Security paradoxes

Reality as we perceive it comes from the story we (mostly unconsciously) tell ourselves. And we rarely make the story up ourselves, it is typically the story that the media (news, marketing, pop culture and TV drama, etc) tell us.

One of the stories that I have, perhaps cognitively rejected, but for all intents and purposes have bought into, is the story that security and certainty offer peace. Further, that security and certainty is a product of outer world things such as income, housing, and other material ‘things’. While I may have agreed intellectually that this is not the case, I struggle to practice an alternative in my living, in part because I haven’t known what the alternative is.

Paradoxically, it seems the path to true peace is to let go of the things I think offer me security and certainty. When I tell myself that I am ‘self-made’, that my lifestyle and it’s privileges are of my own making, the story I am believing is that I am entitled to what I have, and that anything that threatens it is an injustice.

(There is a whole other post here about the story of being self-made, which ignores the inherited privilege and opportunity, the economic realities that mean equally hard working people end up stuck in intergenerational poverty - but that can wait until another time :-))

Back to the paradox. 2024 was a sabbatical year for me. At the start of the year, an unexpected set of circumstances ended the work I had been doing, and which I had expected to be cultivating and doing for the next 5-10 years. And so at the start of 2025, after a deeply reflective 12 months, I am on the cusp of a new season. My natural inclination (the story I told myself) was that the path to security was to double down on the things that I had traditionally believed would offer it to me. Secure income, secure housing, secure relationships …

But what if I went the other way? To let everything go. Everything. To open my hands and relinquish my grasp, lay everything on the table. Even as I write those words the fear rises inside me. You can’t be serious! After everything you’ve worked for?!

There is a parallel paradox that the things that I think offer me security (and therefore peace) actually make me stuck. I set out on a journey that (my story tells me) is one of liberation, but I end up being addicted to an income that will support our mortgage and consumer habits. And so last week in my journal I listed the good things in my life that I am laying on the table. Everything that I hold dear (almost!). The list included my preferred work, my home, my peripatetic lifestyle, my community …

In parallel, I ask myself the question; ‘who do I need to be in this season of uncertainty?’ My answers are very personal, and I share them appreciating that they are mine and are not transferable to others - we all have our unique journey and sensibilities.

1. I will be responsible: this means that at the same time as being prepared to let things go, I will work my butt off to make sure I live with no regrets about what might have been possible. But I will hold the outcomes, which are in most cases out of my control, very lightly.

2. I will be thankful: I have a life that includes so many of the best things I could image. Whatever happens, and shit will, I will chose a posture of gratefulness.

3. I will be positive: I am not a victim, I have agency, and so will chose to act rather than recoil from difficulties.

Every morning, before I leave home for my ocean dip, I take a few minutes of quiet to meditate. As this year starts, I will use these commitments as a daily reminder of who I choose to be.

And in addition to these three, I have identified three things that matter most to me in this transitional season.

4. Integrity: with so much up in the air, my fiercest commitment will be to seek to live in alignment with my espoused values.

5. Simplicity: some who know me well know that we’ve committed to an authentically essentialist lifestyle in these next few years. Everyday that gets challenged by the dominant stories around us, so the training-wheels-commitment to radical simplicity has to be daily.

6. Service: at this stage of life and career, the question I have been asking is what is mine to do? There is a lot to unpack on this one, including the economic story that my work typically fits within. More to come on this one …

And so, why this post? I have been encouraged to make what would normally be my private journal musings more transparent. I am genuinely curious in my own soul about where we will end up if we navigate this path with integrity. Perhaps there are others who can identify with my ponderings and the struggle to stay true to who I want to be as the path reveals itself.

If so, you are welcome to follow along. Welcome. Head over to my substack to subscribe, so you receive notification of new posts.