Like Sally you can discover how exciting it is to fly with confidence.
Your reasons for being afraid to fly might be the same as Sally's or perhaps you're afraid because:
Hypnosis, or more precisely, hypnotherapy, can enable you to conquer any or all of these.
Hypnosis Frees Sally From Her Terror of Flying
Sally wanted to fly with her husband to Europe. He made frequent business trips to Belgium and always invited her to accompany him. But she was too scared.
When she began therapy Sally barely said a word. She spoke in a whispery voice, stood with rounded shoulders and downcast eyes. She did say that she was afraid her husband, Keith, would get tired of her phobias (fear of flying was one among several) and leave.
Sally couldn't understand why Keith had stuck around as long as he had. Their honeymoon had been a disaster: because of Sally's fears they'd driven to a lake resort 350 miles away rather than flown to New Zealand, Keith's first choice.
But no sooner had they arrived than Sally was filled with dread and insisted Keith immediately drive them back home.
Six years later Keith brought Sally to a psychotherapist who specialised in the use of hypnotherapy techniques. Sally shyly confessed to how fearful she was, especially at the prospect of flying and how annoyed she was with herself about being too fearful to travel. "Ironically, my father is a long-distance truck driver."
Hypnoanalysis Reveals Underlying Issues
That was the first clue for the therapist. When Sally described her childhood the underlying conflicts became evident. She only really felt safe and relaxed when she was with her mother. The latter was practically house-bound, and brimmed with bitterness.
Her husband, the truck driver, had never been faithful, was rarely in town let alone at home. Sally grew up feeling a heavy responsibility for her mother, who was subject to fits of hysteria and panic. Sally also felt resentment and hostility toward her absent father.
Sure enough, when the therapist employed hypnosis to examine the origins of Sally's phobia, concern for her mother was paramount. Like the over-responsible little girl she still was inside, Sally could only feel safe when she knew her mother was safe.
But at the same time, Sally deeply resented this responsibility. There was an invisible string connecting Sally to her mother and she was the yo-yo being yanked back whenever the mother chose.
Rational Emotive Therapy (an approach that teaches how to use your thoughts to control your feelings) was used in and outside of hypnosis to help Sally clarify her thinking.
Post-Hypnotic Suggestions Build Confidence
Hypnotherapy was also used to strengthen Sally's resolve, to build her self-confidence, and to enable her to conquer her fear of flying.
Sally and Keith took a practice flight to a city an hour's flying time away. As a result of her enjoyable imagined experience in hypnosis of flying care-free, coupled with post-hypnotic suggestions Sally felt a wonderfully pleasant surge of accomplishment.
She was no longer trapped by [undeserved] underlying guilt about abandoning her mother and hating her father.
Hypnotherapy Has Positive Ripple Effects
A few months later, the psychotherapist responded to a knock on his office door. When he opened it there stood a glamorous woman, head high, great grin, upright posture, firm handshake, strong voice. Sally ! The therapist had not recognised her, so changed was she from the mousy, fear-ridden person who'd come for help the year before. Not only had she banished the fear of flying but through hypnotic techniques Sally had let go of all her other phobias.
