SUPPRESSION AND REPRESSION
"When we oppress ourselves we commit violence against ourselves"
- Thich Naht Hanh (The World We Have)
Suppression is the activity of consciously and temporarily repressing parts of ourselves in an appropriate response to life's events and situations.
Repression is an unconscious and neurotic (irrational) activity that involves denying perfectly natural parts of human life. Repression is mainly due to continual and unconscious suppression due to the negative influence of people and circumstances. This suppressive action is often learned in childhood and adolescence as part of our upbringing (conditioning). The repressed person has either forgotten or does not realise that they are repressing. When we become conscious that we are repressing then we have improved the situation to one of "suppression", a position from which we can consciously attempt to modify our behaviour so that we can understand, heal, and experience whatever we had been repressing.
Repression is not just ugly and perverted but also dangerous to the welfare of life.
"When we oppress ourselves we commit violence against ourselves" - Thich Naht Hanh (The World We Have)
Repressed people become perverted and ill and can begin oppressing other people in the same areas of life that we are repressed within through the life law: “as within, so without”.
The repression causes illness in the areas of life that the repression is being actively administered. Repression is an active function, it is not passivity.
The repressed person is expending a great deal of time and energy keeping up the mechanics of the repression. This means that their life energy is being channeled into the repression and they have little energy left to live a healthy life.
Persistent repression of natural and normal areas of life can lead to depression.
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