What defines the human species is basically the ability to contemplate. Thinking is a particularly human characteristic that is not shared with other living beings.
While we are endowed with the gift of thinking, which allows us to have a broader perception of the world and our relationship to it, thinking can sometimes complicate our life and confuse ourselves to such an extent that it may lead to certain phobias. Paradoxically, the main such phobia is fear of thinking.
The first and basic reason why people are afraid to think is that thinking will cause many unwanted thoughts and emotions to come to the surface of their consciousness. Every person, no matter what their background and upbringing, has undergone difficulties in life, emotional tension, which can lead to psychological traumas. Those traumas usually affect the psyche so deeply that they remain hidden as memories in the unconscious until they are expressed. And although expressing those thoughts can be healing, it can also be very painful, and so most people choose to push them even deeper into their unconscious mind.
Once you bring what you have suppressed under the light of consciousness, you will feel a great tribulation within you – a mixture of fear, pain and confusion. Afraid to experience this state, most of us choose to avoid or find ways to escape from thinking those suppressed thoughts.
And how do we achieve this? By never letting ourselves alone. We are ready to do anything: surf on the internet, watch television, drink alcohol, or even sleep in order to avoid a single moment of aloness, a time when we can confront ourselves – our deeper and truer thoughts and emotions.
But while we are running away from our problems, the problems come even closer to us and become bigger, and the more we avoid them the more they affect our life.
Suppression is never the solution. What you suppress might not be apparent, but is always there; it might be hidden, covered, but is still affecting your life in a tremendous way, whether you are aware of it or not.