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Denial protects us by blurring the truth when we’re not ready to face it.

Avoidance delays action even after we see the truth clearly.

Change happens when doing nothing hurts more than making a change.

“I can’t believe it. What do you think I should do? What would you do?”

I was having coffee with a good friend. She’d called me in a panic after finding out her boyfriend had cheated on her again. This was long before I became a therapist, when I was just the person people called when life got crazy. I’d help them find calm in the middle of a storm, and if I'm honest, I loved being the one they sought for advice.

I would hear about their betrayal and say, “This is the moment you decide you deserve better.” I would hear their self-doubt and say, “Trust yourself, you know the answer.” I would sense their fear and tell them, “You’re so much stronger than you think.” I made painful situations into turning points, translating their chaos into a chance to grow. In those moments, I spoke with conviction; I believed everything I said.

But being that friend also drained me. I would pour my heart and soul into helping them, only to watch them walk right back into the same unhealthy dynamics. They rarely set boundaries; they tolerated what they swore they wouldn’t, made excuses, and justified behaviors. Beyond drained, I often felt frustrated with them for wasting my time.

Coffee cup in hand, my friend searched my face for answers. I thought, Why ask me for advice if you’re not going to take it anyway?

And yet, I had no business judging her, because the advice I offered with conviction was the same advice I never took myself, even when I most needed it.

When you’re giving advice, it’s easy to stay calm. You can sit across from someone who’s upset and tell them exactly what they should do because whatever pain comes from that decision will not be yours to bear. When there’s no risk, you think clearly, you sound rational, and you speak with conviction.

But when you’re the one faced with doing something you know will be hard and uncomfortable, the words of wisdom you’re so good at offering are nowhere to be found. And it’s not that you suddenly lost wisdom, it’s just that something protective has taken over.

The Seduction of Denial

Imagine every Sunday afternoon you notice there’s tightness in your chest, and it increases when you think about going to work on Monday. During the week, you’re increasingly irritable and short-tempered with everyone, and even though you’re getting a lot of sleep, you feel exhausted. You dread logging into your email, you hate sitting in meetings, and doing any kind of work feels like you’re trying to run on wet cement. You count down the days to Friday, when you can finally get away.

You’ve felt this way for a long time, and you know something isn’t right. But instead of allowing yourself to think, This job is draining me or This is not what I really want to do, you normalize your dissatisfaction. No job is perfect. They’re all stressful. You question your own capacity. Maybe I just need more training. You focus on the salary, the title, the stability, whatever will keep blurring the larger truth. So many people would love to be in this job.

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These thoughts are a product of denial, an ego-defense mechanism that steps in to protect you from something you’re just not ready to face. It is sneaky and subtle, because instead of walking into the room and announcing itself, denial seduces you by draping a soft filter over your eyes so that the truth looks blurry and consequently feels less urgent.

From Denial to Avoidance

That soft filter doesn’t always disappear on its own; something usually rips it right off your eyes, and often in the most unsettling of ways.

Maybe that Sunday night anxiety evolves into debilitating panic attacks. Perhaps your doctor says you have high blood pressure, and that your stress is putting your health at serious risk. Maybe your relationship takes a nosedive, and your partner breaks up with you. Any of these situations may easily pull the soft filter off your eyes in an instant, leaving you to confront a truth.

I’m not just tired, you suddenly realize. The truth is I’m miserable, and I need to leave this job.

A moment like this can feel oddly intoxicating, even liberating. You don’t have to pretend anymore or try to convince yourself of something; the truth is finally out there. Your mind finally gets a break, and you feel as though a huge weight has been lifted off your shoulders.

But then it dawns on you that your job still awaits you, and once again you feel that familiar tightness in your chest. You’ve accepted you need to leave your job, but you can’t deny it’s also given you stability and structure. Regardless of how miserable you’ve been, there’s a sense of comfort in knowing exactly how each week is going to go.

And when the devil you know feels safer than the uncertainty you don’t, denial hands the reins over to avoidance.

Like denial, avoidance is an ego defense mechanism that protects you from discomfort, but it shows up differently. If denial is a soft filter over your eyes, avoidance is when you see everything clearly and deliberately look away. It often entails making all kinds of excuses and finding justifications for not making a change. It’s just not the right time to leave. I need to save a little more money. I should wait until things calm down. Maybe I’ll do it at the end of the summer. At the end of the year.

But here’s the hard part: once you’ve owned the truth, remaining in your job can feel worse than when you were in denial, like you’re selling yourself out each time you log into your email.

Ironically, your friends start saying the same things you once said to them: “You need to get out of there," or, “Don’t worry, it’s going to work out.” But instead of feeling helpful, their words irritate you because they’re pointing to something you already know but still don’t feel ready to change.

When It’s Time to Take Your Advice

Denial and avoidance don’t make you weak; they just make you human. Denial keeps the truth blurry for a while, and avoidance helps you delay acting on it once you see it clearly. Both are ways your mind protects you from discomfort and uncertainty, and both block you from taking the very advice you’d give someone else.

Getting to a point where you’re finally ready to take your own advice and make a change is a process, and it is unique to each person. Some people go directly from denial to action, whereas other people need time, reflection, and a few uncomfortable wake-up calls along the way. There really is no right way; there’s just your way.

But perhaps you’ll know it’s time to listen when the pain of doing something finally feels easier to live with than the pain of doing nothing.

Cramer, P. (2000). Defense mechanisms in psychology today: Further processes for adaptation. American Psychologist, 55(6), 637–646. https://doi.org/10.1037/0003-066X.55.6.637

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