272. How I overcame my fear of flying

that most people can relate to them, right. I feel like there are some very universal experiences, not just of our twenties, but of being human that I would say around like eighty to ninety percent of us can say, yeah, I totally get that, I've been there, I've experienced that. I can see myself reflected in that topic. This one is for a unique subset of my listeners who can relate to a fear of flying. Fear of flying, that

is what we are going to talk about today. I have spoken about this on and off in certain episodes, about how I was so terrified of flying that I didn't fly for like a very long time, and I would even do, like, you know, fourteen fifteen, sixteen hour road trips in order to avoid a two hour plane ride.

But a listener actually DMed me the other day and she was asking me for this specific episode where I talked about it, and I couldn't remember, so I thought, you know, I've spoken about it maybe for a couple of minutes here and there, but this deserves a full spot on the feed for people to come back to and to listen to if this is something that they

fear and that they experience. So yes, we are going to talk about a fear of flying, how it manifests, what it looks like, and of course how to overcome it. I remember when I was really struggling with this, maybe two years ago, was when I really started to be committed to overcoming this fear. I was going through and like searching for answers everywhere, and I remember looking it up on TikTok, like what are the best tips for

a fear of flying? And there were some great tips, but a lot of what I received was like informative videos about like playing safety and like interviews with pilots, and I really needed something else. And I think I also realized that it was kind of a turning point for me where I was having all these huge, huge opportunities to be able to go overseas, to go to the US, go to Europe, fly everywhere, and you know, go to these events and travel. And I wasn't going

to get that opportunity again. And if I let myself be held back by my fear of flying, I would really really regret it. Now, I also have to say, when you live in Australia, like those big long international flights are definitely something you really have to you know, it just adds a little bit more intensity to the fear.

Like if I want to overcome my fear of flying and therefore give myself the opportunity to go to Europe, or to experience like a beautiful Italian summer, or to go to the US for work, that's like a twenty four thirty hour commitment. And it was one of those flights that really like pushed me to finally get over

this fear and find strategies that worked for me. Back in twenty twenty three, I had this like really cool opportunity to find in London to speak at like the podcast show, and I was not going to give it up.

So I want to talk about how I really got through it, because now I'm not gonna try and choot my own horn here, but I'm a bit of an expert, Like I definitely still have my moments of fear and anxiety, but I really went about this in like a systematic way of like, this is not going to control my life. And I will say, I know it sounds a very small, privileged fear, and in many ways it kind of is, but it can also hold you back from a lot

of experiences that we want in our twenties. Right there is a lot of glamor and romanticism to solo traveling and to just traveling in general and having backpacking experiences, and some is abroad that if you really deeply fear flying, you can feel a lot of fomo around and feel like you are going to really miss out on and therefore you're going to miss out on really getting everything

that you can out of this decade. So hopefully by the end of this episode you feel capable to have those experiences, even if getting on a plane and flying to whatever destination it is is part of it. Like you feel capable of saying, yeah, I'm scared of this thing, but I'm going to do it anyway because this is what I want to do with my time and what I want to do in these younger years of my life.

So yeah, we're going to talk about why we have a fear of flying, the different types of fears that create the broader fear, and also why avoidance and ignoring the problem is only going to make it worse. And the baby steps and the mental steps and the psychological steps that you can take and you can perform to be okay with getting on those long flights or even just getting on an hour long flight. I really do believe that this is a fear that is easier to

overcome than you would think. So, without further ado, let's get into it. If you have a fear of flying, let me just tell you are not the only one. Even if people don't really talk about it. There have been some recent estimates that about forty percent of us have some fear of flying, and that has only increased since the pandemic. Obviously because a lot of us weren't flying, a lot of us weren't having the expose to an aeroplane or to air travel that would help beat a fear.

And said it was sustaining an anxiety through avoidance that you know, bad things would happen when we get on a plane, and we weren't having any of the experiences to prove that that would be the opposite of the case, Like that wasn't going to happen. I want to talk about where a fear of flying comes from, firstly by talking about my own experience. So for me, I felt

like this just crept up on me. When I was eighteen nineteen, I solo traveled around Europe, like I met up with some friends, but my to get to Europe from Australia, I did that all by myself. And I, you know, was not flying business class. I wasn't flying premium economy. I was flying like on China Airlines, China Southern Airlines, like not a great airline in like the back of economy. And I remember my flights being like

eight hundred dollars return and the food was awful. On one of my flights, like we didn't even have a TV screen and it was like fifteen hours. Like the whole experience was like not a pleasant experience, and I

was totally fine. Oh and by the way, like that ended up being like I think a thirty hour flight because we had to do two flights with a huge layover and I was completely alone that whole time, and like it wasn't the smoothest sailing, and I don't remember having any real fear, and the same on the way back as well, Like I actually I don't know if I've told this story before, but on my way back from Europe when I was eighteen, and like I did

my first big solo trip. On my way back, I got stuck in Taiwan for the night and I'd run out of money, Like I didn't have any money on my travel account, I didn't have a SIM card for Taiwan, like I was completely and utterly kind of stuck. I wasn't sure if I was going to make the flight, and the whole experience was actually really stressful, and I still like got on the plane and didn't feel any fear.

In fact, I felt quite peaceful. And so I can reflect on those experiences and be like, oh, there was a time when like I really wasn't scared by this, and then COVID happened, the pandemic happened. I was meant to.

I think, like a lot of us, I had these big travel plans because I was about to graduate university, like I had just graduated and I was like, great, twenty twenty is like my year for traveling, and like I'm gonna save up and I'm gonna go to Russia, like this was before the Ukraine Russia War, Like look how much has changed. Like I was like, I'm gonna go to Russia and then I'm gonna go to the US and maybe like a bit of Asia and just

have a great time. And I had no fear around getting on flight, like it was not in my mind. And then I didn't fly for two years. No one really flew in Australia, like if you're from Australia, you know the lockdowns here were like very very intense. And then I had the opportunity to fly home to see

my parents in Melbourne, and oh my goodness. I remember going to book that flight and being like, oh my god, suddenly all of these fears are coming up for me, Like I suddenly am picturing myself walking onto that plane and the only sensation I can feel is like a deep pit rock heaviness in my stomach. And I didn't

book the flight. I drove down, and then when I had when the time came to go back up, I drove back up again, like and it was like a twelve thirteen hour drive, Like it was ridiculous, and it was totally inefficient, totally like unsustainable, totally expensive as well. And that was my first real moment of like, oh wow,

this like fear has suddenly emerged for me. And it kept coming up, all these opportunities to go and see family, finally being able to see family, like I would not catch a flight, and then the one time that I did that I really had to, I didn't get on it. Like I literally was about to board, and I was like, I'm going to fully freak out, and I'm going to remember having this fear of like I am going to panic when I'm on this plane and I'm going to

try and get out of the plane. I'm going to pull the emergency exits and I'm going to scream and I'm going to like fully freak out and I'm not gonna be able to control myself. So I shouldn't get on this fight, Like I was just so terrified of having a reaction that I wasn't prepared for and I was so terrified of my fear. So that is kind of where I was at when I realized I needed to change something. So for me, I think it was

that I hadn't. I think underlying this there had always been a more general like claustrophobia and a more general fear of the unknown. But because I had flown so much as a kid, because my parents were always traveling for work, Because then i'd done a long hal flight when I was kind of not even in my twenties yet, like I had been exposed enough that the anxiety didn't have time to feed itself with fantasy. So that's really

where mine came from. I think for a lot of others, it could be your fear of flying comes from a negative experience, So you've just had one really terrible, awful flight that has completely shaped and dominated how you think about flying. I was talking to someone about this, one of my friends. She has a really she has a terrible fear of flying, and I hope she doesn't MND

be sharing this story, but I'll keep it anonymous. She was flying back from the Philippines and they flew through like a thunderstorm, like a lightning storm, Like they flew through a storm, and it was non anticipated, and it was terrifying, and the plane was shaking, and she thought she was going to die, and it just sounded absolutely awful, and it was like from then on out, the fear it emerged like that was a triggering event that was

a catalyst for her fear. Another really big one is a lot of people experience, or a lot of people report an uptick in their fear around flying after a crash. So if you remember like MH three and seventy or a bunch of these other flights that have come down in recent memory that we're everywhere in the news. Everyone

was talking about it. It was a crazy tragedy that leaves an imprint because of something called the salience effect or a salience bias, where really intense, captivating, highly emotional news stories or things going on feel like they're actually a lot more common, just because they are dominating so much of the headlines and they're dominating so much about

thinking space. Like our brain is like, ah, because this is more apparent, it must be more common, even though it's only been one plane amongst hundreds and hundreds of thousands.

This was a big thing that we saw following nine to eleven that was actually a real moment for people, of a real moment where a lot of people shifted from being totally happy to get on a plane to a real avoidance within a lot of people, and some people still I was reading an article like this, people who reported having no fear about flying until nine to eleven, and even what are we now, like twenty four years on, like they still won't get on a plane because of

how our memories work and how our brain influences our decision making and our behavior to protect us from what it fears and to help us survive when really, you know, something like a plane crash or something really terrible happening on a flight doesn't actually happen all that often this kind of links to a broader, deeper idea of why do we fear flying? You know, a lot of people will say I fear crashing, or I fear turbulence, or

I fear the confined space. So at its root, a lot of these come down to a deeper, more simplistically labeled fear, the big one being the fear of the unknown and the fear of being out of control. So obviously, when you get on a plane, you're not in control anymore. If something bad was to happen, there is nothing that you can do. Really, I know that probably gave you a jolt of anxiety, but we're going to discuss why, how to overcome that. But really that's what the fear

is coming down to. If you are someone who is already scared of uncertainty, who was already scared of not being able to control their environment, or scared of the unknown, flying can be a real triggering event. This also really relates to a fear of crashing right, or a fear of turbulence, or a fear of something bad happening on

the flight. You can't I kind of realized that in that situation and in that moment, you might be quite powerless, and that powerlessness, like that feeling, is one that you are not comfortable with potentially being exposed to. There's also the deeper fear, or a deeper kind of phobia, a claustrophobia. This was also one that was big for me. My big thing was I don't like being in enclosed spaces.

I don't like getting in elevators, I don't like At the time when my fear of flying was really happening, I didn't like even catching the train like into work in Sydney. I didn't even like, uh, going in tunnels. So it was all coming down to this claustrophobia. I remember specifically like I would avoid driving in any tunnels around this time, and when I would go into a tunnel,

I would really feel like the panic rising. And I was particularly scared of there being traffic in a tunnel because I was like, oh my god, I don't want to get stuck underground in this enclosed space, Like that just sounds like my worst nightmare, like everything is closing in on me. And so I remember talking to my friend and being like who travels so much for work? And being like, how can you cope with being locked in this metal tube for hours? Like you get in,

they close it, or you're not coming out. Nothing you can do can allow you to exit. And he actually said something really beautiful to me. He was like, yeah, but isn't that really nice because while you're suspended up and up in the air, like you get this beautiful break from reality, Like it's actually quite special. You get to completely disconnect, you get to just like float in this like space and time that is just like all

for you. And I was like, hmm, yes, Like I'm slightly convinced by that, and I'm not fully on board, but I do really still see like where he was coming from. And he also said to me, he was like, there are so many situations like that that you're going to be exposed to in life where you just have to be a bit stoic about it. Like, think about so many other things in your life where you are in a space or an event or a situation or a context that you can't change, and you just have

to find a way to accept it. And so learning how to overcome a fear of flying, actually, what it really does is teach you a lot of lessons about dealing with discomfort and anxiety and your own ability to control a situation in general, Like it helps teach you how to do that in so many other broader areas of your life. But again, just to summarize, those are the real big reasons that we fear flying. We fear

a terrible event occurring. Maybe we fear death, we fear injury, we fear the plane crashing, and therefore we become quite worried about turbulence, We become quite worried about small little things. And then we also have a deeper fear of the und own, a fear of being out of control, and also claustrophobia, a fee of a fear of enclosed, tight spaces when you have a fear of flying. If you're not someone who's familiar with this, what this can feel

like is a lot of anticipatory anxiety. So I remember last year I caught a flight from Bali to New York, and the whole two to three days before that happened, it was all I could think about. I was obsessed. I was obsessed. I was googling what kind of model the plan was going to be. I had to know

exactly where my seat was going to be. I had to know exactly what food was going to be served on board, what time we were departing, what time we were learning, all the possibilities of things that could go wrong, and YadA, YadA YadA, Like it was all this information seeking was all coming back to anticipatory anxiety. Like I wasn't actually in any danger at that point, I wasn't

being triggered. I wasn't in the situation that I feared, but my brain was almost like, well, let's prepare you by I almost copying the anxiety that you will eventually feel right now, so you can get used to it. Of course that didn't work. Like it doesn't work. Your brain tries to come up with all these different ways to manage something that it sees is difficult. But really the biggest thing you can do for yourself is expose yourself to the fear and see that you are still capable,

which we're going to get to eventually. The other big thing with the fear of fying that you're likely to feel is like when you get on the plane, I would sweat, I would shake. I would like just literally my whole body would shake, and I would be like pushing my foot up and down, like bouncing my foot up and down. Everything felt very, very hot. I felt like I needed to run. I literally felt like a

scared rabbit. And I found that actually that was the worst before take off, But once we were like ten twenty minutes into the air, I felt quite calm because I was like, Okay, I'm in it. Now, I'm in it, like the sense of like, yeah, there's really nothing I can do. Tiokover and I was like, well, I may as well just enjoy this experience. So that's really what it feels like. It feels like a panic attack. It feels like a lot of anxious worry. It feels like

you are stuck. You're trying to fight or flight, obviously, trying to run away or fight back against this thing that feels like it's threatening you. I being on an airplane. But it all comes back to like a real like you're the fear center of your brain and your like nervous system is not properly responding to your circumstances. So it's seeing danger where danger is not. Yes, danger could eventually appear, but you're not actually in any danger in

that moment. Your brain is reading the environment and reading the context wrong. And when I began to realize that that my anxious thoughts about something didn't make anything more or less likely to happen, that also was a great relief to me. So we're going to take a quick break here and when I return, I want to really get into the tips that I have for overcoming my

fear of flying. Stay with us. The biggest thing I can say to you if you have a fear of flying is that you need to find any possible way to stop avoiding the situation, To stop avoiding flying flights, airports, whatever it is, and what you want to do is really approach that in slow, manageable steps. So I knew that when I was really getting ready to beat this fear, or at least find a way to handle it, that I had this big thing coming up, this big flight that I really wanted to do. So I wanted to

fly to London. I wanted to make it there, and I wanted to be able to get on that plane and you know, maybe not feel okay, but still be able to go through with it. So in the lead up, like the six month lead up to this flight, I started doing small things to help myself. So I went to a flight simulator. I would watch videos on YouTube of people entering planes, like getting onto a plane, sitting down, showing their surroundings, like a lot of them were like

reviews of certain seats on like different airlines. Like I'd watch like, oh, the Emirates a three eighty like flight from Doha to wherever, like like what the seats would look like and what the meals were like, to just really see. Then I also started saying yes to opportunities that would require me to do very short flights, so one hour, two hour flights around Australia and for the first couple of flights, I took someone with me, so I would literally be like, Okay, did any of my

friends need to fly to Melbourne this weekend. Let's see if we can get on the same plane. Like I paid for my dad to like fly on one of my flights with me, to just help expose me to this feared this fearful state. So the first flight I did was an hour I think it was even less, and I did it with my dad, and it was hot, it was hard, but actually I realized by the end how proud I was, how much relief I felt getting off the plane, and how I was like, Wow, that was not as hard as I thought it was. And

that's what the avoidance makes you believe. It keeps you in this state where the biggest source of truth is your fear about a situation and your thoughts about a situation, often which are false. So the only truth you have to rely on is what your brain is coming up with. But when you actually expose yourself to the situation, a

much different reality becomes apparent. I then did a two hour flight with a friend, just me and her, and then a one hour flight by myself, and that was really hard because we got stuck on the tarmac, and that was something that I hadn't anticipated, and it kind of threw me for a loop. But what I did was I was just reminded myself of how it felt to have someone else there with me, how really like I was still able to do it by myself. And I had a list of things that I knew would

help me out. So I still have this list in my phone, and it's a number of strategies that I knew would calm my anxiety and break me out of a panic attack. So one of them was to just do some guided meditation to do a breath work exercise. I actually downloaded this app called the Dare app, which I've spoken about before, and they do guided meditations for a fear of flying and guided meditations for panic attacks. And I would just sit and I would listen to

that meditation until I felt better. I also would just do jumping jacks at the back of the plane, like in the little flight attendant area, just until I felt better, or squats something that would like make me feel like I was escaping or doing something about the anxiety within me. I put cold water on my wrists, I had something sour to buy into. I also would bring coloring in books. I just had a lot of it. Almost felt like I was building a military right, like I was building

my line of defenses against this anxiety. And I said, I'm only allowed to panic if I get through all these things and I don't feel better. Obviously, you know, maybe my anxiety would be able to jump a couple of hurdles, but I had a whole list of things that I could do, so there was no way that it could get through all of them. Something was bound to work, something was bound to make me feel better. And I also just allowed myself to be okay with

being scared. I was like, Okay, I'm just gonna accept this feeling like I feel anxious, but I'm going to look around at my environment. Is there anything to feel anxious about? Is there anything to feel scared about? And what I would do is I would look to other people and I would mirror them response. So I'd look at the people in front of me, I'd look at all the heads of the people on the plane, and

I'd be like, Okay, well, these people seem fine. These people aren't panicking, so obviously, like if I can't trust myself and my own evaluation of the situation. I can trust theirs, and they seem okay. I also reminded myself something that I knew very much to be true. It's the biology of us as humans. Our psychology is that we cannot panic forever. So even if I was on the verge of a panic attack, I knew that eventually

it would subside. So it was okay. If I felt myself falling into the state, it wasn't going to last forever. It was eventually going to go away. I know that my body could only sustain panic and that level of alertness and stress for so long, so I remind myself it's just sensations, you know, It's just my body trying to protect me. It doesn't change what is actually happening. I also want to say, flight attendants they know how

to handle this. They see this all the time. And I've actually seen a flight attendant help someone who was panicking on a flight. I've seen random strangers help someone who is panicking on a flight. You've got to remember most people are very very kind and very very good. If you were sitting next to someone on a plane who turned next to you turned to you and said, I'm really really scared, would you dismiss them? No, you'd

be like, I totally understand, let me help you. So you've got to understand that most other strangers will also do that for you as well. Most people are genuinely very nice, and even if they aren't, the flight attendants have to be like they're getting paid to be there. They aren't just decorative like. They have done a lot of training, and their training also involves how to handle really heightened emotional states for people for whom this is

a big fear. My other biggest, biggest tip, the thing that I still swear by to this day, and this is particularly the case with long haul flights, is to

don't like just don't let yourself be bored. Create itineraries for each flight, the same way that you might wake up and you might create a timed to do list about your day, or like you would create an itinerary for like a holiday, of like in the morning, we do this, in the afternoon, we do this in the evening, we do this like these are our activities for the day. I would do the same for each of my flight, and the day before I would make one of these itineraries.

So let me see if I can pull one up from my flight to London that I was talking about. Okay, here it is, I've managed to find it. So we had two flights. This was flight one. I will also say that for my flight to London, at the last minute, I did ask my dad to come with me and I paid for his flight, which is something I felt

very lucky to be able to do. I had all these points that I had been like saving up for literally like because I wasn't flying anywhere but before COVID, I flew a lot, and i'd like saved up all of these points for that trip to Europe I was meant to be doing never use them. So I use those to get my dad a flight so that he could come with me, because I was really really scared. But this is what my itinerary looked like. So our one talk to my dad and get settled. Hour two.

I had my routine, like my nighttime routine. So I got a face mask, I brushed my teeth, I put on my noise to canceling headphones. Hour two again, put on a movie. Hour three, finish movie, and do some knitting. Our four, have my first round of snacks, eat meal, So like I was scheduling things to look forward to for each hour. Hour five, start second movie, get ready for sleep, take a melatonin. Then it was like hour

six hours, seven hour eight sleep. But if not, I had alternatives, which was to edit some of my podcast episodes or to do some coloring in. I even had other things to do as well, like I had a little legos, so I had activities like I was prepared then our like ten eleven twelve. I had like instructions to make Instagram posts, like I had everything set up so that I had more things to do. Movie three and then our like fourteen, prepare to land, and then

my second flight. This is what I said. I said it was an eight hour flight. I said, this is just like a nine to five work day, Like that is what this is. If I would easily sit in an office for eight hours in the same space that I would sit in a chair on a plane, Like, this is the same amount of time. So I had my hour one, get settled, have some snacks, listen to a podcast, hour to do another face mask. Hour three. I could either write some episodes or write my books.

I was writing my book at the time, or I could watch a movie. Iur movie movie right right, our seven, listen to a podcast, read our eight, talk to dad, prepare to land. So like I had this itinerary for myself that would help me feel like my time was. The day before my flight as well, the morning before, I would go and get everything that I needed to buy, Slash needed to bring with me, Slash wanted to have.

So this is what I had for like the list, I needed to buy sour candy, compression socks, a puzzle book. I also bought magazines and imask, toothbrush and toothpaste, portable charger, water bottle. I also bought my prescription sour candy. I also had instructions for myself to download five movies that seems a little bit excessive, make sure that everything was charged, wear comfortable but fashionable clothes, which will come into the

next tip that I have. And then the morning of my flight, I went for a really big swim and a really big run so that I was exhausted. Then I had an everything shower and had a really healthy breakfast. All of these things like putting myself in the best possible place to be prepared for this flight, and I had a daily reminder at the top of this list. So this is my list that I have on my phone called flight prep. Haven't updated it since the third

of December. But the reminder on the top of my phone said, you need to do hard things to grow acknowledge the fear and run towards it anyway, And so I had this huge, comprehensive list to come back to. And can I tell you something that those itineraries, that whole plan, I didn't once have to use it, not once.

It was so important that it was there. But once I got onto the plane and I settled in and I maybe did the first hour or two of my routine, I realized that all of this preparation, really what it was doing was just making me feel more at ease with the possibility of discomfort. But after the first hour, I wasn't uncomfortable, I wasn't scared, I wasn't anxious. I was okay. So I was really able to relax into

the situation. That is really what this preparation taught me is that you can do all that you want to do, but when you are in situation, the chances are it's not going to be as bad or as hard as you previously thought it was. Now I want to bring us all back to that thing I said before that

may have sounded strange. Wear comfortable but fashionable clothes. This links to something that I still too still do to this day, which is that I romanticize the privilege and the act of flying by And it's gonna sound really silly imagining that I'm someone really famous or really important. And the person that I tend to imagine is that I am Taylor Swift and that I'm getting on my

flight and that this is just part of business. And I romanticize this whole process of like having the opportunity to be a jet setter, what that means, like what that feels like, and like would that person feel anxious, would like Taylor Swift feel anxious about flying? Probably not, Like would Beyonce feel anxious about flying? Probably not? Like this is this is like what they do, Like this is what it means to be someone who is successful. I kind of like to pretend that I'm someone else

in that moment. I am someone more capable. I am someone for whom this is really really normal, and it really really works visualizing and romanticizing the process visualizing getting off the plane as well visualizing what it's going to feel like to literally put your feet on the tar, on the tarmac or on like the whatever it is like the walkway, like visualizing that sensation, visualizing your first breath of fresh air when you get off the plane.

Also really really profound, like your mind has like has so many superpowers and hidden talents and hidden capabilities built into it to get you through hard situations, and its ability to reflect and remember and visualize and imagine future situations or past peaceful situations is something that you can use to pull yourself into a calm space when you

are maybe panicking or you are maybe spiraling. I also mentioned having a go to meditation that you know and you've proven to yourself can bring you out of a stressed state. Mine was the Dare meditation that's really useful and finally have a backup calming option. Now, I'm not gonna tell you to go out and get a valiant prescription or to rely on prescription drugs or whatever it is, or melatonin or something herbal or even like a glass of wine, but just knowing that you have it there

without having to use it is incredibly helpful. So I did have a valiant prescription. But let me just tell you I didn't touch it like I for a lot of my long haul flights now slash Ever, like I think, I've only taken it once, and it was because I was really like I was feeling quite ill, and I was also really not feeling well mentally. I had slept for like a couple of days just because I'd been so run off my feet and jet lagged. That was

the only time I used it. But I have taken so many international long haul flights where I have not needed it. But just the fact that I have it in my toiletrys bag, or that I know I can have a glass of red wine and feel better even though I don't drink on flights, that has been so powerful. Again, it's just giving your brain and giving yourself all of these hurdles that it has to jump over before you

are going to let yourself panic. So having all of these different things that you can focus on, that you can zoom in on, that you can feel comforted by before you feel like you have to let your sensations take over. I want to also remind you of that reminder I had at the top of that list. In

order to grow, you have to do hard things. So if you are someone who has avoided flying, who was scared of it feels really uncomfortable, it does get easier and you do see more of the rewards of putting yourself in a hard situation, an uncomfortable situation, something that you don't actually want to do, but which you are able to come out of and realize that you are

so grateful to yourself for doing it. And it's actually not very common I think in our day and age, that we do things that are very difficult, and that we push ourselves really hard into a place of discomfort and even fear, and are still able to come out the other side and see the rewards. Flying when you have a fear of flying is such a great opportunity to feel what it really means to you know, feel deeply proud of yourself and deeply accomplished for doing the

hard thing over the easy thing. So I'm wishing you so much luck. I know this is really really hard, but I also want you to know that, as someone who used to be so afraid that she would get off flights, that she would drive frickin thirteen hours to get places who you know avoided so many opportunities because of her fear. I have been able to get over it. Yes, like it's not completely gone, but in like two weeks, I'm flying solo to the US for work and then

flying back and that's like a fifteen hour flight. And the level of anxiety I feel about it is nowhere near what I would have experienced two or three years ago. And I feel completely fully capable of doing it, and I believe that you can feel that way as well. So sending you lots of love, peace, strength, calm, and the opportunity to really push yourself and to learn and to see what you are capable of. Thank you so

much for listening to this episode. If you are someone who also has a fear of flying, and you have a tip or a suggestion or a piece of advice that you personally have used that I didn't mention, please drop it in the comments below. I would love to have the comment section on Spotify just be a you know, just a huge page and peace and community notice board of advice and feedback and tips and tricks for all

of us to learn from each other. I think that would be really really useful, and again, send this to someone who you think might need to hear it. If you have a friend who you know also experiences this who was one of the forty percent, or a parent or a family member who has been avoiding or putting off flying for some of the very reasons we talked about, maybe this could help them, So feel free to share it, and if you haven't already, make sure that you are

following along the Psychology of your twenties. Leave us a five star review and follow us on Instagram at that Psychology podcast. If you have further thoughts, questions, queries about this episode, or you want to suggest another episode. I love hearing from you all over there, and until next time, stay safe, be kind, be gentle to yourself, happy fly dying, safe travels, and we will talk very very soon,