Not a Lighter Burden, But Broader Shoulders

Freud considered repression the basic and most important defense mechanism. Its essence is the exclusion of excessively painful or terrifying impulses or memories from consciousness. A person often represses memories that evoke shame, guilt, or self-deprecation.

Constantly dwelling on stressors, referred to as rumination, means that a person withdraws into themselves and thinks about how bad they feel, worries over the consequences of stressful events, ponders their mental state, and constantly talks about how poorly they are doing, without doing anything to fix it.

Learned helplessness, which manifests as apathy, withdrawal, and inaction, also appears in some people—but not all—in response to uncontrollable events. The original theory of learned helplessness had to be modified to take into account the fact that some people behave helplessly after uncontrollable events, while for others such events are a challenge and an incentive to take action.

He (Carl Rogers) was primarily convinced that people would likely function better if they were raised with unconditional positive regard—if they felt that parents and other people value them positively even when their feelings, attitudes, and behavior are not ideal.