... [B]efore we are able to relax unwhole­some thoughts, they must be recognized as such. One characteristic of the unskilled mind, of course, is its inability clearly to dis­tinguish between wholesome and unwhole­some thoughts. Just as the unskilled mind has difficulty even knowing when it is absorbed in thought, it finds it hard to know when a thought is edifying or corrosive—or even the importance of this distinction. An apocryphal anecdote from the life of Sigmund Freud puts this difficulty in an amusing light. Freud sup­posedly asked one his patients if she were ever troubled by lustful thoughts. “No,” she re­plied, “I rather enjoy them.”

Excerpt from an article by Mark Muesse, "Taking Responsibility for Our Thoughts: Reflections on the Vitakkasaṇṭhāna Sutta," Insight Journal 2001