When Coping is the Problem
“Pain in this life is not avoidable, but the pain we create avoiding pain is avoidable.”
What you should know:
Coping with discomfort isn’t inherently a problem. In fact, it’s completely natural: our brains evolved to reduce pain, manage stress, and keep us safe.
The issue lies in the consequences of how and why we cope with our problems (how it affects our behavior, our relationships, and our ability to redirect or move forward). Whether we cope through action, acceptance, avoidance, distraction, control, numbing—what matters is whether it actually works and moves our life toward our values, needs, or goals.
The modern world offers endless access to an infinite amount of quick, easy, and potent ways to control how we feel. It’s never been easier to get rid of feelings, but that doesn’t mean they actually work or keep working in the long-run.
Over time, we may cope just to escape discomfort—not to “function better” or “move forward”. We lose tolerance for hard emotions and stop facing what matters. Obsessively needing to “feel good/not bad” eventually leads to “doing worse” (making choices that are not aligned with our values, needs, or goals).
We have to be more conscious and deliberate about why and how we cope with things—being reactive or compulsive often keeps us stuck in sacrificing long-term vitality for short-term relief. Many common forms of “self-care” we engage in don’t actually help or solve much when they are just disguised procrastination, numbing, or avoidance.
Coping is a natural and necessary response to distress, but it’s not always a helpful one. We’re wired to reduce pain and restore control when overwhelmed. That reflex once helped us survive… But in the modern world, where comfort, distraction, and avoidance are endlessly available, we’ve turned coping into the lifestyle and solution for our psychological difficulties: we suppress, numb, distract, and scroll, often without asking what our discomfort is pointing to (or what we might be sacrificing in exchange for temporary relief). Over time, this over-reliance on comfort erodes our capacity for resilience and flexibility (often needed to take meaningful action). The goal isn’t to stop coping, but to reclaim it: to cope consciously, with awareness of what it’s helping us face, and what it might be helping us avoid. (ultimately: does it actually work?). When we relate to discomfort with curiosity instead of urgency, we regain the ability to choose how we want to live (not just how we want to feel).
Coping: Solution Or Problem?
Coping isn’t good or bad. Neither is avoidance, control, acceptance, or even action. What matters is the function—what the behavior is for and whether it’s actually working.
Avoidance might help reduce immediate overwhelm—until it reinforces long-term disconnection.
Control might stabilize a chaotic situation—until it starts driving rigidity or fear.
Acceptance might free you from unnecessary suffering—or it might become confused with resignation or being passive and inactive about things.
Taking action might bring growth—or become another way to distract from what you’re unwilling to feel.
Ask a simple but powerful question…
“Is this helping me move toward or away from what matters?”
This perspective helps unhook from over-simplified labels like “good” vs “bad” coping. It shifts the focus simply toward coping that actually works vs doesn’t—the long-term usefulness of your responses based on your goals, needs, and values.
Coping becomes a problem only when it consistently moves you away from life, connection, and meaning. That’s not a judgment—it’s an invitation to examine whether your strategies are still serving you.
Coping isn’t the enemy. It’s how we endure. But every behavior—coping included—has a function. What matters is not whether you’re avoiding, numbing, or controlling… but why you’re doing it, and what it costs.
Are you calming your nervous system or escaping discomfort entirely?
Are you restoring yourself—or disappearing from life?
Are you making space for your values—or just pressing pause on your emotions?
We don’t need to moralize coping. But we do need to understand that if a strategy keeps pulling us further from connection, vitality, and growth—it may be time to reevaluate its role.
Coping is Protection (And that’s Okay!)
We don’t avoid, control, cope, etc because we’re broken. We avoid because our nervous system evolved to detect discomfort as danger. Emotional pain, uncertainty, and self-doubt were once signals to retreat, conserve energy, or seek safety. So we…
Watch just one more episode
Scroll through another 20 posts
Keep cleaning instead of journaling
Say “I’m fine” instead of reaching out
Overwork or under-rest
Get stuck in endless overthinking
None of this makes you weak. It makes you human. The issue isn’t that we cope—it’s what our coping costs when it becomes our only strategy.
The Hidden Cost of Comfort
Modern life is built for ease. Everything—from entertainment to food to digital connection—is available instantly, without effort. When we feel uncomfortable, the world offers a thousand exits. And slowly, silently, we begin to believe:
We shouldn’t have to feel anxious, sad, bored, or unmotivated.
Any discomfort means something is wrong.
Relief should be quick, clean, and convenient.
But the more we protect ourselves from discomfort, the more fragile we become in its presence. This doesn’t mean we shouldn’t comfort ourselves—it means comfort should serve as a rest stop, not a detour from life.
From Numbing to Nourishing
There’s a difference between coping to feel less and coping to live more. Mindless scrolling, emotional eating, or overworking can all temporarily soothe—but they rarely lead us where we want to go.
Compare:
Watching a show to feel nothing vs. choosing a film that reconnects you with beauty, meaning, or creativity
Eating to forget vs. preparing food that grounds and nourishes you
Escaping your mind vs. expanding your capacity to observe, accept, and redirect it
The pivot isn’t to stop coping. It’s to upgrade your relationship with discomfort—and with the actions you take in response to it.
Coping Can Be Conscious
What if coping wasn’t about “getting rid of” difficult thoughts or feelings—but about making space for them while also showing up for what matters?
This means we can:
✅ Take breaks without guilt, but return with purpose
✅ Choose rest and ritual instead of mindless avoidance
✅ Allow sadness to be there while still reaching out or taking care of ourselves
✅ Let anxious thoughts ride in the car—without letting them drive
This is psychological flexibility: not fixing, not fighting, but facing life. It’s recognizing that we can be uncomfortable and still deliberate, still compassionate, still directed.
Remember:
Coping isn’t failure. Avoidance isn’t a flaw.
They’re just one way to protect yourself—until you’re ready for something more.
When your strategies stop serving you, that’s not a reason for shame. It’s an invitation to grow.
You don’t have to stop soothing yourself.
Just make sure you’re also investing in yourself.