Anxiety about driving in unfamiliar places is a common problem and one that you can overcome.
Here are some hints and tips showing how to fix the problem and get driving in new areas that you’ve never been to before.
Contact me to work with me online from anywhere in the world.
These videos explain more about the fear of driving in unknown places. Use the menu button at the top right to choose a video.
Anxiety about driving in unfamiliar places
Your fear of driving in unfamiliar areas may appear to be perfectly natural.
The human mind runs away from anything new or different and that’s how we evolved as a race and survived.
This is not what causes a fear of driving in unknown places though; something from your past causes it.
This can sound crazy when you first hear it and it’s easy to dismiss it and call it a crackpot theory. It isn’t, this is what’s happening!
What anxiety of driving in unknown places really is
Here’s a real example from a session I did with a client that had a fear of driving somewhere unknown.
Whenever he got more than a few miles from home he would start to shake and have a panic attack. It was so bad he had to call someone to come and drive him home.
We discovered the cause was that many years ago, a teacher locked him in a cupboard as a punishment. This small dark space gave him a panic attack which was the cause of his fear of driving in unfamiliar places.
How does that work?
His mind had for some reason linked that event from years ago with him driving somewhere new. He was reliving that traumatic event every time he drove somewhere new.
Once we found this memory and processed it properly he could drive anywhere just like before because his mind no longer linked the two things.
That’s why driving lessons for anxiety and exposure therapy will do nothing. They fail to address the root cause (the memory) and only focus on the symptoms (driving somewhere new).
You need professional help to find this memory. You won’t just remember it by thinking.
I wonder what your memory will be?
What else can cause the problem?
The problem doesn’t always come from a past event.
It could be that something in your current life is stopping you from driving such as the fear of success. That can sound strange but it’s often the case.
A client of mine had an offer from his boss for a pay rise of £10,000 a year and a company car. He’d turned this promotion down for a while so was losing out on a lot of money. It turned out that was the problem: his mind was scared of having more money and success and wanted to stay as it was.
The fear of the unknown and making changes are often behind driving anxiety but fixing it requires more than just knowing that.
Ways of fixing it yourself
You can use hypnosis tracks like the one I have made below.
This isn’t designed to totally get rid of any issue but it has been known to do just that! It’s most likely to be of use in very minor cases where the problem doesn’t run very deep and can quite easily be fixed.
This track is nothing like professional therapy which is interactive and uses much more effective methods. There is only so much you can do with a YouTube video but for those of you that want it, here it is!
Please let me know if it helped you in the comments.
Fix it with professional therapy
We can fix anxiety from driving in unfamiliar places online from anywhere in the world.
The way we do this is by finding the cause of the issue and re-educating your mind so that it understands it is unnecessary to cause you to stress when you’re driving somewhere new.
It sounds simple but all of this takes a lot of training and practice to get right. You are not going to just find the cause of your problem easily because your mind blocks you from doing that to keep the problem going.
Why would it do that? Because your mind thinks it’s serving a good purpose and so it won’t give it up.
Can I fix my anxiety about driving in unfamiliar places?
Yes, you can fix it and then drive again.
I know how annoying it can be because I’ve gone through a similar experience myself.
The good news is that you weren’t born with driving anxiety and it’s a problem that you have picked up. If you picked it up then you can put it down again.
Contact me for help
Book your call with me now for help getting over the anxiety of driving in unfamiliar places
Learn more by visiting my YouTube channel.