How To Stop Being a Nervous Passenger
Being a nervous passenger: we’ve all done it occasionally – turned into a nervous wreck when someone else is driving the car. Sometimes it’s justified (after all, not everyone is a world class driver). But when your first reaction is to constantly hit that imaginary brake, you know you’re a fully fledged nervous passenger.
So, what can you do to calm your nerves?
How can you stop being a nervous passenger?
Start with a reality check. If the person who’s about to drive you is a reckless driver or is not in a fit state to drive a car then you’ve got every reason to be worried. And you probably should turn down the offer of that ride.
But when their safety record is good (or at least, no worse than yours), then you need to find a way to calm down.
Start with your breathing. Chances are that when your nerves start jittering, your breathing gets shallower. Focus on taking deeper breaths and holding them for slightly longer than usual. Exhale slowly as well. This exercise alone is a good way of calming your nerves and stopping you worrying about every small variation in speed or course.
Sometimes being a nervous passenger stems from your need to be a control freak. Not being in charge could be the trigger that turns you into someone who wants to outguess their driver at every move.
This isn’t as easy to deal with – you need to work on changing your mindset. Which you’d likely have already done if it was easy. A shrink is expensive and probably overkill in this situation. So a lot of people turn to the idea of hypnosis to help them adjust to being a more regular car passenger in the future, rather than one who wears out the carpet in the passenger footwell, pumping on that invisible brake pedal.
Hypnosis is a good way of dealing with this kind of fear as it can tackle the parts of your mind that are tucked away from everyday use. The rules you live your life by as well as all the small details that allow you to live a normal life without having to think how to breathe, how to beat your heart, that kind of thing.
Your nervousness as a passenger is almost certainly deep rooted and hypnosis can help by digging around the recesses of your mind and changing your overall approach to the issue. It may take a few days or weeks but gradually you’ll notice that you’re less worried when you sit in that passenger seat.