. Most of the time wanting to be in control is not only healthy, it’s smart. Wearing seat belts, taking vitamins, or jogging to stay fit are all preventive attempts to maintain control over realistic life concerns. But there’s another type of control, not generated by factual life concerns, but by fictions of insecurity. These are typically worry-thoughts preceded by “what if.” In the case of flying, “What if we hit turbulence, how will I handle it?” Or, “What if I have a panic attack?” Worrying is the quintessential form of trying to control life.

Concern vs. Worry

You begin to “what-if” a situation in order to anticipate or predict what’s ahead. Why? Because you’ve convinced yourself that if you know what’s coming before it happens you’ll be in a better position to handle it. The problem is that with all forms of insecurity and worry, you’re not reacting to actual circumstances (facts) but to fictions. Things that may happen are not facts. And when it comes to fear of flying, the “things” you’re reacting to are projections of negativity and chaos. You might ask, “But isn’t wearing a seat belt anticipating chaos?” The answer is no and it has to do with understanding the difference between concern and worry.

Concern deals with facts, worry with fictions. You may be concerned about automobile safety because of the statistics you’ve read: wearing a seatbelt is a legitimate and reasonable response. Worry, on the other hand, would have you buckling up because you’re convinced that you were going to have an accident. This is neither legitimate nor reasonable. Bottom line: concern doesn’t project negatives, worry does. The first step in liberating yourself from fear of flying is understanding that worry is a projection of insecurity that anticipates things going wrong.

You begin to counter a worry habit (yes, it’s a habit) by simply asking: “Is what I’m fearing a fact or a fiction?” Okay, but what if telling yourself that running up and down the aisle of a plane screaming uncontrollably is a fiction, and the thought still frightens you? After all, “What if…?” Obviously, separating facts from fictions isn’t enough—you’re going to have to take this a step further. And that’s where an understanding of control comes in.

Assuming you’ve done your homework and you’ve managed to separate out the facts of your fear from the fictions, you must now establish that your “fictions” aren’t about real-life events, as you’ll see in a moment, they’re about your tentative connection with Self-trust—your ability to believe you can handle life’s challenges. Saying this differently, it’s not about flying, it’s all about feeling that you will be in a situation where you are out of control. I’ve had more than a few patients tell me that if they were flying the plane, they would be perfectly fine. After all, they would be controlling things.

Somewhere in your life’s journey, you’ve lost trust--the belief that you can handle what life throws your way. And because of the lack of self-trust, you’ve begun to compensate by using various strategies of control (like worrying) to control life. Which brings us to the crucial fear-of-flying-eradicator: learning to risk trust.

Trusting

Before discussing the necessity of risking trust (both self and life trust), let’s define it. Simply put, trust is a willingness to believe. But trust isn’t something you can prove. You can’t, for example, prove that you’ll be fine at 37,000 feet when your plane hits a bit of turbulence. But you can take a risk, a leap of faith, by letting go of insecurity’s rumblings and ruminations and insist—risk—believing that one way or another you’ll handle what life throws at you. In contrast, worrying sensitizes you to be primed and ready for anxiety the moment you step on that plane. You probably already know that worry does absolutely nothing to protect you and only hypnotizes you into feeling panicky and anxious. Let’s face it, letting go of worrying and risking trust just makes more sense, “I’m not going to worry about my flight. Whatever happens, I’ll handle it.” This is trusting.

Maybe you want to risk trusting, but you’re just not feeling it. First off, recognize that distrust is your current habit. It’s what feels natural. Letting go of worry and fear will seem unnatural! This isn’t unusual nor does it need to be a problem. Keep in mind that breaking any habit will feel very unnatural at first. Bottom line, if you’re a worrier, it’s not going to feel natural for you to trust—not at first.

Starting today, begin to recognize the many possibilities each day where you can begin to exercise your trust muscle and build more confidence along with a “willingness to believe.” Choosing what to order on a menu, what DVD to rent at Blockbuster, or what color blouse or shirt to wear can all become mini-experiments where you don’t overthink or intellectualize or worry. Stop thinking What if I make the wrong choice? Instead, practice going with your gut. Risk trusting yourself. In this experimenting, what’s important isn’t making the right choice (as you grow in trust this will happen), it’s simply making the choice and trusting that whatever the outcome, you will handle it! This is the key to our experiment, proving that you don’t have to control outcomes, you don’t have to know what’s coming before it arrives, and you don’t have to fear being unable to handle life’s challenges.

For a step-by-step guide to breaking your fear-of-flying, visit www.healthylivingNYC.com

[Norm: the following is for the website, not the magazine]

Getting Ready to Fly

You’ve been practicing risking trust. You’ve learned that you can handle making “mistakes”--picking the wrong thing on the menu, DVD, or blouse for work--and survive. Now it’s time for the final leap of faith that can transform your flying experience.

1. Begin by separating out facts from fictions—keep in mind feelings aren’t facts

2. Recognize the difference between worries and concerns

3. Starting today, begin practicing letting go of worrying by telling yourself (as often as necessary), “I do not need to anticipate, speculate, or worry—I need to get on that plane and trust that whatever happens, I’ll handle it in the moment.”

The key to making the above work is learning that you can trust. You need to let go and trust your instinctual, intuitional abilities. If you’re willing to take the leap, if you’re willing to understand that worrying actually makes you feel more vulnerable, and if you’re willing to let life unfold without trying to control outcomes, then you have an opportunity to enjoy the exhilaration and magic of flying.

Those with core of insecurity, you know who I mean, the worriers, the “what-iffers” those who anticipate, “What if” such and such happens…insecurity predisposes us to worry because we’re just trying to be safe—in control. For this type of person, any situation that makes them feel out of control, will bring on stress and anxiety. It could be getting stuck in traffic or having to be in a crowded elevatory. But the quintessential challenge for a worrier is flying. Flying is a blanck screen for our projections of insecurity. You sit in a crowded compartment and are immediately assaulted with a stuffy, crowded, cramped environment replete with a cacophony of unfamiliar sounds from deep withing the bowels of the jet. Not having adequate understanding each pre-flight sound heard above the throttling up of the engine begins to raise conscious thoughts, “ what was that?” Once airborne, the anticipation