Driving test pressure
On Friday I posted a blog about how I can help students prepare for their exams. The same process can be used for driving tests both the theory test and the practical test. Much of the anxiety people feel when going into tests or exam’s is self-produced. That is to say it is perceived stress or perceived pressure. It has been recognised in the military aviation world for quite some time. Most military flights in the UK are for training purposes but you still feel a certain amount of stress when an aircraft is found to be unserviceable shortly before its take off time. An example would be the maintenance engineer is told by the shift controller that the crew will be expecting to have that aircraft in an hour. What he hasn’t been told is whether or not there is a spare aircraft that can go, can the sortie be carried out later or next day. The answer is usually yes to one or both but without knowing this the maintenance engineer will think he is under a lot of pressure to be quick when in reality he’s not under that much pressure at all. You see with the time taken to draw tools out get spares, then put tools back after the job and do the necessary paperwork detailing all that has been done, one hour is not long to find out what’s wrong and fix it. Perceived pressure therefore can push the engineers into cutting corners. This will normally only have an effect on inexperienced engineers as the experienced will have the attitude of it’s best to miss a training sortie than get it wrong and cause a crash. This attitude will backed up by the management as safety is paramount and perceived pressure is just one area of human factors that military aviation tries to combat in the name of safety.
I explained how student about to go into exam’s this year may be perceiving pressure from their parents or teachers but what about those preparing for their driving test, can they be the victim of perceived pressure? Of course they can. Most people taking their driving tests will be young, below twenty. So as their friends pass their driving test they feel under pressure to do so as well. Come the big day instead of just concentrating on their own driving the candidate may be thinking about others. Friends they think of as brighter but who failed first time. Therefore they can’t pass can they? Or someone they thought would fail but did pass, now they really must pass. But thinking of these things will only reduce your performance, worrying about the test cannot have any positive outcome.
You need to look at the driving test with realistic eyes. It doesn’t matter how others faired when they took the test. Their result will not affect yours. What does affect your result is how much of the required knowledge you can recall for the theory and how you drive on the day of the practical. For both the theory and practical test remaining calm and confident will always bring about a better outcome than worrying about others.
I can’t make you a better driver but with a good driving instructor you should have the skills and knowledge required to pass before the big day. Using hypnotherapy I can help you remain calm and confident on your big day. Learning to overcome those nerves or lack of confidence will increase your chances of success. So why not give yourself the edge for your test and give me a call on 07514 672326 today.