What is avoidance?

Avoidance is a concept in personal epistemology: When you resist writing something down, examine what you are avoiding. The resistance itself is data about what matters most.

Example: You have an idea for a career change. It surfaces in the shower, while walking, during a meeting that bores you. Each time, you could write it down. Each time, you don't — you tell yourself you'll remember it later, or that it's not fully formed yet, or that you need to think about it more first. Three weeks pass and you've never captured a single sentence about it. The resistance isn't laziness. You're avoiding making the thought concrete because a concrete thought demands a response. Writing 'I want to leave my job' on a card makes it real in a way that thinking it never does.

This concept is part of Phase 3 (Capture Systems) in the How to Think curriculum, which builds the epistemic infrastructure for capture systems.