Hypnotherapy for Fear of Flying & How It Works

If you’ve ever experienced a fear of flying you’ll be very familiar with the way it feels. Rather than looking forward to your trip or vacation, you’re anticipating the flight.  Once you’ve arrived at your destination, much of your enjoyment time is spent actually anticipating the flight home.

Even waiting to board the plane can be excruciating, as your mind begins swirling with hundreds of “what if” scenarios. Your nerves feel on edge, and you are very inwardly focused, paying very little attention to other people or things around you. In effect, you become all wrapped up in the worry and fear. Proceeding onto the plane, things just get worse, and you may experience a “trapped” feeling that is very similar to claustrophobia. Your heart rate may be elevated, and your stomach may feel uneasy — you might even feel nauseous.

Once the plane is in the air, you become hypersensitive to every little noise, and turbulence during the flight. Some people will attempt to “self medicate” their fear of flying by drinking heavily during the flight, though this is obviously not an ideal solution, and can even make matters worse in many cases.

After September 11, 2001, psychiatrists and therapist all over the United States began noticing a significant rise in the number of patients with a fear of flying.  Hypnosis has proved to be a valuable tool to help with phobias and irrational fears, such as a fear of flying, and there are even hypnosis CDs and MP3s by experienced hypnotherapists tailor-made for this specific phobia. (We do that, too)

Some people make their plans to vacation or travel and then don’t start to think about the air travel part of it until about a week or two before. Some don’t think about it until a few days before, and yes some don’t start to think about their fear until they are already on-board the plane and flying to their destination.

With all these different types of responses for the same problem, you might think how could one type of solution work for all? The simple answer is that it can work for all because the responses are all the same with regards to the feeling that is brought up. And it is the response to that feeling that causes the problems.

You deserve to be able to experience all of those excited feelings that really made you feel special. You know, you’re going on a vacation. And that vacation isn’t supposed to be isolated to just the time you spend at your destination doing fun things. It should also include your anticipation of all the fun things your planning to do. And all the excitement that builds up in the expectation of all that fun to come. You don’t have to miss out on those feelings anymore.