Repression is a defense mechanism that’s employed to unconsciously push uncomfortable memories, thoughts, impulses and emotions from our conscious awareness.
Despite effectiveness of alleviating these anxiety-arousing contents from the Conscious mind, they still shape our behaviours and reactions below our awareness.
Sigmund Freud first popularized it before his daughter Anna Freud and other psychologist expanded it.
To Freud, Repression was the primary and most vital Defense Mechanisms which our minds employs to protect us from anxiety, guilt and uncomfortable feelings.
Repression vs Suppression.
Repression is mostly confused with supression their definition and means of accomplishment are slightly different. For instance; Repression is an automatic Unconscious mechanism where unwanted contents are pushed to the unconcious mind while supression is more conscious where one chooses to ignore uncomfortable impulses untill when it’s comfortable to act on them.
Repression Vs Denial.
Both Repression and Denial involves pushing away uncomfortable objects from the conscious mind but in different ways.
While Repression is more of automatically swallowing the uncomfortable feelings, thoughts and memories to the unconscious mind, Denial involves refusing to acknowledge reality or uncomfortable information from outside.
Imagine your mind being an apartment in which you stay. The apartment has two rooms, one at the front which acts as the working area and the other at the back which you might not be aware unless you become conscious of it but contains unwanted materials.
Anytime an unwanted material drops in the working area room you feel discomfort that your servant called the ego quickly comes and pushes it to the back room where you are not in a position to see it and hence feel discomfort. This process is called Repression.
On the other hand, A guest who comes from outside with an unwanted gift that makes you feel uncomfortable might see the ego push him away or refuse to welcome or acknowledge his presence. This process is called Denial.
Contents Pushed to the Unconscious Mind.
Among the contents that are Repressed to the unconscious include;
- Painful Memories eg; Traumatic memories
- Negative Emotions eg; Anger, shame, guilt
- Uncomfortable Impulses eg; Of Aggression, Sexual impulses etc
- Uncomfortable Thoughts eg; Of hatred, Resentment etc
- Painful Feelings eg; Rejection, Abandonment etc
Freud’s Iceberg Metaphor and Repression.
Freud’s psychoanalytic structural theory of the mind likeness the mind to an Iceberg in water with a small tip visible Above (Probably the conscious mind) another layer just below the tip but under water but still visible if you observe it keenly (the Pre-conscious) while a huge part remained invisibly submerged under the water, call it the Unconscious mind.
The layer below that’s invisible is what hold all the repressed Memories, Desires, emotions and thoughts. What’s more likely to cause instability to the tip is automatically pushed down to the unconscious.
How Repression affects Mental health
Repression is closely associated with mental health disorders.
For Instance , Repressed emotions such as anger can lead to Depression while certain painful memories are associated with high level of anxiety. As it’s said; “The opposite of Depression is Expression.
How Repression leads to Fear.
Repression might lead to certain phobias especially when combined with other defense mechanisms such as Avoidance.
It makes an individual to steer away from situations, places, topics and people who might trigger the the repressed contents.
For instance; A repressed memory of rejection or criticism might lead an individual to avoid all situations that may cause him to relive the negative memory.
How Repression affects Behaviours.
- Repressed contents might lead to numbness of emotions.
- One may develop escapists behaviors such as Drug abuse, Over working and Social Media scrolling to avoid the uncomfortable feelings.
- People with Repressed impulses or memories may also avoid speaking about anything that’s associated with those repressed memories.
How to manage the Repressed contents.
Freud and most psychologists believe bringing the repressed contents from the unconscious before solving it consciously is the way to go.
And as Carl Jung said;
“Untill we make the unconscious concious it will direct our lives and we shall call it fate“.
Also instead of repressing and surpressing painful emotions and memories, it’s better recommended to accept it.
Freud’s theory on Repression vs Modern Scientists.
Unlike Freud who saw Repression as the primary defense mechanism, modern Social Psychologist and personality studies, regards repression not as a defense mechanism per se. Infact the other defense mechanisms are called into being because of the inefficacy of repression. In this view, repression is simply viewed as the blotting of contents to the unconscious mind.