The SOAR Library

The Abstract Point Of No Return is a concept which is rather advanced; it is not for everybody.

This concept can deal with anticipatory anxiety. But there is a paradox. You can’t USE it for dealing with anticipatory anxiety. What I mean by that is, if your goal is focused on finding the easiest way to get rid of unwanted feelings, this is not for you.

This is for someone who is focused on personal growth . . . someone who is truly being an adult and dealing with issues on an adult basis, which means, a person who is not JUST looking to FEEL better, but to BE a better - a more complete - person.

So when I say you can’t USE this to deal with anticipatory anxiety, I mean just that. This concept, if you embrace it, will deal with anticipatory anxiety, but only as a by-product, a by-product of personal growth.

So, let’s get started and see if this is for you or not.

The first concept I want to direct you to is the idea that the mind is not necessarily supposed to be at peace. One of the most eye-opening psychological papers I have ever read was by the famous New York psychoanalyst Charles Brenner MD who point out that psychotherapy does not cure conflict. Why? Because we are SUPPOSED to have conflict. What psychotherapy does is help us provide - INTERNALLY -an arena in which a contest between an aim which is in conflict with another aim can come out into the open. When our conflicting interests and desires and impulses can be made conscious, THEN we are in a position to determine what the BEST outcome involving those conflicting aims can be, and THEN take action.

By contract, what happens if those conflicting interests and desires and impulses are NOT made conscious? Instead of THINKING it out and taking the best action, those interests and desires and impulses are expressed in living, as first one, and then another, and then another dominates.

This is not such an easy concept to get, so let’s try an example. If a person wants to decorate a living room, one way is to go out and buy a sofa, buy a few chairs, but some pictures, and buy a rug, and put them in the room. And then, physically move them around the room. Move the sofa here and the chairs there. Then move the sofa someplace else and the chairs someplace else. And then decide it doesn’t work and send them back and buy others.

In this example, you can only discover whether a certain selection and arrangement of furniture is to your liking by physically placing it in position here, and then there, and then elsewhere. That takes a lot of time, money, and muscle.

But consider the other possibility. What if you can - instead of buying the furniture and physically trying it out in various places in the room - you could do it in your imagination? What if you could look at various stores at sofas, chairs, rugs, etc., and then visualize the living room, and imagine those items placed here, and then there, and then in the other place. That takes a lot less muscle; in fact, it takes none at all. It takes less time, that is, if you have the mental ability to do that. And certainly it takes less money than first buying and then having to sell those items of furniture you find are not right.

So, now let’s apply this idea to living. Instead of various furniture items, you allow the various aims, desires, interests, and impulses to come into the mind, and you allow yourself to be FULLY conscious of them - even if some don’t fit together, and even if some are in direct conflict with others.

That may be uncomfortable. But one of the aims of psychotherapy is to help you build the strength to let that happen . . . to BE the arena in which these competing aims, desires, interests, and impulses can be presented to you to deal with MENTALLY instead of being subjected to spending years and years LIVING them out, and dealing with the debris, the expense, the frustration, etc.

Well, I didn’t mean to get so deeply into that. What I really wanted to do was to say, conflict is something we are SUPPOSED to have and are SUPPOSED to be aware of.

I didn’t know that. I can look back to years ago when I believed the proper aim in life was to get rid of - or be unaware of - conflict. I envied people who just did whatever they felt like doing. Of course, as it turned out, in time, their lives became a mess, or worse.

That may be - as it was for me - a very new idea . . . the idea that we are supposed to be aware of conflict inside ourselves. If that is a new idea, it will take quite some time to adjust to that new way of thinking. So I will not ask you to take any father here.

Instead, let’s go to the next point. Anticipatory anxiety is about conflict: that’s pretty obvious when you think about it: the conflict is you want to fly and you don’t want to fly.

Perhaps it would be more accurate to say that some “part” of you wants to fly because it allows you to do things you otherwise would not be able to do. Let’s call that part of you “part A” . . . No, let’s call that part of you, “Orville” after Orville Wright, or “Johathan Livingston Seagull” after the book written by ex-F-86 pilot and author Richard Bach.

But another part of you says, “no way” . . . if I get on that plane, I will have a panic attack, because I will know that at every moment I may be about to die. Let’s call that part, well . . . Linus . . . who needs soothing, not adventure.

Internally, when it looks like Orville or Jonathan is getting the upper hand, Linus gets terribly upset and causes a lot of distress. And when Linus gets the upper hand, the far more adventurous Orville or Jonathan part get ashamed, frustrated, and angry.

The Orville or Jonathan part is happy only when engaged in growth or adventure. The Linus part is only happy clinging and making sure that nothing changes.

The only thing the two parts can agree on is this: I want to be in control. But the problem is, when the Orville or Jonathan part is in control, Linus screams bloody murder. And when Linus is in control, Orville and Jonathan feel ashamed.

What can be done?

I want to tell you a story, a personal story. Back when I was very busy trying to prove something - though if anyone had told me that at the time, I would have told them they were mistaken - I bought a race car. It was a Formula 3 race car built by a company called Lola. I made arrangements for the purchase by phone. The car was in England. I was stationed in the Air Force in Germany at the time. When I went to pick up the car, the seller had slipped off the fiberglass body so I could inspect it. I looked at the car. It weighed only 880 pounds. It was just constructed of triangulated tubing to which four wheels, and and engine and transmission were attached. And, in front of the engine, was the driver’s seat, and in front of the driver’s seat, almost nothing. I pictured myself IN the car, sitting in the simi-reclined seat, with my legs stretched forward, and suddenly I realized: there was nothing between where my body was going to be and anything I happened to run into but a couple of pieces of lightweight tubing. There was nothing between me and disaster . . . except skill and luck. I got very uncomfortable, but I had already paid for the car. We loaded it on a trailer and took it back home.

Now, the cockpit of this car was so tiny, and so form-fitted, that sliding into the car feet first, was like sliding ones fingers into a snug-fitting glove. Once in, it wasn’t easy to get out.

Fast-forward to race day. The race will be starting in five minutes. It is time to get into the car. I stand on the seat, and start slipping my heels forward, forward, forward, until my butt is planted into the form-fitted seat. The seat holds my body firmly - not only in the back - but to the sides, so that when going around turns, I am supported to the side.

The thought comes to mind: “You shouldn’t be doing this.” How can such a thought be argued with? But the thought just sits there, “You shouldn’t be doing this”.

But there is a fact. The fact is, I am in the car. Once in, it is very difficult to squirm ones way out. There is no question about it. I am in the car. And there is another fact. I AM doing this. There is no question about that either.

Something then happened which I can only say is: remarkable. The something that happened is this: the part of me that was expressing the thought, “You shouldn’t be doing this”, continued . . . and though it wasn’t in words, if it had been in words, it would have gone something like this, “Well, I see that you ARE doing this, so . . . if I tell you ‘you shouldn’t be doing this’ when you are going around a curve at 90 miles per hour, my telling you that is going to distract you, and BOTH of us are going to be killed.”

See, this is one part of my self in direct opposition to another part of my self.

The next thought was, “So, in order not to be telling you this when you are going around a curve at 90 MPH, I’m getting out of the car.”

And this is what was so remarkable. It was as if that part of me which say, “You shouldn’t be doing this” got out of the car. And I experienced complete peace. Never before in my life had I experienced a moment without some conflict. My life had always been conflict between what I wanted to do and what I should do. Thing of - again - two parts of the self: one part that expresses desire, and one part that expresses should, one part aligned with wants, and one part aligned with prohibitions and obligations.

The two parts were in life-long conflict; and then, one part got out of the car, and I experienced - amazingly when you consider the risks of racing and uncertainty about life and death, success and failure - absolute peace!

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Now, how does this apply to flying? Imagine you are in a room with several other people. And in that room, there is a huge sheet of steel suspended from the ceiling on a rope. And, there is a sledgehammer. Let’s say one person in the room goes over, grabs the sledgehammer, and slams it against that huge sheet of steel as hard as he can. It would make a horrendous noise. It would bother everyone in the room . . . except one person. Who? Who would it not bother. It would not bother the person DOING it, the person who was swinging the sledgehammer. Why? Because he is not the victim of the action; he is the person causing it.

There is a huge difference between an action when you cause it instead of having it happen to you. It’s like the Simon and Garfunkle song, “I’d rather be a hammer than a nail.”

Everything in life is like that. When we are the author of what happens, when we cause what happens, it FEELS very different than if we are the victim of what happens.

When the door of the airplane closes, you are past the point of no return. Anxious fliers dread that moment because it takes away their control and makes it impossible to use escape to get rid of high anxiety or panic.

Think of the door being swung closed as the same thing as the hammer being swung against the steel . . .

There are two ways to be in both those situations: one is as the author who is causing the situation, and the other is being the victim of what is caused in the situation.

When you reach the point of no return, which would you rather be, the hammer or the nail? The author who causes . . . or the victim who suffers?

Now we can talk about this advanced concept, the Abstract Point of No Return. You can be past the point of no return as the author who causes yourself to be in that seat out of your own choice and your own free will, or you can be in that seat out of being a victim.

Here’s how.

Let’s imagine it is three days before your flight. You consider this: what is the very worst that can happen on my flight? Well, you could get on, the plane could take off, and climb up to cruise altitude and - though I can’t imagine how it would happen - I’m sure you can imagine the plane plunging, and you can imagine going through terror, with people screaming, and things flying around, and then . . . it’s over. You are dead.

And while we are on the subject, it is not being dead that is so awful, . . . it is GETTING dead, going through that terror first.

As someone posted on the message board, yes I know flying is hundreds of times safer than driving, but if I crash my car, it doesn’t fall 30,000 feet first.

It is the terror that is the problem. Terror is the worst thing that can happen on your flight.

OK, that’s the worst. What’s the best it could be. You get on the plane, they upgrade you to first class. You find yourself sitting next to your favorite celebrity, and is delighted by your wit and charm. The plane takes off and you hardly notice it. Cruise is perfect - not a ripple. The plane glides down to touchdown as smooth as silk, and you get off, and actually find you luggage made it, too.

OK, we have been through the worst it could possible be and the best it would possibly be. Neither of those is going to happen. You know that and I know that. It is - instead - going to be someplace in the middle, someplace between those extremes.

So, as I said, it is three days before your trip, and you have considered the best and the worst. You could hope for a perfect flight: it isn’t going to happen. You could dread the worst flight from hell with terror and death; it isn’t going to happen. It is going to be some place between the two.

There is only one question remaining: are you going to do it or not? Here is your opportunity to make the choice to fly, and further, to make that choice a commitment to fly . . . and here is the kicker . . . no matter what, even if it kills you.

THAT, is the thing that makes all the difference . . . no matter what, even if it kills you . . .
it is as certain - now - three days before your flight - that you will be in your seat on that plane when the door closes - as if you were on it right now. You will allow NOTHING to stop you from being on that plane when the door closes.

You can take it to the bank. It is carved in stone . . . a done deal. Why? Because you say so. . . because you have made an irrevocable commitment to do that flight, no matter what.

OK. An amazing thing happens. That part of you that has been doing numbers on you to find some excuse, some way out, of taking that flight, gives up. Conflict disappears. You feel unified. You feel peace. Anxiety falls away, vanishes.

For as long as that commitment - that unconditional commitment to fly no matter what - so long as that commitment persists, anxiety cannot get a leg to stand on.

But, it is three days before your flight. The commitment will lapse. Anxiety will come back. You will need to make the commitment again. But remember; paradox. You can’t DO this commitment thing to make anxiety go away. You make this commitment out of you own personal ability to make a commitment and keep it.

Anxiety going away is only a by-product. If you do this to try to make anxiety go away, if you try to commit in order to get relief, it won’t work. This commitment has to come out of the essence of who you are. Now everyone has that essence; as I said, . . . this is not for everyone. This is for people who have a sense of personal power, people who know they have the power to make things happen.

So, to keep the commitment real, you will need to search for the hidden strategies you may have to sneak out of the commitment. . . such as, Yes, I’ll do it no matter what, but if I don’t sleep well the night before then . . . no. That won’t work. Or, the weather doesn’t look good. Or, there was a crash on the news. Or there was something that might be an omen. Look for your secret “ways out”. Recognize them, and re-commit.

Once again, this is not for everyone. If you are just looking for relief, it’s not for you. If you are really committed to personal grown, then APNR is for you.