The science of being seen

Sazzy

Sazzy

Pre-takeoff checklist
Joined
Apr 16, 2019
Messages
100
Location
Highland Park, IL
Display Name
Display name:
Sazzy
Today was a very sporty day up at Batten international, and I'm glad to have been able to get up and down before the weather turned ugly. The airport was barren of traffic, for the most part, so my instructor and I were doing pattern work the whole time. My first few landings were waffley. Then the Skyhawk showed up.

I felt so self-conscious that another pilot might see me screw up. As far as I was concerned, my instructor could go pick his nose, or anything else for that matter. I just handled it on my own, without his guidance, and my best landing today was made when that one other pilot had briefly joined the pattern...does anyone else feel that way? I just didn't want another pilot to see me do something wrong. And I did really well. On point, radio calls and all. I don't want to be that pilot who always has something to prove, but that's how I kinda felt today...

Oh...and all you haters who just love to validate yourselves by making a student feel like crap..? Bring it on.
 
Last edited:
I don’t know what you’ve experienced, but personally as a student, I haven’t really noticed anyone being a “hater” and being made to feel like crap. Mostly either neutral or encouraging.

I think it is a good thing that you figured out that that worked for you, and why. From an outsider what you describe sounds good in that it seems to have motivated you to up your game.

If it were me, I’d try and transfer that over to trying to impress your CFI. Maybe since your CFI (or A CFI) has been with you from the beginning, and has seen you from when you had to be told everything and hadn’t yet gotten the hang of it, maybe one can get into a pattern or idea like “well, my instructor knows I’m still gaining experience but that Skyhawk, I can fool into thinking I’m an experienced pilot” or something?”

If you can think about, before a lesson, that you’re goal is to impress your CFI (and yourself) you might be able to nail it even when no other planes around? Eventually, hopefully, we will often be flying alone and still need to up our game, try to impress ourselves.

it’s kind of like being married :), sometimes you can get in a rut, and might flirt with a woman, then realize you can and ought to try also flirting with your wife!
 
Absolutely doesn’t matter what anyone else thinks. It’s just you and your airplane. The rest of the world consists of those who haven’t the stones to fly airplanes, and other pilots who think they’re Odin’s gift to aviation and can do everything better.
 
...and I thought this thread was going to be about reflective tape or what color to paint your airplane, lol.

For what it's worth, most other pilots treat student pilots with kid gloves. It's like when I'm about to honk at the slow-poke ahead of me until I notice the student driver sticker on the back window and I back off a bit...we've all been there.

Don't worry about what others think of your flying. Honestly, aside from avoiding hitting you, they're not paying attention to you; they're doing their own checklists and making sure they're doing things right. Or at least they should be.

Yeah, there's gonna be Statler and Waldorf sitting in the balcony of the FBO lounge hecklingother pilot's landings, but there's a reason those guys are sitting around sipping coffee and BSing rather than flying, so don't worry about them.
 
Not sure which of the 5 hazardous attitudes this is, but it seems like it should fit one. You should be focusing on flying to the best of your abilities not worrying about what someone else thinks. Most likely that other pilot wouldn’t even remember you were there if you asked him today (because he was flying his plane, not worrying about looking good for you)
 
Brad Z said:
...and I thought this thread was going to be about reflective tape or what color to paint your airplane, lol.
Click to expand...
I thought it was going to be about flying with navigation and landing lights. Really.

Good job on having a good day with your CFI.
 
You sound pretty self conscious and defensive. Just fly the airplane, don't worry about what other people think, either in real life or on the internet.
 
Do you get upset when you see another car on the road while you are driving ?
Get used to it...it gets much worse. Flying is a serious business...it requires your total attention.
 
Sazzy said:
My first few landings were waffley. Then the Skyhawk showed up. I felt so self-conscious that another pilot might see me screw up. As far as I was concerned, my instructor could go pick his nose... I just handled it on my own... and my best landing today was made...
Click to expand...
Two things:
  1. You're not yet mentally up to speed ("waffley") but you're within reach of it when faced with enough motivation.
  2. There comes a time during training when we've learned what we need to know and the CFI unintentionally starts to get in the way of us putting it all together, so we tune him out. As long as we don't disregard what we've been taught and just start doing what makes us feel good even though it's incorrect, this is the moment we (you) are beginning to be a pilot in command.
 
I think, to some extent, you had a normal reaction. I once made the mistake of landing at an un-notamed fly-in. Once I get in the pattern I realize there were like 500 people lining the runway. Best landing of my life!

It's normal not to want to look like a rookie in any endeavor. If it pushes you to focus more and fly better, use it to your advantage.
 
After a few thousand landings, a few perfect, most okay, some stinkers, you realize this is fairly typical. While I strive for perfect landings every time, and I mentally critique each one, I am rarely satisfied and often disappointed.

My point is, "Get over it." As long as you don't damage the plane, the landing was fine.
 
Thinking about this a bit more. Interesting topic. I think we all to some extent want to look good in front of everyone, even strangers. Be top of the heap, top dog, etc. I also want to be the person who is helping others in a way, which ties into not being a x$k!@ and making grief for others - cutting people off in traffic, etc. You want to be on top of your game - Ok, nothing wrong with that.

But you've got to be wise about what other people think. If someone is qualified to get advice from, then take it for what it's worth. There are people - especially other pilots I've observed - are good at offering "advice", beating their chests, throwing leaves in the air to show that they are the top gorilla. An example - as a student, I was landing with another plane behind me. Guy called the tower and said something to the effect "what was that plane doing - he was all over the place." Nothing constructive, I'm a student, get over yourself. (Tower's response was cool, calm, polite, and put the Joe fighter pilot wannabe in his place).

I'm still puzzled by your first statement that student pilots are trashed here. Not my experience. Sounds defensive. Perhaps that is because that is occurring where you train. If so, really suggest you find another school.
 
Nobody in the pattern even knows you’re a student. If they do figure it out somehow, the most they care about you is staying out of your way.

If there’s two students doing laps, the other student isn’t paying much attention to you. They’re busy.

Both instructors are busy teaching, or if you’re doing well, letting you practice and trying not to yawn. They’ve been in the pattern with six lost students or rusty pilots before. They’re just keeping track of where everyone is.

In other words... it’s all in your head. Nobody cares. :)
 
Haha good point tarheel. I tend to be pretty hard on myself when I fly, which I think is a good thing. And if it takes me telling myself "don't biff this, Saz, 7HE is looking at you" then hey...I guess why not? I did recognize the tail number as being one of the trainers from an airport that I had actually trained at initially--I kinda felt responsible for not being a bad example in front of another student. And yeah yeah yeah, no one is really watching me like that. But I don't think it could hurt to think of it that way.

So, for those of you who commented on me seeming defensive? Confused about me assuming that some people might just choose to talk crap? Well, consider yourselves lucky you haven't seen that yet here. I once saw a student who had posted about feeling nervous on his intro flight. An INTRO FLIGHT. About five different pilots jumped on him and said flying wasn't for him. Nothing but discouragement. I myself one time was excited about taking off from a short runway, learning some new skills about short field, etc., and there was a handful of pilots who were really cool, encouraging,. And enthusiastic for what I felt was a new accomplishment. There was an even bigger handful of pilots who seemed to get off on telling me "well, THAT'S not very short" and all kinds of other garbage that really didn't need to be said. Then when they were done with me, they started picking little arguments with each other! It was like a schoolyard brawl!

So defensive? Yeah, a little. Without reason? Nope.
 
I can be pretty hard on myself too, but when it gets out of hand it doesn’t seem to me to be a good thing. Aiming to be objective about yourself with high standards and at the appropriate time just try to concentrate on doing it “perfect”.

I don’t think being defensive, specially preemptively gains anything. Most of us have small periods of it maybe, but specially on the internet often things can be taken two ways or more, it’s up to us to decide so why not decide it wasn’t meant (unless very obvious) in the negative way? Not everyone thinks a lot before answering.

CFIs can be kind of hard on one too.

I liked a moment in one of my first few flights where the instructor, who had a tendency to give out instruction very quickly and repeating over and over, watch your altitude, keep an eye on the airspeed, nose down, nose down, nose down, etc... and I realized I was holding a death grip on the yoke, and reacted by tuning him out, relaxing my grip, taking a deep breath and as I did I hear him say “yeah, NOW you’re getting it” :)

I don’t know much, but still think it is good you recognized your motivation from wanting to do better because another airplane was in the circuit, but still think transfer it to trying to impress your CFI next time, and then eventually to just goal of that good feeling when you do it just right. Back to being hard on oneself, sometimes that can be negative, as one amplifies the slightest little imperfection, and forget to forgive that and get on with it. It can linger in your mind, convince one that you already blew it, etc.

I don’t know.
 
Wow LongRoad--that's exactly what my instructor said! After I made that nice landing, he literally said "Good work, now try impressing the guy who's gotta sign you off for your checkride. I then proceeded to turn final too early on the next one and beat myself up about it til dinnertime. Lucky that Skyhawk had left the pattern.
 
Sazzy said:
Oh...and all you haters who just love to validate yourselves by making a student feel like crap..? Bring it on.
Click to expand...
WTF!!!

I have never seen anyone on this forum "hate" and try to make students feel like crap, unless the student went out of his way to deserve it.
 
Wow way to disenfranchise the people on the board. Remember flying is supposed to be fun.
 
Turn final too early? Add more flaps! Landing is a series of recalculations. As a Cessna pilot, the default flaps were 20 degrees, add more to shorten the glide, reduce flaps and increase speed to go further.

And I do remember you getting "beat up" on the short field landing. I thought it way too critical. The attitude here should be informative and helpful for new pilots. Listen to the good ones, tune out the bad ones, and don't bother to complain, they are not going to change. One of my careers was a technical instructor, and my students were fond of 'beating each other up', which I discouraged as much as I could, even though they felt it was all in fun.

Try hard to make every landing better than the last, and learn from the errors that produce bad ones. Every maneuver your CFI introduces you to, re run it in your head to help make it automatic in the future.

Enjoy yourself while you learn, I did,
 
Oh yeah, John, they're out there lol. I didn't go out of my way or anything, I literally shared my new experience about being on a shorter runway and learning new techniques, hoping that most people would be cool and share their own experiences (because a good pilot is always learning). Some did, but a TON of others just pounced like frikken tarantulas on crickets.
 
Hey there geezer.

It wasn't necessarily a matter of being too high when I turned, I was just all cockeyed and nowhere near the center line. So basically, I made my turn based on altitude cuz my dumb a$$ was looking at the instruments too much and not outside, so I was too low to begin with. I had to tickle some power in and readjust myself to get right with the runway.
 
Sazzy said:
Haha good point tarheel. I tend to be pretty hard on myself when I fly, which I think is a good thing. And if it takes me telling myself "don't biff this, Saz, 7HE is looking at you" then hey...I guess why not? I did recognize the tail number as being one of the trainers from an airport that I had actually trained at initially--I kinda felt responsible for not being a bad example in front of another student. And yeah yeah yeah, no one is really watching me like that. But I don't think it could hurt to think of it that way.

So, for those of you who commented on me seeming defensive? Confused about me assuming that some people might just choose to talk crap? Well, consider yourselves lucky you haven't seen that yet here. I once saw a student who had posted about feeling nervous on his intro flight. An INTRO FLIGHT. About five different pilots jumped on him and said flying wasn't for him. Nothing but discouragement. I myself one time was excited about taking off from a short runway, learning some new skills about short field, etc., and there was a handful of pilots who were really cool, encouraging,. And enthusiastic for what I felt was a new accomplishment. There was an even bigger handful of pilots who seemed to get off on telling me "well, THAT'S not very short" and all kinds of other garbage that really didn't need to be said. Then when they were done with me, they started picking little arguments with each other! It was like a schoolyard brawl!

So defensive? Yeah, a little. Without reason? Nope.
Click to expand...

Yep, I've had the same experience a few times. I learn to ignore the people who discourage because they do no good in my life.

Now to the original question. Yes, I do feel that way sometimes when I land in front of people. I'm not sure why but I also feel that way when I play in my band in front of other musicians. I work hard to play my best for the other musicians in the crowd. The rest of the people I don't care so much about, but the other musicians/pilots make me work a little harder.
 
It doesn't matter how good a pilot you think you are, there is always someone better...unless you're Bob Hoover. That being said, I'm sure even Bob Hoover screwed up a landing here and there. We are all learning and you don't get better are anything unless you screw it up a time or ten.
 
I am freakin ace in the cockpit without a care what the outside world thinks.

..until I have another pilot sitting in the plane...CFI or otherwise...and then I turn into a bumbling fool that forget what flaps are.

It happens.
 
My landings usually tend to be better when carrying passengers, or if a plane is holding short watching the whole thing. But not always. Don’t worry about it. Every landing is a bit different. Just make adjustments and make it safe and go around if things aren’t working out.
 
I've got news for everyone ... Someone is always watching.
 
A lot of people here seem to be saying nobody cares about your landing, but I know where you're coming from.

We have a group of old pilots who sit around and judge landings for sport! I've even joined in with them a time or two, but I know I'm the target when I'm in the air, so I'm pretty gentle! You'll hear comments about Captain Kangaroo hopping down the runway, wondering how many of those landings (bounces) he'll log, or someone turning base at Executive (10 miles away), but it's not said on the radio just to amuse their friends. They keep threatening to get score cards, but I think they know how karma works!

I can tell you that I've mastered some airplanes and can almost always grease them on. Then I get in the Toot and go racing down the runway just trying to keep the tail behind me and realizing I know nothing. Relax, get the plane back on the ground in one piece, and laugh at yourself. If you're already laughing about it, you'll care a lot less about what others think.
 
dreyna14 said:
It doesn't matter how good a pilot you think you are, there is always someone better...unless you're Bob Hoover. That being said, I'm sure even Bob Hoover screwed up a landing here and there. We are all learning and you don't get better are anything unless you screw it up a time or ten.
Click to expand...
And Bob's gone, so who is number one now? Even Bob was known to tell people there was no such thing as a natural pilot, and he certainly wasn't one, it was all about the 10's of thousands of hours the taxpayers paid for him to fly! It's all about practice, practice, practice.
 
Oh...and all you haters who just love to validate yourselves by making a student feel like crap..? Bring it on.
Click to expand...

As a student, this is the place where I feel welcome.
 
No one really cares, because we've all been there. Just imagine, 2000 hours from now, you're approaching on a beautiful sunny day, planes are lined up down the taxiway waiting their turn...and you go bouncing down the runway and end up going around. Happens to all of us.

I was on an airliner recently, next to a commuting captain wrapping up his workday. There was a decent crosswind and the crew slammed it down and pulled to the right, sideloading the hell out of it. I turned to the captain and said "do you judge?". He said "nope, because that's all of us at some point".
 
Sazzy said:
Haha good point tarheel. I tend to be pretty hard on myself when I fly, which I think is a good thing. And if it takes me telling myself "don't biff this, Saz, 7HE is looking at you" then hey...I guess why not? I did recognize the tail number as being one of the trainers from an airport that I had actually trained at initially--I kinda felt responsible for not being a bad example in front of another student. And yeah yeah yeah, no one is really watching me like that. But I don't think it could hurt to think of it that way.

So, for those of you who commented on me seeming defensive? Confused about me assuming that some people might just choose to talk crap? Well, consider yourselves lucky you haven't seen that yet here. I once saw a student who had posted about feeling nervous on his intro flight. An INTRO FLIGHT. About five different pilots jumped on him and said flying wasn't for him. Nothing but discouragement. I myself one time was excited about taking off from a short runway, learning some new skills about short field, etc., and there was a handful of pilots who were really cool, encouraging,. And enthusiastic for what I felt was a new accomplishment. There was an even bigger handful of pilots who seemed to get off on telling me "well, THAT'S not very short" and all kinds of other garbage that really didn't need to be said. Then when they were done with me, they started picking little arguments with each other! It was like a schoolyard brawl!

So defensive? Yeah, a little. Without reason? Nope.
Click to expand...
I’m of the opinion that if we do Aviation correctly we are always harder on ourselves than anyone else.
 
Sazzy said:
Today was a very sporty day up at Batten international, and I'm glad to have been able to get up and down before the weather turned ugly. The airport was barren of traffic, for the most part, so my instructor and I were doing pattern work the whole time. My first few landings were waffley. Then the Skyhawk showed up.

I felt so self-conscious that another pilot might see me screw up. As far as I was concerned, my instructor could go pick his nose, or anything else for that matter. I just handled it on my own, without his guidance, and my best landing today was made when that one other pilot had briefly joined the pattern...does anyone else feel that way? I just didn't want another pilot to see me do something wrong. And I did really well. On point, radio calls and all. I don't want to be that pilot who always has something to prove, but that's how I kinda felt today...

Oh...and all you haters who just love to validate yourselves by making a student feel like crap..? Bring it on.
Click to expand...

Why would someone in another plane have the least interest in what you do unless there is the possibility of collision? You are PIC...fly your airplane, observe the rules, and don't worry about other pilots (who may have issues that keep them occupied). I have been involved in general aviation since 1960 and can't recall a single instance of seeing someone "screw up." (Full disclosure: I have screwed up a thousand times and learned something every time.)

Bob
 
Last edited:
While humans are wired to seek external validation, it is important to develop healthy internal validation habits, especially in learning challenging endeavors like flying. That is, what is of most value is self-recognition of your progress and barriers. Others' opinions about these matters have little value to your personal progress.

Having said that, I know everyone in the viewing window at the airport is critiquing my bouncing in another gusty crosswind landing, all in good fun. As long as I can safely get her down, it's all good. I'll be smoother next time.
 
Man I bounced one in the other day at Blairstown 1N7 the other day. Not sure why either. Hair fast and not flaring good enough. Narrower runway then I’m used to looking at too There was a twin sitting and waiting for me. But a month ago with friend waiting at hangar I nailed it. If I know who is in the ramp watching I’ll grease it stall horn blaring and all. Some days are good. Some days are not so.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top