Is it correct to say that benzene is more stable than cylcohexatriene due to delocalization?

I'm virtually all chemistry books I own say that benzene is more stable than the theoretical cyclohexatriene, by 150 kJ to be specific, due to the delocalization of pi electron density around the ring.


I've come across many explanations for this such as "spreading of charge minimizes repulsion" and "particle-in-a-box from quantum mechanics", but these explanations don't really seem satisfactory. If delocalization or spreading of charge does is in fact stabilizing, why doesn't it occur in every molecule? (I am aware that electrons are actually delocalized in every molecule but I'm referring to the uniform spread of charge that occurs in benzene.)


I feel that the statement that "delocalisation stabilises benzene" is misleading at the very least. The actual electronic distribution of any molecule is, by definition, the one with the lowest possible energy. So any inaccurate lewis structure **must** have a higher energy than the actual one. So shouldn't the correct statement be "benzene is more thermodynamically stable than cyclohexatriene because the actual benzene has delocalised π electrons while cyclohexatriene does not, so cyclohexatriene is an inaccurate and thus less stable electronic configuration"?


I've asked this question from my teacher but he says he's never heard of this.


