Returning to my aviation experience: The second thing I learned in flight training is that most of the instability and course deviation that my instructor unceasingly made me aware of was the result of my input — that I was often introducing misdirecting control input and largely unaware that I was doing so. My instructor was quick and most helpful in helping me become aware of this and he did so by distracting me, quite effectively, by simply talking about a number of topics unrelated to aviation, while simultaneously pointing to the instrument gauges which were always indicating horizontal and vertical course deviation. In order to fly the airplane safely and within safe parameters of flight, I needed to pay attention and consistently adjust or correct changes in altitude and course direction that were occurring all of the time. Some of these changes were the effect of rising air, wind shear, and other forms of natural turbulence…, but the vast majority of off course misdirection was coming from unconscious control movements that I was unwittingly introducing.
About a year later, while training for my instrument rating, I learned an equally important lesson about control input, which was not to over control. Briefly, acquiring an instrument rating trains you fly more accurately and in weather conditions where you do not have visual references. When flying in instrument conditions or IFR flight rules, you are relying on the instruments for course change input and not on what you perceive to be happening outside of the cockpit environment. Often in IFR conditions you are in the weather, in the clouds, and do not have outside visual references. This is often the case shortly after take-off, and also when descending to land at your destination airport. In such conditions there is often the need to make an instrument approach or an ILS approach to landing. This involves getting vertical descent guidance as well as horizontal guidance from the instrument indicators. The instruments inform you by providing left right and up down course feedback so that you are aligning the aircraft properly and safely for landing. The key is to correct, but not over correct, and for this you learn to input small course corrections and wait to see the effect or result before inputting more change.
Now, all of this powerfully transferred to other areas of my life and to enormous benefit and relief. I quickly saw that I was operating in my down on the ground experience largely unaware of destabilizing misdirection that I was introducing regularly and to undesired effect. And that I was frequently under-correcting or not paying attention, as well as over-correcting, which made my life-style clumsy and somewhat awkward…, a feast or famine experience that was frustrating, irritating, and quite discouraging. More or less, I was operating out of habit and past oriented conclusions, memories, and hardened beliefs which quite effectively produced more of my past, but only at the cost of present opportunity! I had learned how to have more of what I did not want but at the cost of having what I did want!
So how does all of this sum up? Well quite frankly, I saw that the ‘present’ I was famously complaining about, was only the result of a very narrow and restrictive state of mind that I was obsessed with and even addicted to perpetuating…, no matter the cost to myself or others! I was simply interrupting or interfering with my own learning curve and making little use of countless opportunities for Meaningful Change which I was constantly in the midst of.
