As a some what socially stunted chungus, I’ve always felt some form of insecurity my whole life. I had a hard time understanding what security is and what it actually felt like. This made me initially believe that security was something that was gained through things I didn’t have that others did: lots of money, loving relationships, and memetic-competitive¹ knowledge.

I saw some posts that were aligned with security from Chris Lakin² and Ava³ that made me reflect on what it really meant to me. As the chungus I am, I regretfully intellectualized the concept of security through systems. “In order to be secure, you must understand X and Y. You mustn’t do A or else X and Y will be false, you must do B to make X and Y true” type slop. I put myself in psychosis for a week trying to figure out if that system was correct and if there were any fallacies or holes within it.

Taking a step back in that moment, I thought to myself, “Do I really believe in what I’m writing?” No, not at all, it was cope, or rather an iteration of understanding. I have always thought that the things I didn’t understand must be complex, but in reality they’re really simple. I was scanning the sky for something that was stationed at ground level this whole time.

To understand the concept of security, I came up with two short perspectives that supplement each other: the act of being secure, and a D.I.Y. path to understanding security

An Act with Security #

If you and a moe-anthropomorphic⁴ depiction of the world were playing catch, how would you throw and catch the ball? If you had to think, you’re kinda fucked up. If you answered something similar to “I’ll just catch and throw the ball back, I don’t know.” Good job.

To put it simply, a secure-you would throw and catch the ball like “normal,” whatever that means to you. If you don’t know how you’d throw the ball, you probably need to find and fix yourself. If you don’t know how you’d catch the ball or aren’t able to catch it, you need to find a better world to play catch with. Playing catch should be fun and easy bidirectionally, and so should being an actor interacting with the world.

Understanding Security #

You must figure out who you really are, and search for a real world that you understand and agree with. It’s just an innate feeling that feels logically correct. It might sound stupid, but it comes to life with this question, at least for me:

What do you really want and what would the world do if you wanted it?

Sit with it. How does that make you feel? Especially when the world acts upon you? And how should you feel?

You shouldn’t feel nonchalant, you should feel an ease that comes from knowing. It’s not about the feeling that comes from knowing the answer, it’s the feeling knowing that whatever happens will be okay. You’re you and the world is yours and more malleable than it seems. If you can capture, replicate, and deploy that feeling to every action, you won.

Even if you don’t understand it, search for the truth. Who are you? What in the world? Each is a journey that must be lived, not just understood. Once there’s common ground between each, “security” will click. I’m sure! That’s my best way to describe my understanding of how to start understanding security.

Security is a feeling of ease, an understanding of the self and the world. Chasing the feeling of security, is security.