They often operate below our conscious awareness. Hence, we rarely think: Hmm, I’m starting to feel some terror about knowing life is impermanent and I’m going to die. I’m also feeling deep grief about my brother being ill. Now, to defend myself against these feelings, I’m going to maximize my stress about work and focus on my upcoming project as if it’s life or death. Instead, we just feel stressed about this damn project at work, check our email forty-seven times per day, and worry about what will happen if we don’t pull it off perfectly.
