And unlike inequality, insecurity is more than a binary of haves and have-nots.Its universality reveals the degree to which unnecessary suffering is widespread even among those who appear to be doing well. We are all, to varying degrees, overwhelmed andapprehensive, fearful of what the future might have in store. We are on guard, anxious, incomplete and exposed to risk. To cope, we scramble and strive,shoring ourselves up against potential threats. We work hard, shop hard, hustle, get credentialed, scrimp and save, invest, diet, self-medicate, meditate, exercise, exfoliate. Astra Taylor

Love that exfoliate is part of this. Because insecurity shakes us down from scams to our skin. 

When do you feel secure? I am mean top to bottom and all around.  Not easy if you pay attention to the persuasion pandemic that envelops us. We are pushed and pulled to purchase provisions to protect us from the onslaught of poisons and predators.
 
In her forthcoming book “The Age of Insecurity: Coming Together as Things Fall Apart”, Taylor reasserts that insecurity is the most common experience across ages, stages, and economic classes. More pernicious than inequity, because the insecurity industrial complex bombards all of us with algorithms and newscasts that highlight our inadequacies, and the invisible onslaught of incidents and ailments that are lurking to befall us.

Taylor talks about the proliferation of security cameras. Who feels more secure? When we see a lot of cameras does it mean we are at risk or safer? The owner of the shop probably feels better. How about the customers? The employees all feel less secure. They are being watched–everything they’re doing is being judged. Generating unintended insecurity for all.

We have always felt insecure . Our innate survival instincts, often referred to as the “lizard brain” or the “fight or flight” response, have evolved over millions of years to help us navigate threats and ensure our survival. These instincts include a natural inclination to be cautious and vigilant, which translate into feelings of insecurity in today’s complex society. But the efforts to exploit these instincts are relentless and disorienting.

We don’t really want that much security. We want it because we’ve told we need it. We want freedom. We want the ability to make choices and decisions that reflect what we believe and what we want. Not what other people want and not what other people expect of us. The tyranny of expectations fuels our insecurity, anxiety, and stress. Exposing the great inadequacy of who we are.

Alan Watts wrote the quintessential book on insecurity more than 70 years ago: The Wisdom of Insecurity. 

There is a contradiction in wanting to be perfectly secure in a universe whose very nature is momentariness and fluidity. But the contradiction lies a little deeper than the mere conflict between the desire for security and the fact of change. If I want to be secure, that is, protected from the flux of life, I am wanting to be separate from life. Yet it is this very sense of separateness which makes me feel insecure. In other words, the more security I can get, the more I shall want. To put it still more plainly: the desire for security and the feeling of insecurity are the same thing. To hold your breath is to lose your breath. A society based on the quest for security is nothing but a breath-retention contest in which everyone is as taut as a drum and as purple as a beet.

To stand face to face with insecurity is still not to understand it. To understand it, you must not face it but be it. 

The main mechanisms by which we are told to gain security for ourselves — making money, buying property, earning degrees, saving for retirement — all ways to buy us insurance. But these mechanisms involve being invested in systems that are inherently unstable. 

Put another way, instability is the way of all things. And thus our sense of security is threatened everywhere.

I just talked to an industry leader in finance about her retirement plan, part of a 4 yeay conversation. She was excited about her readiness for this next phase of her life. But she told me that the “volatility of the stock market” will delay her plans. She was feeling less secure. Less confident about her plans. I know the zipcode of her wealth level. She is more than fine, even with a big downturn. The stock market is always volatile. She knows that. She had already considered every scenario and was over-prepared.

How she can look into her crystal ball and say the next three years will be better, is mind boggling! Perhaps the market will settle, but how will she be?

Insecurity cuts the legs of courage out from under our lives. It breeds fear and doubt often where there are only shadows and ghosts. It destroys our agency and advocacy for what we know we want.

Some philosophers refer to this type of phenomena as “partial suicides”. Where we kill part of our souls and selves. 

I hate to see anyone miss the time to be free. To be unshackled from the unreasonable and mostly mythical marauders that threaten our self confidence and even our dreams.

Insecurity is the way of life, it is part of who we are. But we must filter out the noise. Ironically, we have to protect ourselves from the slings and arrows of the insecurity business that profits from the needs and fears they impose on us.  

We can be overwhelmed by insecurity. And it leads us to behaviors that are self-fulfilling prophecies. We predict the life that we see. And live that life despite its real and jagged disconnection with reality.

Insecurity is real and unreal. It is natural and unnatural. Our nature perceives insecurity and then the external world exploits these instincts.

What do you really want? What do you really need? What will give you more security?

What is real and what is imagined?

As Watts advises, we need to embrace our insecurity, learn from it, to liberate us, to be fully present to pursue and become who we want to be.

The greatest challenge is to look inward and become secure in our insecurity.