Flat Is Good

Every person who suffers from a phobia of flying knows lots of people who really enjoy flying. So they see that as their ultimate goal; to get on a plane and recognise that it's fantastic. You can look out of the window and down below is a patchwork of green fields with cows and sheep, maybe caravans in some fields. And then as you leave England behind there's the beautiful blue of the sea, and the boats and the ships to look at.

You know what? At thirty eight thousand feet you can't see the animals or the boats. Which is no bad thing because probably what you're looking down on is the top of a blanket of cloud that most of the way down to Spain. And anyway, you might have an aisle seat. The welcome truth is that flying is like any other form of transport, tedious and time consuming. Oh there's the exhillaration of actually doing it for the first time, but pretty soon after that it's boring. That is your goal, to be bored by it instead of terrified.

There's another thing, too. My friend Jenasaurus of blog fame discovered that the way to overcome anxiety was to confront it; to say, "Go on then, do your worst!" And when she said that anxiety slunk off into a corner and refused to come out. But that challenging attitude is high maintenance. It burns up enormous amounts of energy and leaves you exhausted. What she hasn't noticed is that she has won - because I don't think she actually expected that. She thought that she had found a way to control anxiety, whereas in fact she had defeated it.

Jen, that battle is over. You've won. No need to go for walks to challenge anxiety any more. Go for exercise, for fun time with K, to get stuff from the shops, or keep appointments or drop in on friends for a cup of tea and a ciggy. There will be other, different things to overcome save uour energy for them.

Oh, and well done.