The psychology behind avoidance, overworking, numbing, and the things we do to escape uncomfortable emotions.
Have you ever noticed how productive you can become when there’s something you really don’t want to deal with? Suddenly, the house needs cleaning, your inbox needs organizing, and that closet you’ve ignored for six months has become an emergency. Or maybe you’re the opposite. You find yourself scrolling through your phone for an hour, binge watching something you aren’t particularly interested in, or convincing yourself you just need one more glass of wine to unwind.
One of the things I find fascinating about human behavior is how creative we can become when it comes to avoiding uncomfortable emotions. We can convince ourselves we’re being productive, responsible, independent, or simply enjoying a little downtime when we might actually be doing everything possible to avoid something we don’t want to feel.
And sometimes we don’t even realize we’re doing it.
Avoidance Isn’t Always What You Think It Is
Most people recognize avoidance when it’s obvious. We put off difficult conversations, ignore problems, or stay away from situations that make us anxious. But avoidance can be much more subtle, and sometimes it looks like behavior we actually admire.
Think about the person who works constantly, takes care of everyone else’s problems, and never seems to have a minute to themselves. Everyone talks about how hardworking and dependable they are, but what happens when they finally have nothing to do? Can they relax, or do they immediately start looking for something else to occupy their time?
What about the person who researches every possible outcome before making a decision? They might consider themselves careful or analytical, but sometimes all that research is an attempt to eliminate uncertainty. They’re not necessarily looking for more information. They’re looking for a guarantee that they won’t make the wrong decision.
Psychologists call this experiential avoidance, which involves trying to escape, suppress, or control unwanted thoughts, feelings, memories, or physical sensations. Interestingly, these behaviors often provide relief, which is exactly why we keep doing them.
Why Avoidance Feels So Good
Let’s say you need to have a difficult conversation with someone. You’ve been thinking about it for days, rehearsing what you’ll say and worrying about how they’ll respond. Just thinking about it makes you anxious, so you decide you’ll deal with it another time.
Almost immediately, you feel better.
Your brain just learned something important: avoiding that conversation made the anxiety go away. In psychology, we call this negative reinforcement. When a behavior removes something unpleasant, we’re more likely to repeat it.
The problem is that you never gave yourself an opportunity to discover whether you could handle the conversation. You didn’t learn that you might be capable of managing someone’s disappointment, disagreement, or even rejection.
Instead, your brain learned that avoidance was the solution.
And the more often we repeat that pattern, the more likely we are to rely on it. Eventually, we can become so focused on avoiding discomfort that we don’t recognize how much our lives are being influenced by it.
When Staying Busy Becomes a Way of Hiding
I think overworking is one of the more socially acceptable forms of avoidance. We admire people who are constantly busy, rarely take time off, and somehow manage to accomplish more in a day than most people do in a week.
But being productive and being emotionally healthy aren’t necessarily the same thing.
For some people, work provides satisfaction and purpose. For others, staying busy can also provide a convenient distraction from loneliness, anxiety, grief, or dissatisfaction with other parts of their lives.
Sometimes being needed feels more comfortable than being vulnerable. Sometimes productivity becomes the way we measure our worth. And sometimes we fill every available moment with something to do because we’re uncomfortable with what happens when everything gets quiet.
Of course, not everyone who enjoys staying busy is avoiding something. Some people genuinely enjoy being active and productive. What matters is whether you can slow down without feeling anxious, guilty, or compelled to find another distraction.
The Many Ways We Numb Ourselves
We have more opportunities to distract ourselves than ever before. Social media, television, shopping, food, alcohol, gaming, and endless information are available almost instantly.
Think about how often you reach for your phone without even making a conscious decision to do so. You’re bored, uncomfortable, lonely, or worried about something, and suddenly you’ve spent forty minutes watching videos you never intended to watch.
Sometimes we’re simply entertaining ourselves. Other times, we’re trying to escape what happens when we stop.
The same thing can happen with alcohol, food, shopping, or other activities that temporarily change how we feel. None of these behaviors automatically indicates a problem, although relying on substances to manage emotions carries additional risks.
The important distinction is whether you’re choosing an activity because you enjoy it or depending on it because you don’t know how to tolerate what you’re feeling without it.
There’s a difference between taking a break from life and spending your life trying not to experience it.
Reassurance Seeking Is Avoidance, Too
This one surprises people because seeking reassurance doesn’t look much like running away from anything.
Let’s say you send someone a message and they don’t respond. You start wondering whether they’re upset with you, whether you said something wrong, or whether they’re intentionally ignoring you. You reread your last conversation, ask someone else what they think, and maybe send another message.
Eventually, the person responds, and everything is fine. You feel relieved.
Until the next time.
Reassurance seeking can become part of the same avoidance cycle because it temporarily reduces anxiety without helping us develop the ability to tolerate uncertainty. Instead of learning that we can manage not knowing what someone is thinking, we become dependent on someone else telling us everything is okay.
And that’s exhausting, particularly because life doesn’t come with guarantees.
We all need reassurance sometimes, and there’s nothing unhealthy about asking for support. But when reassurance becomes something we need repeatedly before we can relax, it might be worth asking what we’re actually afraid will happen if we don’t get it.
What If You Don’t Know What You’re Avoiding?
Here’s where things get interesting. Sometimes people aren’t consciously aware of the emotions they’re trying to escape.
They may recognize irritability without realizing they’re sad. They might notice restlessness without identifying anxiety. They may feel exhausted without understanding how much energy they’re spending trying to maintain control.
For people who grew up in environments where emotions were criticized, dismissed, or treated as inconvenient, avoidance may have developed long before they had the ability to understand what they were doing.
If expressing sadness resulted in being told to stop crying, or showing anger led to punishment, learning to disconnect from those emotions may have been a way of protecting yourself.
And sometimes the behaviors that helped us manage difficult experiences earlier in life become the very patterns that interfere with our relationships and emotional health later.
That doesn’t mean there’s something wrong with us. It means some of our coping strategies may need updating.
So, What Are You Actually Running From?
I don’t think the answer is to stop distracting yourself, quit being productive, or force yourself to confront every uncomfortable emotion. Sometimes you genuinely need a break, and for people with trauma histories, learning to regulate emotions and establish safety may need to come before approaching painful experiences.
But I do think it’s worth getting curious about our patterns.
The next time you find yourself compulsively checking your phone, looking for another project, asking for reassurance, or doing just about anything to avoid sitting quietly with yourself, consider what was happening right before you felt the urge.
Were you anxious? Lonely? Frustrated? Overwhelmed? Did something remind you of an experience you’d rather forget? Were you worried about something you couldn’t control?
You don’t have to immediately fix the feeling or figure out where it came from. Sometimes simply recognizing what’s happening is a meaningful first step.
Because here’s something I’ve learned about human behavior: We can become so accustomed to avoiding discomfort that we stop recognizing how much effort we’re putting into it.
And while avoiding something might make us feel better temporarily, it doesn’t necessarily help us feel better in the long run.
Maybe the question isn’t whether you need to stop running.
Maybe it’s whether the things you’re running from are actually as unmanageable as you’ve come to believe, and what kind of support or skills might help you approach them differently.
After all, there’s a difference between protecting your peace and avoiding your life.
Research and Further Reading
Hayes, S. C., Wilson, K. G., Gifford, E. V., Follette, V. M., and Strosahl, K. (1996). Experiential avoidance and behavioral disorders: A functional dimensional approach to diagnosis and treatment. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 64(6), 1152–1168.
Aldao, A., Nolen-Hoeksema, S., and Schweizer, S. (2010). Emotion regulation strategies across psychopathology: A meta-analytic review. Clinical Psychology Review, 30(2), 217–237.
This article is intended for educational purposes and does not replace individualized mental health care.
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