Written by Alex Gervash, commercial pilot (31 years) and fear of flying specialist (18 years, 16,000+ cases treated)
The exhausting contradiction of trying to calm down while simultaneously feeding your fear with catastrophic thoughts during every flight.
Why You Exhaust Yourself During Flights
What does a fearful flier actually do during a flight? You are usually doing two contradictory things at once, which is exhausting.
Sawing the Metal Ball
Imagine your fear is a heavy metal ball. You spend the flight trying to "saw" it smaller. You distract yourself, you drink alcohol, you pray, you check the flight attendants' faces. You are desperately trying to calm down.
Welding the Ball
At the exact same time, you are adding more metal to the ball. You listen to a noise and think, "That's the engine failing." You feel a bump and think, "We are falling." You recall a news story about a crash.
You are trying to soothe your nervous system with one hand while terrifying it with the other. This is why you land feeling physically shattered.
You must learn to drop the saw and stop the welding. You cannot force your autonomic nervous system to calm down by scaring it with catastrophic thoughts.
In Short
The exhausting contradiction of trying to calm down while simultaneously feeding your fear with catastrophic thoughts during every flight.
Trained in psychology and trauma therapy (EMDR, Somatic Experiencing)
Founder of phobia.aero & SkyGuru App
Alex Gervash leverages 31 years of commercial aviation experience alongside his psychology and trauma therapy expertise to provide a sophisticated approach to flight fear treatment. By applying principles of polyvagal theory to the autonomic nervous system, he helps the nervous flyer deconstruct the biological roots of their phobia.aero symptoms. Through his comprehensive aerophobia therapy programs, Alex has guided over 16,000 individuals to overcome fear of flying, while his pioneering SkyGuru app provides real-time in-flight support to a global community of 200,000+ users. This unique intersection of cockpit mastery and mental health science allows Alex to transform the way travelers process anxiety at 30,000 feet.
