The Core of Insecurity

One of the greatest paradox of human being is the feeling of insecurity and the attempt to deal with insecurity. Allan Watts has mentioned this in which he called the thing as the "backward law", that is to say, the more one crave, the more people suffer. Here, we notice that Allan's philosophy is influenced by Buddhism. In Buddhism and also from Allan Watts perspective, insecurity is the result of trying hard to be secure, but at the end one will only realize, we are hopeless and we are doomed for insecurity. 

Nonetheless, there is another way of thinking besides the phenomena of insecurity coming from the paradox of trying to pursue security. I will argue for the case that insecurity exists because of the false belief of ourselves. False belief is a normal occurrence. Almost in every topic that we can imagine of, at least, we are blame of false belief that we often take for granted. We can call this phenomenon of false belief as believing in "Myth". The simple myth is we need to drink at least 8 glasses of water everyday, or 8 is a perfect number to stay hydrated. However, this can cause several dubious questions. What kind of glasses? Is this principle applicable to all ages? Truly, this simple thing is only a myth which we frequently consider as bed-rock fact! Likewise, we also have lot of false beliefs, myth regarding ourselves. And to this I will turn our attention.

Two most common thread of insecurity that we often put in ourselves are coming down of to these two common false belief: first, we are not good or capable enough. Second, we are not as good looking as other people. Actually both are normal and should not be a thread if it comes out a sober and honest review of ourselves. In fact, it would be a good thing for only by knowing self, we can improve ourselves. In Sun Tzu Art of War it is written that "knowing one self" is one of the greatest key to win the battle. So, the main problem comes when we "dogmatize" it. What I mean by that is this, that we are thinking that we are not good and not capable enough for eternity, always be like that. And for the second, we think that we are really bad looking and nothing beautiful left from us. 

Well, the first one is totally wrong. We are human being. Part of being human is growing. As long as we live and can grow, we are living not in the state of actuality but potentiality. There is always a possibility of improvement in the future. True stupidity is when we stop trying, growing is more to a process than fix result.

For the second part, the issue is evident nowadays. Especially for the younger generation. With the rise of Instagram and social media platform, people create the paradox of self, a mere projection of self that sometime unrealistic, full of filter and editing process to give a greater projection of self, which is fake. Maybe we can be happy for a time being yet at the end, it still can causes us insecure because at the end of the day, the picture is not us but only a representation of us. Jean Baudrillard famously argued that photography has led to "the death of reality", more attractive, more captivating but less real. 

To deal with this false belief, we need to remember that beauty does not belong to a certain pattern or shape of body, but also about other aspect such as cleanness and neatness. Probably, we do not have face or body shape like Korean artist but, we take care of our cleanness and neatness, we can project another dimension of beauty that is equally powerful and beautiful. Moreover, everyone have their own definition of beauty. This remind me of Ethiopian people who think that the fatter the man is, the more attractive he will be. Therefore, there is someone in the earth can see the beautiful side of us. Everyone just need to take care their physique, believe in its uniqueness and be confidence as well. 

In fact, body parts are  not the thing that matter most in life compare to mind.  Edward De Bono beautifully craft this line which I think really speak to us, 

 "A beautiful body and a beautiful face age and grow old. A beautiful mind does not age and becomes ever more beautiful. A beautiful body and beautiful face without beautiful mind can be boring. A beautiful mind without beautiful body or beautiful face can still be attractive..." 

Living in the modern society is to live in a state of insecurity as a most vivid threat. The demand of the world really shaking our soul to its core, most of the time. However, we need to be reminded that we are not useless and bad-looking, end of the story. That judgement only a false belief that has been projected exaggeratedly by the society. If we are human being that was created by God, the most perfect being. Therefore, each and everyone of us are not created bad nor ugly. If we think that is the case, then that is must something wrong, and as we already stated above, yes false belief lingering. The heresy that causes constant insecurity in lives. Beware of it. Now we know, once again, the old maxim really helpful to deal with the problem echoes, Know Thyself! Or to put it more precise, know thyself well!