Years ago, during a class on human behavior, a psychology professor said that when teachers are speaking, only 11% of the class is actually paying attention to what is being said. On the other hand, 23% of the people are thinking about a personal problem, while 66% are having a sexual fantasy. According to the professor, no matter what he said that day, at least two-thirds of the class was sure to have a good time.

Isn’t this the problem that most folks have? No, not sexual fantasies. I mean paying attention to the thing that most deserves your attention. In the classroom, it’s the dialectic that deserves your attention. In a car, it’s the road that deserves your attention. Flying an airplane also demands that we pay attention, but not necessarily in the way we normally think. After years of pondering this, it’s now clear to me that those with an extraordinary ability to keep themselves safe in the air do so because they—there’s no other way to say this so I’ll just say it—mimic the behaviors of what the self-help literature calls the enlightened individual.

Whoa! Hold on Kwai Chang Caine. I know you’re thinking, “Don’t shimmy that Sholin up my sleeve. This is aviation pal, and its subjects are ruled by laws, equations and test tubes. So back off, Monkman.”

Not to worry. I share your sentiments, having gone through my “New Age” stage in my early 20’s. My kick in the karma came at a seminar where an unemployed engineer claimed to channel a wise, 30,000 year old spirit. For $20 a pop, you could ask the spirit anything. So I asked him to sing a song from the Late Pleistocene’s Top 10 radiocarbon list. I realized that I had just lost 20 bucks when I heard something similar to Mowtown’s Four Tops. Perhaps I really heard the Four Triceratops. Who knows?

No, none of that jumbo for you, but only the best mumbo from me.

The fact is that the term enlightenment has both historical and respectable roots and this makes it an idea worth exploring. My thought is that a person’s enlightenment in any realm of life (be it aviation, car racing, or muffin making) has nothing to do with his or her ability to speak sotto voce from the lotus position. The answer is (thank goodness) more practical than that. The enlightened person is someone whose situation-specific behavior is guided by a single dominant and permanent thought that both informs and influences his behavior in a meaningful way.

Either because of practical experience or proper training, a person acquires the habit of sustaining one important thought in the background of his consciousness without having to work at keeping it there. His or her behavior is now permanently moderated by this idea. Let’s call it “background awareness.”

For instance, research on consistently happy people—I would certainly call these individuals enlightened in the area of life—indicates that their permanent and dominant thought—their background awareness—is that of gratitude. These individuals are seldom unhappy, because they sustain an awareness of the good things (relatively speaking) that they have in their lives.

Of course, it goes without saying that enlightenment in any area means nothing if it doesn’t further the values of the culture in which the enlightened individual resides. In other words, you may be an enlightened Satanist, but you and your pitchfork shouldn’t plan on receiving an invite to Friday night Catholic bingo.

So, just what does all this have to do with you, the pilot of an airplane?

In my opinion, pilots with an extraordinary ability to fly safely—enlightened pilots—have also learned, either through directed training or the good fortune of having had an appropriate role model, to sustain one extremely important thought as part of their default background thinking.

What is that thought? It’s one that produces self-referential thinking. Said another way, it’s the type of thought that compels a pilot to objectively evaluate himself, his airplane and the environment in which he’s flying. It’s as if, by thinking the proper thought, the pilot has an “OOFE”—an out of fuselage experience—and is now able to examine all three critical conditions as an independent flight observer.

For many pilots, mentally stepping outside their fuselage begins with the thought, “What’s happening to me?” If a single thought can be the catalyst that initiates an awareness of one’s environment, an evaluation of the airplane’s performance and an honest assessment of a pilot’s present mental acuity, this has to be it. I can think of no other idea that so completely informs a pilot about his or her present level of in-flight safety.

When this thought becomes a dominant and permanent part your background consciousness, then you’re certainly closer to cockpit enlightenment than most other pilots.

The important question is, “How do you make this thought a permanent part of your background thinking?” While there are many paths to the same endpoint, the simple answer is that you force yourself to think “What’s happening to me?” until it becomes part of your reflexive behavior. In this instance, practice makes permanent.

Unfortunately, other than constant practice, there is no easy way to cockpit enlightenment. There’s no Zen-koan question to accelerate the process. Besides, if I asked you, “What is the sound of one cylinder firing?” I know you’d say, “That sounds like a rental.”

Copyright 2010 by Rod Machado

For all those who are interested in the third edition of the IFR Survival Manual, the 509 page, softbound book is now available for ordering – $34.95 (the full color ebook version is also available – $24.95). In addition to the previous advanced instrument flying information, the third edition now contains advanced information on GPS flying techniques using the Garmin 530 IFR certified GPS WAAS unit as well as techniques for scanning glass cockpit displays in technically advanced aircraft. You’ll also find practical information on convective weather interpretation in the form of Skew-T/Log-P diagrams as well as using and interpreting your in-flight NEXRAD weather display to avoid convective weather.

To view excerpts and read more about the book, click here.

To order, call (800) 437-7080 or visit our ordering page by clicking here.

Nothing, and I mean absolutely nothing, is more important to a person’s success at learning to fly than having a good flight instructor. Yes, there are many good flight instructors in the aviation business, just as there are many good doctors and lawyers in their respective businesses. Unfortunately, there are also individuals who don’t represent their professions well. Sorry, but that’s life in the big city (or big sky).

Unlike golf clubs and fancy cars, flight instruction is likely to be something a prospective pilot has never shopped for in his or her entire life. That’s why most folks have nary a clue about what questions to ask (or even if they should ask questions) in order to winnow the instructor wheat from the chaff. Without the right information, lots of students wind up with chafe from the chaff, and people who should have been pilots become pedestrians.

I’ve assembled a list of questions that will help any prospective student (and that includes you if you’re going back for advanced training). The objective is to try to spot someone who will be a good instructor. No single question is going to reveal all the strengths and weaknesses of an individual, but ask a variety of well-targeted questions and you’ll learn a lot about someone.

Keep in mind that a good CFI is worth his or her weight in airplane parts. Once you find one, treat him or her well. Pay him what he’s worth, and sing his praises to everyone. Good CFIs seldom get the credit they deserve.

1. Why did you become a flight instructor?
The reason you want to know this is because the person might talk only about flying professionally. Most likely, this is someone who is flying to build time. There’s nothing wrong with this, of course, but if he doesn’t talk about, mention, or even hint that he loves to fly and share flying with others, then I might be a bit concerned about him not having my best interests at heart.

2. What are the chances of your being hired by an airline or another aviation company in the next six months?
If she says that she’s got a good chance of being hired by a commuter airline in the next six months, you know that there’s a very good chance she won’t be around long enough to see you through private training. If she says that hiring in the next half-year is unlikely, then the chances are good that she’ll be around long enough to take you to the private pilot level.

On the other hand, I can’t say enough about the influence a good flight instructor has on a student’s initial development as a pilot. If this person is a gem with whom you’re simpatico, then it’s probably in your best interest to fly with this instructor, even for a few hours, despite him heading off for an airline job in the next few months. At least you’ll have a taste of good flight training, which will make you a more educated consumer when shopping for instructors at a later time.

3. How many private pilots have you trained, and how many have passed their checkride on the first attempt?
If the person hasn’t trained any private pilot students, then it’s likely that he’s either a new CFI or he doesn’t prefer doing primary training. A new CFI is often very enthusiastic, and for this reason alone he could do a great job for you. Sure, he is new, but the possibility exists that he can at least teach you to fly as well as he can, right? That’s a good thing. On the other hand, there’s nothing wrong with looking for someone with experience, if that pleases you. I’d be worried if this person trains private pilots and has had more than three out of 10 applicants fail on their first attempt. In this instance it might be wise to look for someone with an A or B+ or even a B average instead of a below-C average.

4. How many hours will it take for me to solo if I fly three times a week and learn in the simplest airplane available?
The answer to this question, even in a tower-controlled environment, varies but it should be around 14 to 18 hours. If you are told that it typically takes 25 hours or more to solo, then this should raise an eyebrow. It shouldn’t take 25 hours or more to solo when flying frequently in a basic training airplane (assuming that you don’t have any learning difficulties or personal struggles to cope with).

5. What is the average length of time and how many hours does it take your typical student who trains consistently to obtain a private pilot certificate?
The national average for the private certificate is around 70 hours, but there are instructors who can put people through in under 50 hours within a five-to-six-month period. Sure, weather, availability, training schedules, funds, and so on all affect this time, but if 70.1 hours is the average, then there are many students who complete their training in fewer hours. There’s no reason you shouldn’t be in this group. If the CFI says that his students who train consistently take 70-plus hours, then I’d check around for someone with more favorable numbers. If this person says that it takes about a year to obtain a private pilot certificate, then this isn’t the person for you. Most people who fly consistently plan to spend no more than six months to complete private pilot training.

6. If we assume that I’m your typical student, and if we assume that I might have the problems of an average student, what areas of difficulty might I expect to encounter during flight training?
The response to this question will tell you a lot about this person’s teaching personality. If he says that “most” students are lazy and don’t work hard enough, then he is likely not a good manager or motivator. Most people who pay money for flight training aren’t lazy and do indeed want to work hard. If the CFI tells you that “most” folks are afraid of stalls and emergency procedures, then this person may have difficulty assuaging the anxieties of his students. The fact is that most people aren’t frightened of stalls and emergency procedures if their CFI is sensitive enough to introduce and explain them properly.

If the CFI says that it takes a long time to learn how to land, then you want to be suspicious here, too. It doesn’t take a long time to learn how to land. In fact, given accommodating traffic and weather, a capable student can learn how to land in about four to six hours of pattern work. So use a bit of common sense here. If the CFI is emphatic about specific areas where his students struggle and have difficulties, then compare this with what other CFIs have told you. It’s quite possible that this person has problems teaching in these areas. If the CFI says that most students have general challenges but these are nothing that can’t be overcome, then that is the type of attitude you’re looking for.

7. Tell me about your best and your worst students and why they became the best and worst.
This will tell you a lot about the CFI himself. It’s a variation on question six, but it also can provide you with insights into what this CFI likes or dislikes in his students. If the instructor says that he likes students who understand if he loses patience or is late, then it’s possible that he is a hothead and is late a lot. If this CFI says that he likes students who are serious about learning to fly, then he is probably serious about teaching, too. So listen carefully to his responses, and let your head and gut tell you whether this person is right for you.

8. How much ground instruction do you do on every lesson?
If the CFI says that he does very little ground instruction and suggests that the student’s homework should cover this, keep looking. Good CFIs do both a preflight briefing and a postflight debriefing. That’s ground instruction. It’s not unreasonable to have at least one hour’s worth of ground instruction (which you’ll rightly pay for, of course) for every two-to-2.5-hour lesson block.

9. May I speak with three of your previous private pilot students?
If he says no or makes it seem that such a thing wouldn’t be possible unless a Ouija board is involved, consider flying with someone else. If he says yes, then interview these students or former students. Ask them about the quality of training they received. This provides an excellent window into the training style and capabilities of this individual. If the previous students suggest that this CFI has a problem with patience and tends to yell, then find another CFI.

Keep in mind that you’re looking for specific trends in the answers given above. Stop, look, and listen carefully. You’ll be surprised at what people reveal about themselves in what they say and what they omit from normal conversation. Finally, ask yourself if you’d like to spend 40-plus hours in the cockpit and under the supervision of this person while learning how to fly. Is this person the type of individual who seems like he will have confidence in you? If not, then find someone else. Remember, you’re the consumer, so act like one. If you feel that this person is right for you, then agree to fly with him for no more than three lessons up front, after which time you’ll commit to the rest of the training if the relationship is working out. At least this gives you a chance to escape with few hard feelings if you feel he isn’t right for you.

One of the best ways to put this information to work immediately is by participating in AOPA Project Pilot, which pairs experienced pilots willing to act as Mentors with students actively engaged in flight training. This program is so powerful that AOPA statistics show that a student with a Project Pilot Mentor is three times more likely to successfully complete his or her flight training. That’s why I’m such a big fan of AOPA’s mentoring process and hope you’ll find a way to participate.

So copy the question list and sign up for AOPA Project Pilot. Help a prospective student find a good CFI and you’ll be helping someone else, general aviation, and yourself.

On the day of my first flying lesson, a tiny voice spoke to me in a Sicilian-like accent. It pleaded, “Rodney, donta goh, donta goh. I cook you pasta, I cook you pizza. Just donta goh flying today,” I’ll never forget that voice—it came from my grandmother, standing in the kitchen.

I replied, “Granny, why are you speaking like that? We’re not even Italian.”

Yes, I still flew that day. Yes, I still had Italian food that night. And yes, I’m still not Italian.

Many of us, even those without grandmothers, hear voices. They may be the ones speaking to us when laying our eyes on the printed word or those associated with our conscience and its splintered kin, each with personalities all their own. Most of the time, these voices are supportive. Punctuating our waking moments with helpful suggestions and prodding us to behave in sensible ways, they act as wise overseers.

Occasionally, while aloft, we encounter voices that go bad. These are the ones that attempt to sabotage the means by which we find satisfaction in airplanes. I’m speaking of those voices emanating from the darker corners of our mind. The ancient Greeks knew of these voices, often referring to them as dysdaimon or bad demons .

Bad demons compel us to doubt ourselves, to worry unnecessarily, to be fearful and anxious when those responses aren’t justified. For most of us, these demons remain confined to the dusty dungeons of the unconscious mind. But for reasons that are both known and unknown, they occasionally slither onto the bedrock of consciousness and lay siege to our intellect and emotions. Here, they deplete us of the joys and pleasures we find in flying airplanes. Once these demons assume custody of our mental machinery, we’re forced to make a simple choice. Either we learn to control them, or submit to being controlled by them.

Before Ted wrote me several months ago, he had been flying for many years, accumulating several thousand accident-free, fun flying hours in the process. Then, on one cross country trip, everything changed. Ted heard an alien voice, a nagging voice, that prodded him to worry about his safety. As a result, he made an unscheduled landing to collect his wits (and offload that voice).

Ted said he’d never experienced anything like that before. Before long, Ted would only fly when accompanied by another pilot. Yet, it wasn’t Ted’s ability to control the airplane that troubled him. It was the general feeling of uneasiness that plagued him on subsequent flights. Just for the record, Ted didn’t experience heart palpitations, dizziness, sweating, trembling, chest pain, choking, chills. Nor did he experience panting or rapid breathing, as if he had just eaten a dog biscuit. These symptoms are typically associated with panic disorders and anxiety attacks (or the oral portion of a private pilot checkride). Instead, Ted had come face to face with a bad demon.

As Ted explained it, his sudden onset of discomfort was inexplicable. While we might associate similar events with the trauma of an aviation accident or even a close call, Ted had encountered neither. Experience tells me that there’s almost always a reason behind the sudden appearance of a bad demon, despite the difficulty in identifying the means by which we unknowingly summoned it.

Much of the time, these demons are kept in check because we pay selective attention to the world around us. It’s simply human nature not to dwell on our mortality. We seldom think about how easily frightened we might be by the most banal and common things in our lives (e.g., a seemingly friendly dog that attacks us, perhaps because we at its biscuit) or even how vulnerable our body is to being punctured, squished or bent. That’s why we have little reason to feel anxious about these issues. While we may tacitly acknowledge our vulnerability at times, we certainly don’t dwell on it.

Now consider what happens when a solo pilot, cruising at several thousand feet, stumbles onto the perfect combination of time, opportunity and circumstance to muse about his vulnerability. Suppose, for example, he begins to nibble on the idea of losing consciousness. As he chews on the thought, the devastating and ultimate finality of blacking out might easily lead to feel ill at ease. Now a very bad demon (i.e., a voice) might rise from its slumber and gain access to the waking mind. Never mind that this fellow is in perfect health and has never lost consciousness a day in his life. All that matters to him now is his newly revealed vulnerability (albeit a statistically insignificant one), and the lack of protection against it.

Sure, this fellow might find comfort in wiring the parachute system of his Cirrus SR-22 to an onboard EEG monitor so that it automatically deploys at the first sign of diminished mental activity. The problem is that some pilots with dimly lit stars might find their chute deploying regardless of whether or not anyone actually fainted. Fortunately, there’s a more practical solution to the problem. In situations like these, pilots must intervene on their own behalf to stay their runaway emotions. Here is where we can take a lesson from the past.

Goethe, the German poet, once suggested that he never shunned any of his personal thoughts, no matter how disgusting, grotesque or disturbing they were. To him, these thoughts—representing his bad demons—were part of him and part of the human condition. Instead, he acknowledged these demons, listened to them, and allowed them conditional access to his psyche for one very important reason: so as not to empower the bad ones by ignoring or dismissing them .

Goethe knew that great peril existed when attempting to banish by force of will those parts of his psychic self that he didn’t like. Great mind that he was, he recognized these bad demons as errant or spurious thoughts that didn’t reflect his true values or beliefs. The lesson Goethe and other wise men of antiquity learned was to acknowledge their disturbing thoughts (their demons), listen to their message, then begin talking to them.

Talking to them? That’s right!

Does that sound like crazy talk to you? Are you thinking I’m possessed and need immediate debriefing by a priest? Perhaps FAA psychologists are kooky, too. After all, the recommended strategy for countering irresponsible behavior requires that you to talk to yourself in applying their recommended hazardous thought antidotes. If you still believe talking to yourself is crazy, then you’ve certainly riled the ghost of Goethe and probably vexed the spirits of Montaigne, Shakespeare, Ruskin, Socrates, Thomas Jefferson and many others, as well. These were men who, to different degrees, learned to cope with their personal demons by holding conversations with them.

For instance, in the book Jefferson’s Demons , Michael Beran details Thomas Jefferson’s battle with the many different and sometimes disturbing voices and personas with which our third president struggled. Like most intellectuals of his time, Jefferson was skilled in the classic literature of the Greeks and the Romans. He knew that the ancients perceived these demons and their accompanying voices, as instructional forces that could either hobble a man’s creativity or help him marshal it effectively. Socrates, for instance, was known to chat with his demons, which the great Greek sage recognized as nothing more than the whispers of his conscience.

Like many great men of the Renaissance, Jefferson learned to carry on conversations or dialogues with these internal voices, his demons. In the process, he and others like him, found a way to talk to themselves , letting their wiser parts offer counsel and guidance to their more troublesome personas. This is the means by which Ted and pilots with similar afflictions might come to terms with their demons and the uneasiness and discomfort they produce.

Here’s an example of how this process might play out from beginning to end. Pilots who suddenly find themselves chilled by a disturbing and unreasonable thought (fainting, acrophobia, etc.) should acknowledge this demon and its accompanying voice. They shouldn’t ignore or dismiss it. Then they should listen to it, giving it the benefit of the doubt by assuming its message might contain advice from a part their psyche that’s concerned for their safety. After all, there’s no reason to automatically assume that these demons are against you. The animating force behind all life is the preservation of life. We have every reason to assume that in strange and indecipherable ways our demons might actually be trying to assist us in much the same manner of an admonishing and overcontrolling mother. This is the part of the process that opens the doors of communication between one’s consciousness and the mental machinations that lie beneath it.

The next step is to talk to the demon (if you have passengers, do it subaudibly lest you give them a good reason to start cranking out their own supply of demons).

For instance, you might begin by saying, “OK, thanks for the warning and the information. That’s interesting. I’ll consider your point, but I believe I’ll be fine for now.” Then go about your business.

If you’ve listened to your demon’s message (be it one of anxiety, acrophobia, competence, etc.) you’ll know what to say in return. While I can’t possibly tell you how to talk with your demon in all instances, I can suggest that you treat it as you would a concerned neighbor who is respectfully but stubbornly trying to butt his nose into your business. Reasonable people will listen politely to that neighbor, but then establish a limit line beyond which his nosiness should not cross. Trust your instincts here. Remember, talking to your demon allows you to influence your behavior in much the same way your behavior is influenced when someone talks to you.

Ultimately, your objective is to find a way to make your demon work as an ally for you. Jefferson managed to do just that, using his many voices to turn anxiety into action and chaos into order. Perhaps Beran said it best about Jefferson when he wrote, “He learned better than most people do [about] how to talk to himself—how to cherish the stray pieces of consciousness he found within him. The Renaissance masters taught him to treat his various voices [good and bad alike] like bright playful children, little prodigies who must be given scope for the expression of their elegant (demonic) energies.”

Finally, let’s be clear about one thing. Mentally healthy people hear voices. That’s a fact. They don’t, however, dress them up, drive them places and introduce them to their friends. That’s goofy and a sure sign that someone needs a shrink to help shrink his new friends away. As long as an individual doesn’t have too many bats in his belfry, he can probably deal with most forms of cockpit unease or discomfort by treating it as the ancients did—recognize it as a personal demon, listen to it, talk with it.

Copyright 2010 by Rod Machado (www.rodmachado.com)