Most of us have some kind of fear that is unexplainable. It could stem from the distressing events in the past or even just from watching a tv show and something you’ve seen has developed into a phobia. It can be hard to take the first steps to overcome it but for us, gaining knowledge whilst travelling has helped us a lot. The most common travel related fears are:
Flying
Getting lost
Fear of the unknown
How to communicate without speaking the language
Having a bad experience/ not what you expected
Feeling lonely if you’re travelling alone
Running out of money
Being out of your comfort zone
The Irrational Fear
My irrational fear used to be ants. Since I got attacked by what seemed like a colony of red ants in Bali as a child, I’ve always had this strange creepy feeling when I saw ants. Now, I know they can be the most harmless insects out there but it was just something about the way they moved that really creeped me out. This led on to me not liking anything that looked small and in a clusters. Patterns like a polka dot on a dress with clusters of small dots together (but it was fine if the dots were big??). With this in mind, i’ve always loved and been fascinated by insects which made it even stranger!
“Being brave isn’t the absence of fear. Being brave is having that fear and finding a way through it”
The turning point
It wasn’t until I visited Colombia where I felt that my mindset had completely switched. This was simply because I was hiking through a national park one day and saw all these sections of leaves moving. I walked up closer and saw that there were hundreds of ants carrying these leaves, about 30 times the size bigger than them and was mesmerised by this. I stood there for a good half an hour watching them each pick up individual leaves, sticks and pollen like soldiers dodging each other whenever one of them was in the way.
How i’ve overcome it
I was intrigued by this and went back to research what these ants were up to. I asked the staff at my eco lodge and they said they were ‘leaf cutter ants’, which are widely found in Central and South American countries. These ants don’t actually take the full leaf, they cut sections of the leaf and bring it back to their nest. Once these leaves decompose, it’s the fungus that grows from it that becomes their food. These insects work non stop and are able to strip a tree off it’s foliage in 24 hours!
After reading up about all of this, I wondered to myself how I could fear these little soldiers my whole life! They’re one of the most incredible and smart insects, with amazing organisation. They also play a major part in the eco system as they aerate the soil so water and oxygen is able to reach the plant roots, as well as carrying seeds and dispersing plants into new areas. Now everywhere I go I watch ants carefully, how they move and where they’re going. If it was just in my garden I wouldn’t have appreciated these insects as much as I do now, but thanks to being in a different part of the world and seeing new species I was able to learn about them and overcome this irrational fear.
Of course the scale of fears varies massively and you may think that it was easy to overcome the fear of ants because, well, they’re only ants. It’s not quite the same of the fear of heights and feeling like you’re going to fall off the edge every time you look down even though you’ve got a railing in front of you. This is just a survival mechanism and if you’ll need to be able to determine what is a healthy fear and a what is an irrational fear.
Healthy Fear
This is an emotional reaction to when your brain sense real danger. It is there to protect you and will alert you if something is wrong. They will help to keep you alive if you are fighting against a threat.
Irrational Fear
These are thoughts that are harmless and have stemmed from learned fears. They usually involve fears that can’t hurt you physically or emotionally. Sometimes these fears can turn into anxiety and prevent people from living their lives.
The truth is irrational fears are easy to overcome and travelling makes them a whole lot easier. Once you’re put in at the deep end, you haven’t got a choice but to face your fears. This is great for self development and it also feels rewarding knowing that you have overcome something that has made you doubt yourself or stopped you from doing certain things.
Some people find that small changes will help them slowly ease their way into reversing their irrational fear. This is called the fear ladder. You make a list of activities that involve your subject of fear and you gradually work your way up into overcoming it. Here we’ve used the example of ‘being out of your comfort zone’ from the list above.
Another method would be to follow these steps that we followed and maybe that fear of skydiving out of a plane will turn into excitement!
01
Understanding the fear
The first step is to identify what your fear is and think of ways this could have potentially developed. Was it something that happened in the past? A recurring dream you had? Something that happened to someone has that gave you this idea in your head? Sometimes we tend to think of problems before they have even happened, to to be on the safe side. It is good to prepare for the worst, but this can also lead to overthinking and could potentially ruin your plans.
02
Speak to people
You need to understand you will always have support in this and it’s important to speak to people about it if it’s something that bothers you. There are more people than you think with even more irrational fears than you, so it’s useful to talk to someone who can put your mind at ease, research on the internet, or speak to us! We found Reddit extremely useful for random topics as people get together as an online community and leave their opinions.
03
Turn the negative into a positive
Another way to help you on your journey is to think about the positive outcomes of it and not the worst case scenario. Try to picture the outcomes in your head and instead of thinking of things you can’t do and letting the fear get the best of you, think about what you can do to gain control over the fear.
04
The only person you have to prove anything to is yourself
As we mentioned before, think of this as self improvement. How good would you feel if you managed to do something you always doubted yourself doing? How could this change your trip, or better yet, change your life? You can walk away feeling proud of yourself and feeling like you’ve overcome a massive hurdle.
Fear of being in shark infested waters? Read this: Why I Would Think Twice About Shark Cage Diving (again)
“The Professional Hobo”
“Never Ending Footsteps”
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What irrational fears do you have? Let us know in the comments below and we’ll support you and try out best to help you overcome it. Or let us know how you’ve overcome your irrational fear and help other readers relate to you!
