Fear of heights is a psychological phenomenon that, in most cases, is useful. Thanks to it we avoid putting ourselves in dangerous situations that involve being on the edge of a cliff. In this way, without the need to stop and reflect on whether it is a good idea to stand on a balcony without a railing or next to a very deep ravine, we simply obey the feeling of fear and greatly reduce our chances of dying.
However, in some cases the fear of heights becomes so intense that it manifests itself strongly in contexts in which there is no real danger of death or injury from a fall In these cases it becomes a problem, and even more so if it is so serious that it becomes a phobia. When this happens, you have to intervene.
In this article we will see several tips on how to make the fear of heights disappear or at least mitigate its effects so that it stops being a problem.
To begin with, it is important to consider that, like many other psychological phenomena and traits, fear of heights can occur in different intensities. When your level is relatively low or moderate, it is possible to make progress on your own, without help from other people. However, if this fear becomes very extreme and the level of anxiety is so high that control is completely lost, it is necessary to go to a mental health professional to receive psychotherapy.
Fortunately, phobias are disorders which in most cases can subside until its effects are so low that they no longer interfere with the person’s quality of life.
Of course, the line that separates fears from phobias (pathological fears) is blurry, and that is why it is necessary let a professional make the diagnosis, and not yourself
That said, let’s move on to see what are the tips to overcome the fear of heights in the event that the level of anxiety and fear expressed is not very extreme.
How to overcome the fear of heights
Follow these steps, adapting them to the characteristics of your life and your daily life.
1. Talk without complexes about your problem
This is a first step to being able to face the fear of heights. Doing this is allows you to free yourself from the extra worry of giving a bad image If there is someone close to you when you go into a crisis of this type. In addition, it has the obvious usefulness that other people can help you, for example, so that you can have support when you feel bad for this reason.
2. Set a reasonable distance
In this step, you must imagine places where there is a cliff and establish, also in your imagination, what is the threshold that separates the really dangerous area from the one that is not.
Doing this repeatedly will help you solve the uncertainty that comes from not being clear when the fear is justified and when it is not, and you will generalize this spatial criterion to many other real or imagined situations in which there is a cliff.
If you read and inform yourself about the way in which mental processes are relatively independent of rational ones, you will not feel guilty for feeling anxious when you are near a rich person, a large window, etc. Overcoming the fear of heights is, therefore, a task in which you have to tame part of your own nervous system, so that it adjusts to rationality; It is, in a certain sense, a challenge.
4. View images that convey security
It’s good to start getting used to the idea that most of the time when people approach cliffs and the like, nothing bad happens. For it, Use visualization and imagine many people calmly approaching a cliff maintaining a safe distance and relying on handrails (if any).
Then, imagine that you imitate those people. The good thing about these scenes is that they are realistic, because they fit with what we usually see in real life, although normally in those contexts we are invaded by anxiety.
5. Expose yourself to heights
This is the determining step to definitively defeat heights, but you must do it with help. On your first attempt, aim to go a little beyond the limit you usually respect so as not to suffer too much from fear, and stay there for a few minutes.
In the second, go a little further. This way You will progress little by little, assuming an ascending difficulty curve and ending in a degree of proximity to the precipice that can be considered a reasonable margin from the point of view of safety. On the other hand, if you have access to virtual reality technologies, such as the VR system in video games, you can also use it to expose yourself to cliffs that are not real, even though they are very realistic.
