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I Tried Hypnotherapy at Hong Kong's All About You to Conquer My Fear of Flying — Here’s What Actually Happened
- Faye Bradley
- May 2
- 4 min read
HONG KONG
There was a time — pre-pandemic — when flying felt second nature. Boarding a plane was as routine as boarding a train: legs stretched in the aisle, headphones in, the satisfying thud of carry-on sliding into overhead bins. Then, something shifted. One turbulent flight during the tail-end of COVID set off an unrelenting chain reaction in my body — the stomach flips, the clenched jaw, the sleepless nights weeks before departure. I wasn’t just uneasy. I was afraid.
At first, I wrote it off as an anomaly, an inconvenient aftershock of a collective trauma. But the fear lingered. And it grew teeth. I began associating flying with roller coasters — another longstanding nemesis of mine — and my job, which requires frequent travel, suddenly felt like a punishment. White-knuckling my way through flights with shallow breaths and sweaty palms wasn’t sustainable. Something had to change.
That something, it turned out, was hypnotherapy.
I’d long been a curious observer of alternative wellness treatments — the kind whispered about in leafy enclaves of Bali and on the retreat circuits of Ibiza. But I’d never tried hypnotherapy myself. My only real exposure was watching a family member attempt it to quit smoking. He was a stubborn sort — the kind who smoked cigarettes daily for over sixty years — and yet, post-session, he stopped cold turkey. The effects lasted only a few weeks before he relapsed, but for a brief, brilliant moment, it worked. That was enough for me to believe there might be something there.
So I began researching. That’s how I came across Sonia Samtani, the founder of All About You Wellness Centre in Hong Kong, who came highly recommended by everyone from corporate executives to spiritual seekers. Her credentials are as multifaceted as a prism: a licensed Clinical Hypnotherapist, Life Coach, Regression Therapist, Image Consultant, Family Constellation Facilitator, and a public speaker with nearly two decades of experience helping people dismantle fears, trauma, and internalized limitations. If anyone could help me unclench my jaw at 36,000 feet, it was her.
“Hypnotherapy works by bypassing your critical filter,” Sonia told me in our pre-session chat. “Cognitive therapies work with the intellect — but the problem isn’t there. It’s buried in the subconscious, where old associations and past experiences are still stored. We work on accessing that space, gently and safely.”
There’s a soothing matter-of-factness to Sonia’s voice, as if she’s quietly rearranging the furniture in your mind while making you tea. Our first session was, contrary to popular myth, not some grand hypnotic spectacle where I handed over control. Instead, it began like any good therapy session: a conversation. What was the fear, when did it start, what was I imagining might go wrong? Sonia’s role, as she explained, was not to implant thoughts but to guide me toward rewiring my own.
“If people come to me and say, ‘I don’t want to feel scared,’ that’s not enough,” she explained. “The brain doesn’t process the word ‘not.’ If I say, ‘don’t think of a polar bear,’ what’s the first thing you think of? You need a positive replacement — an emotion or image to move toward, not just something to run from.”
Once I lay back, she guided me into a state that felt less like hypnosis and more like the peaceful, foggy in-between of jet lag — not asleep, but deeply relaxed. She counted backwards from ten, and I felt my shoulders begin to lower, my breath deepen.
And then: the memory.
In my subconscious, I found myself on a frog-drop ride at Ocean Park. I was five years old, riding with cousins, terrified. I remembered the jolt — that stomach-plummeting sensation I now associated with flying. Sonia asked me to go back to that version of myself and speak to her. “Tell her she’s safe. That she’s strong,” she said. So I did. I told her what I wish someone had told me then.
We repeated the process with the flight that had sparked this all — not to re-traumatise, but to release the fear. Sonia had me visualise the sound of the engines, the bumps, the captain’s voice — all the triggers — until they were no longer threatening, just details in a broader, calmer memory.
She also walked me through the entire flight process in my mind: from packing my suitcase to boarding, takeoff, turbulence, and landing. “Let your brain experience the journey without the panic,” she said. “When you’ve already imagined a calm version of it, your body is more likely to respond in kind.”
Throughout it all, I never felt out of control. I felt more present than I had in weeks. “People are already in hypnotic states every day,” Sonia later told me. “When you’re immersed in a movie, and you cry at the ending — that’s a trance. You’ve suspended disbelief. Hypnotherapy uses that same focused awareness to access deeper brainwaves like alpha and theta, where transformation can begin.”
Sonia also gave me some “homework”: grounding techniques and reflection prompts to reinforce what we’d uncovered. “The work isn’t only done here,” she said. “This is a partnership. You maintain the shift with daily practice.”
And the results?
I won’t claim I’m suddenly cured, throwing my arms up joyfully at every bit of turbulence. But something did shift. The weeks leading up to my next flight didn’t involve the usual anticipatory dread. I caught myself noticing — not fearing — the sounds and sensations on board. I felt more aware of my body, but less ruled by it.
Fear, as Sonia reminded me, is often just a protective mechanism with outdated data. “Our minds store experiences from the past and keep them on loop,” she said. “When we update the belief at the root, the behaviours start to change.”
I’ll likely go back for another session before a long-haul trip. Like any good form of healing, it’s not a one-and-done fix. But the fact that I now walk toward flying instead of flinching from it is a quiet kind of miracle.
And if I’ve learned anything from years on the road, it’s this: courage isn’t always loud. Sometimes, it sounds like a whisper in your mind saying, You’re safe now. You’ve got this.
Location: 10A, Wing Cheong Commercial Building, 19-25 Jervois St, Sheung Wan, Hong Kong | Phone: 2992 0828 | Email: info@allaboutyoucentre.com | Instagram: @allaboutyouwellnesscentre | Facebook: All About You Wellness Centre
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