So in our previous video, Craig rode a roller coaster.

And it was awesome, right Craig?

Oh yeah.

My brain was like a symphony of chemical reactions.

The dopamine was flowing.

It was mildly terrifying.

I'm out of my seat!

And it felt great.

I know what you mean.

I went on it too.

And it was like Beethoven played the bongos on my brain parts.

Who could possibly not enjoy something like that?

Well, I don't.

[both scream] Sam, don't sneak up on us like that.

Yeah, you know we have a delicate constitution.

I've been here the whole time.

You should have gone to the wide shot earlier.

Anyway, what's this about you not liking roller coasters?

Yeah, what's not to like?

You like being scared.

You like haunted houses.

You like playing in front of large crowds with your band.

You even like the most terrifying music on the planet, ska punk.

Yeah, all those things are awesome.

But I have a crippling fear of heights.

Well, today's the day you face your fear, Sam.

Uh, what?

Yeah, perhaps you can overcome your fear by going to the ledge on the top of the second tallest building in the Western hemisphere.

I didn't know we were doing that.

Just go with it.

[music playing] Yeah, I guess it's weird, because I used to love heights.

I used to love climbing in trees.

I would go up on the roof to help my dad set up Christmas lights.

And I had a tree house that I loved.

How long have you had a fear of heights?

For about 10 years.

I fell off-- I fell off a roof.

How'd that happen?

I was working construction one summer.

And I was just-- I was near the edge.

It was really early in the morning.

There was some dew.

Probably not the best safety precautions going on.

And I slid right off a two story roof.

So you fell off this roof.

What happened next?

Well, I just-- I landed on my tailbone.

So I was laying there.

And this guy I was roofing with, Bill, comes over.

And he's like, aw, man, you OK?

And I'm like kind of going into shock at that point.

I'm feeling cold and sweaty and all that.

I'm like ah!

And he's just like, oh, looks like you got the wind knocked out of you.

I'm going to go get Jerry.

So I was laying there alone for a little bit.

And then Bill comes back around.

I said, I'm having trouble speaking a little bit.

And he starts-- he picks me up by the shoulders and starts dragging me into his Dodge Neon.

OK. That doesn't sound like proper procedure for that kind of accident.

Well no, I'm thinking like spinal injury.

And so he's dragging me to his Neon.

And he puts me in the passenger seat and reclines the seat.

And he's like, oh, I'll be back in a minute or two.

So I'm in this guy's Neon.

And they're inside, doing something inside this house we're working on.

After awhile, no one's coming out.

And I'm running through these things in my head.

And I'm like spinal injury.

You got to get the hospital as soon as possible.

No one's coming out.

I'm kind of trying to yell.

I'm like, hey!

Hey!

You know, like a groaning injured person.

Yeah, but you were going into shock.

Right, but I'm going into shock.

So what I do is I open the door of the Neon.

And I remember seeing a hospital like close to the job site.

So I crawled across the road.

And I dragged myself into my own car.

And so I just drive myself to the hospital.

I put my car in the parking lot.

And I cried because I was like-- So you parked-- you parked in the parking lot?

I was kind of-- I was a little delirious.

So I was like, oh, I don't want to get a parking ticket.

I didn't have much money.

Yeah.

So you found-- you drove around the parking lot, found a space, and then crawled to the emergency.

Yeah, I crawled across the parking lot into the emergency room and just kind of like propped myself up on the desk.

And I was like, I think I need to see someone.

And the lady was like, oh, can you fill out this paperwork?

And I was like, I just fell off a roof.

She was like, holy crap.

And then they put me on a stretcher and gave me a bunch of drugs and stuff like that.

I fractured one of my vertebrae.

I'm actually missing half of one.

So it exploded outward and not inward, which is why I am not paralyzed, probably.

OK, well, that's pretty fortunate.

And so your entire fear of heights stems from this incident, I mean, an incident that could have killed you.

Well, right.

Yeah.

I was in a weird stormtrooper brace for four months.

I imagine that your brain would react to a situation like that pretty strongly, like, we don't ever want to do that again, because we almost lost the whole thing.

Well, right.

Well, you know, what we want to do is we want you to go up into the Willis tower, go up to the sky deck, and go to the ledge.

So you want me to go to the ledge of the tallest building, one of the tallest buildings in the world just to see what happens to me.

So why, exactly, are we sending send to the top of the Willis Tower?

Don't we like Sam?

Not especially.

But it all has to do with a psychological technique called exposure therapy.

I don't see what Sam being naked has anything to do with anything.

No, not that kind of exposure.

It's all about the amygdala.

I don't want to see Sam's amygdala.

No, remember Craig, the amygdala is in your brain.

When your brain gets a signal of danger, it triggers a response right away called a fight or flight response.

Humans evolved in a very different world than we inhabit today.

And many of the dangers prehistoric humans encountered just aren't around anymore.

However, in those days, the brain needed a very effective and decisive mechanism to keep us out of harm's way.

The amygdala reacts without even communicating with the conscious brain.

So if that's true, then why does Sam hate heights and I love them?

Shouldn't my brain have the same programming evolutionarily?

Well, the thing about the amygdala is that it only learns when it's afraid.

So when Sam fell off that roof, it decided that being near the ledge of anything tall was a very, very bad thing and now reacts accordingly.

Well, that's all great, Matt.

But I don't see how terrifying Sam is going to help.

It can probably help him in small steps.

Think of the amygdala like a microchip.

It gets programmed to react to a traumatic event.

And the only way to deprogram it is to expose it to that fear again under safe conditions so that it can learn that a strong response isn't necessary.

So if Sam takes a series of small steps to confront his fear in a safe environment, he can teach his amygdala to not freak out?

MATT: Possibly, which is why we're sending him to the ledge at the top of the second tallest building in the United States.

So here we are at the Willis Tower.

I'm going to go up on the sky deck, which is really, really high in that building and look off a ledge, because it terrifies me.

How many floors are we going up?

103.

We're going up 103 floors.

You know, I wasn't very nervous until we were driving here and looking up at the building.

I was like, wow.

That's probably going to make my body feel kind of funny and weird.

All right, 103.

There we go.

It seems to be moving pretty fast.

Yeah, I mean, I can feel the pressure in my ears.

Seems to be wobbling back and forth a little bit, which is a little creepy.

Yeah, I don't know.

I wonder what it's going to be like out there.

It's the 103rd floor.

Check it out.

Oh, there's the ledge over there.

CAMERAMAN: Do you feel OK right now?

Or do you feel weird or?

Honestly, it's more like a physiological reaction when I actually get to something that is of a height rather than just being-- just being near something that's tall.

Oh yeah.

Oh, you actually like, you walk out on the ledge, huh?

and there's just a glass floor.

Yeah.

It looks pretty scary.

The thing with me is like the edge without the railing.

And it's very much looking like there's not really a railing there.

I mean, I know I can't fall out but still.

Yeah.

So let's go put me on this ledge.

CAMERAMAN: OK. Do it.

All right.

Oh!

Yeah!

I'm definitely getting like that weird vertigo sense.

That's not-- that's not good.

But I'm going to hop out anyway.

Oh, this is awful.

[laughs hysterically] OK.

I'm not going to look down right away.

I'll look down at some point.

At some point.

Oh god.

I can barely do this.

CAMERAMAN: OK, you're doing good, man.

You're on it.

So I'm on it.

My hand's kind of shaking.

So now is the point where I should probably look down.

Is that the thing you do here?

CAMERAMAN: Yeah.

You guys are both out here too.

I mean, this must be secure.

PRODUCER: How about we all do it at the same time?

CAMERAMAN: All right, ready?

All right.

Are we ready?

CAMERAMAN: Yeah, let's do it.

All right.

Ah!

[laughs maniacally] OK.

I'm up here with you, Sam.

OK.

I think I'm going to get off the ledge now.

CAMERAMAN: OK. You did it though.

I did.

CAMERAMAN: Good job.

I did do it.

Woo!

All right.

I'm good.

I'm actually, like, I'm a little shaky.

It's kind of weird.

I think once you guys got out there, it was better.

Once I actually stepped on, and I could feel that it wasn't going to crumble beneath me or I wasn't going to slide off, it was a little bit better.

But I definitely-- I wasn't comfortable out.

I don't want to-- I don't want to spend a ton of time out there, probably.

But it was cool.

I mean, you can really see the city and everything.

But yeah, getting towards that ledge was a little-- I'm a little kind of dizzy right now, actually, so.

Do you think the way you reacted to that ledge was stronger than just any regular person would?

Or was it just kind of like a regular thing?

Well, I assume it was stronger, because Ryan was actually dancing and jumping around on it, which I definitely had a problem with.

I couldn't do that, really.

I sort of go on and then got off.

A funny thing that the person giving us the tour noticed was that when I went out there, and I got nervous, I was actually touching my back.

You didn't notice you were doing that?

No, I didn't.

She pointed it out.

She said that most people kind of hold themselves right here as a comforting thing.

But I was actually touchiing the back of my self, which was weird.

Because of this experience, do you feel better about heights at all, do you think?

Well, I don't know.

I walked out there.

And I was standing out there for, whatever, 30 seconds.

And then a little bit afterwards, Ryan was like, oh, why don't you try to sit there?

So with learning that I wasn't going to break through the glass, I did sit there.

I still had a reaction.

But maybe there were a few baby steps that I took.

Woo!

OK.

I have this really strong urge to get off this thing right now.

Do you think you'll take any larger steps in the future?

I don't even know what it would be, maybe jumping out of an airplane, yeah, sky diving, maybe?

I don't know.

I mean, it depends on, I guess, how much that I want to like conquer it and for what reasons.

Do I-- do I want to feel this sense of accomplishment?

Or do I just want to save myself the anxiety and stay away from heights, which is totally possible and in normal life?

Well, did it help?

Is Sam going to be riding roller coasters and hanging off precipices all the time now?

Maybe.

Studies have shown that with enough controlled exposure to what he's afraid of, the neurons in his amygdala might quiet down enough for him to become a roller coaster king.

Some small steps for Sam, a giant leap for Samkind.

That was awful.

So do you have any phobias?

Have you ever conquered a fear?

Or are you trying to conquer a fear?

Let us know in the comments.

Last week we asked you about thrill rides and roller coasters.

Here's what you had to say.

TheFifthStateofMatter said that they can shut down their fear by consulting the hard evidence of statistics that show that roller coasters and flying are much safer than cars.

Well, if you can assuage your fears by consulting statistics, you are in the minority.

Most fears do not operate rationally.

It's pretty well known that planes are safer than cars.

Car accidents happen all time and probably should be more scared of them.

But the number of people with a fear of flying far outweighs the number of people who have a fear of driving.

You're just as likely to drown in your bathtub as die in a terrorist attack.

But you don't see us waging a war on bathtubs, do you?

ElizabethMadisongottenrocks05 and several of you complimented my stylish fanny pack that I wore while riding a roller coaster.

Truth be told, I do not wear fanny packs in public, anyways.

I was wearing that to hold audio recording equipment so you could hear my screams and ahs and guffaws and what have yous.

Unfortunately, the fanny pack was too big to fit under the lap bar.

So you got the opportunity to see it flying around.

Looking good, Craig, looking good.

Also, it gives me an excuse to say the words fanny pack a lot.

Fanny pack.

In the last video, we pointed out that the word for roller coaster in several different languages actually translates to Russian mountains.

Michael Charkin pointed out that oddly enough, the word for roller coaster in Russian translates to American little mountains.

The reason for that might be that some people argue that the first true roller coaster was the switchback railway, which was built in the United States at Coney Island in 1884.

So maybe the Russians are given the United States credit for that.

Ms.Lazyllama101 commented that one of her favorite rides is the Hogwarts ride at Universal.

I just recently went on that ride.

And it was truly awesome.

But my favorite ride at Harry Potter World was the butter beer.

It was delicious.

Thanks for all the great comments.

And if you want to help support the show, don't forget to check out our patreon page.

Thanks for all the great checking out our patreon page.

Thank you.

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