Proximal and distal defenses typically work in tandem. A reminder of death prompts a proximal defense as we try to get the unpleasant thought out of our mind. But once we do that, those thoughts linger on the fringes of our consciousness, and then our distal defenses kick in. This explains why most people believe they don’t think about death or that they’re not affected by such thoughts, despite being bombarded with intimations of mortality every day.
