The experience of turbulence in fear of flying can be a scary experience for many people. Even if you understand on a rational level that turbulence is a normal part of flying, just as waves are a normal part of being on the water, emotionally it can feel terrifying once the seatbelt sign turns on in the cabin and the announcement is made to return to your seats.

One of the reasons that anxiety around turbulence has traditionally been tough to overcome in fear of flying is because it's a fear where a lot is happening at the same time. The body is experiencing something uncomfortable and out of the ordinary, compounded by the fact that you're up in the sky in a plane—a place that is often uncomfortable, vulnerable, and out of the usual for many, as well. When the flight isn't smooth, it can trigger an indication that something is wrong, or about to go wrong. People can go into an all-or-nothing line of thinking with turbulence that a smooth flight means safe, and any bumps are unsafe.

The Roller Coaster Experience

People sometimes equate turbulence to a roller coaster. While in physical body experience this can make a bit of sense, there are some significant differences that don't align well with this analogy. On a roller coaster, your body may experience all sorts of movement in different directions, and this can have some similarity to flying. However, on a roller coaster, you can see the track, you can see where you're going to go up, down, turn, etc. It's predictable, and therefore even within the movement there is a greater sense of unconscious certainty in this. As opposed to on a plane where there is no track to see what's coming next. Not being on a track can make you feel less grounded, and there is much more uncertainty and unpredictability within the movements.

Some have also described a fear of turbulence to be a "fear of falling". While anxiety around turbulence can sometimes involve a fear of falling, it actually isn't often a fear of falling on its own. The plane can drop a bit and people may panic or worry that they'll keep falling. However, this alone isn't normally isn't the crux of the turbulence issue as much as one part of it.

The Deep Fear Of Losing Complete Control

In working with people on fear of flying, I have seen how much a fear of turbulence is often more about the deep fear of losing total control—of everything. Losing control of the body, the mind, the plane (your surrounding environment), existentially with life, and more. This isn't only when feeling anxious about falling. It can also be when air pushes up from under the plane and the plane is suddenly climbing for a rough few seconds, and so on.

What's never really addressed when talking about turbulence is how much the complexity of the airplane environment itself exacerbates the total experience of turbulence. An airplane is a really big structure. When you're sitting inside of an airplane it's sort of comparable to being in a big building or room (or even a movie theatre, to some degree). It's a big space that holds a lot of people. It's not so similar to being on a roller coaster where you're in this small and contained car where all the movement is happening in that small space surrounding your body.

Earthquake In The Sky

A better comparison with turbulence is an earthquake. In a plane, it's not just your contained space around your body that's bumping and moving around. It's the whole structure you're sitting inside of that's moving around. The whole environment is shaking and moving. I know this may seem obvious to acknowledge. But imagine the place you're sitting in right now as you read this starts bumping and shaking, and then imagine that happening in the air. Whether you have or have not experienced an earthquake, turbulence can bring a very similar experience. This is something many people don't experience in any way outside of flying, and it can feel scary and greatly destabilizing.

What's also similar to an earthquake is that sense of not knowing in the moment how bad it's going to get, which is also a great source of anxiety, panic attacks, and catastrophic thoughts during turbulence. This uncertainty can be terrifying, especially for people who have experienced various types of trauma and anxiety in life. People can start to worry how much can the structure handle before it can't take anymore (and, by projection, how much discomfort, fear, and anxiety can they themselves handle before they will panic or lose control). In a bad enough earthquake, the shaking of the building may break the walls, cause cracks in the foundation, even cause buildings to collapse. No one knows how bad an earthquake has to be in order for damage to start happening.

In a plane, this is a crippling anxiety for many. The idea of how much the structure (plane) can handle before it's going to harm the functionality of the plane. People worry it may break the plane, or cause the power to fail, or do something catastrophic that they can't recover from. Put this alongside the body feelings of unpredictable and unsettling motion, and it churns up fears that everything is getting out of hand and they are about to lose complete control.

Trauma, Anxiety, And Lack Of Internal Safety

This experience in fear of flying can often be heavily exacerbated for people who have experienced trauma or struggle with anxiety. It is also much harder for people who generally struggle to feel safe or comfortable within themselves to feel safe in turbulence. As alluded to above, there is some unconscious projection in turbulence. Even when people know turbulence is not a threat to the plane, people can still feel deeply fearful not only that the plane will break or lose control, but actually they themselves will break—that they'll pass out, or become short of breath and need medical attention that isn't available, or will jump up and yell or cause a scene, and completely lose all control. Or, feeling so many chaotic and overwhelming feelings and having to somehow hide it all while sitting in your seat appearing calm on the outside while feeling anything but calm inside.

Essentially, the less safe you feel in your internal environment, the less safe you may feel in the greater environment when things start to feel less stable.

Overcoming Fear Of Turbulence and Fear Of Flying

If you struggle with fear of turbulence, or generally from fear of flying, it is actually possible to overcome it. Overcoming turbulence isn't just about taking deep breaths or "trying harder" to not be anxious. It's important to actually create a different type of interaction with turbulence so you can comfortably coexist with it.

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