I was going to crash the airplane.

I was sure of it. Every sensation in my body confirmed it. My instructor and I were going to die.

Then I heard his calm voice:

“Trust the instruments.”

I was not yet a licensed pilot, and during this training session I was flying “under the hood.” This means I was wearing a weird plastic device that blocked me from seeing outside the plane, so my only reference was what the instruments on the panel were telling me.

My instructor would give me instructions like:

• “Ascend to 7,800 feet on a heading of 250, and then fly straight and level.”

• “Descend to 6,500 while maintaining a 30-degree left bank.”

• “Initiate a steep turn to the right, maintaining altitude, and hold the turn until I tell you otherwise.”

Now, here’s the weird thing:

When you initiate a steep turn in an airplane, you feel it. But if you stay in that turn long enough, your body—particularly your inner ears—acclimates to it.

And so it feels like you’re flying straight and level.

So when your instructor tells you to fly straight and level, it feels like you already are.

And when you do what the instruments say you need to do to actually fly straight and level, it feels like you’re intentionally entering into a death spiral.

I mean, it really, REALLY feels that way.

So, at that moment, every fiber of my being was screaming,

“You’re going to crash!”

But the instruments—the actual data—said otherwise.

And that’s when I realized my senses were lying to me.

When you stay in a turn long enough, your body gets used to it. You feel straight and level, even when you’re banking hard toward disaster. The only way to correct course is to trust the instruments.
To rely on something outside your own perception.

And that’s not just true in aviation.

It’s true in business.
It’s true in leadership.
It’s true in innovation.

Because when you get too comfortable with how you’ve always done things, you stop noticing the warning signs.
You mistake routine for stability.
Familiarity for safety.

And that’s when you can drift off course—thinking you’re flying straight and level the whole time.

So maybe the question isn’t,

“How comfortable do I feel right now?”

Maybe it’s,

“Am I still flying straight and level—or have I just gotten used to the turn?”