Reddit reviews The Wisdom of Insecurity: A Message for an Age of Anxiety

This idea is a large part of Alan Watt's message in The Wisdom of Insecurity.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0307741206?pc_redir=1397447945&robot_redir=1

This Alan Watts book helped me a great deal as far as dealing with fear, anxiety, and tons of other topics of struggle within the general human condition.

I would also recommend anything by Ram Dass. The Only Dance There Is might be his most approachable book as an intro to him. Be Here Now is partly illustrated (beautifully, I might add) but it is not necessarily your typical book. Not to say it is not worth a read, it just might not be a format for everyone. Ram Dass isn't preachy, and his teachings encompass many religion's roots, and weave them beautifully.

Sure. There's a bit of a story arc where I came to my senses first, then discovered I wanted to unfuck my life, and leanfire principles is a part of that.

The one that started it all was The Art of Happiness. I was miserable and herein the Dali Lama shocked my life with his assertion that the goal of your life is to be happy. I had a mindset that I had to suffer in order to be worthy of good things in life.

Then, if I recall correctly were non buddhist books, but in the realm getting your head straight:Learned Optimism: How to Change Your Mind and Your Life: I saw this man's TED talk.

& How to Stubbornly Refuse to Make Yourself Miserable About Anything

These two go great together to discover that its all in your head and you can change that. I had a terrible inner dialogue and was able to be rid of it. Life Changer!

The I think I read The Wisdom of Insecurity: A Message for an Age of Anxiety probably 10 times over the last 4-5 years & listened to the audio book when falling asleep. This one really underlined how miserable we make ourselves striving for security that isn't to be had. There is wisdom here that constantly reveals itself long after having read it.

The Pema Chodron Audio Collection was a constant go to also.

My most recent listening are lectures by Ajahn Brahm of Buddhist Society of Western Australia - These lectures really turned me around to moving past the pain, fear & worry about changing my life.

\^\^ I really like listening to these while falling asleep or with a nap on the couch on Sat/Sun afternoons.

Some other notables:

Fuck It: The Ultimate Spiritual Way : Saying Fuck It when you're miserable due to expectations and attachments has a real emotional response vs the above which can be very cerebral.

Man's Search for Meaning: Sometimes it's hard to grateful when wrapped up in our own lives. I read this once a year as a refresher. When I'm being ungrateful I try to remember what others have put up with and it calms down my complaining mind.

The Art of Disappearing: Buddha's Path to Lasting Joy : more from Ajahn Brahm - There is a better way to live our lives and not be miserable. Simplicity and lean fire go really well together.

More minimalism than buddhism, but they jive well together:

Ikigai: The Japanese Secret to a Long and Happy Life

Goodbye, Things: The New Japanese Minimalism

Above all I feel these are all about snapping out of the nonsense mindsets & habits many of us have.

Good luck.

This happens to me every time I read "The Wisdom of Insecurity" by Alan Watts. The whole time I'm reading I am thinking, "Yes! This makes so much sense! I've got to start looking at my life differently and living in the now!" Then a week later I'm back to being a general mess. But at least I know the book is there and I can start the whole thing over again.

The Wisdom of Insecurity by Alan Watts (really, anything by Alan Watts) and The Unteathered Soul by Michael Singer. They're more commonly found under zen or Buddhism than Self Help though. For me they were the most helpful in gaining control of one's emotions and thoughts, as well as self acceptance and happiness in one's life as-is, rather than any unreachable goals or futures.

I had moments of like that before.

The reason I recommended to all my peers to do psychedelics later in life is because it takes a stronger mind to handle them. I'm not a follower of my own words, since I started psychedelics kind of early.

> realizing how irresponsible I am

That's good you realized this so early on in life. You're the lucky few, dude. Some people don't get this realization until they're 30-40 years old, and you got it when you were 17! Have that motivate you so you don't have to live with that knowledge.

> i ended up re enforcing my idea of it being pointless,

Imo psychedelics don't teach you new things sometimes, they just bring up what you've been hiding. So what life is purposeless? I think so, and I love it. Imagine if life had a real purpose. I don't know what your religion is, but the fact that our life has no meaning means we can do whatever with it. We're not restricted to fate. I'm not living in the shadows of some god afraid to make sins. We're not trying to worship and impress some god that we don't know that exists. Your story is your story, you're the one who defines it, you're the one who decides where it goes. Up to the point from when you are born to when you die is up to you where you go. Even then, it has no meaning, but having a 9 year old read a book like catcher in the rye may have no meaning, but to an adult can have an extremely profound effect. It's up to you to make sense of it, and sometimes something weird is just something familiar viewed from a different angle.

Read some books. the taboo of knowing who you are by Alan Watts has great insights on this. Same with The Wisdom of Insecurity: A Message for an Age of Anxiety. Imho I've learned more from books that's applicable to life than I have learned on any drug.

You're 17. I had an existential crisis kinda when I was 17, where I desperately was searching for DMT but had no means of finding it. I was looking for it since I was 15-16 years old. What's important is applying that you learned that you're irresponsible and using that to motivate you to be a better person.

Happy Monday, everyone ♥

This cool dude has been hanging around outside my place the past few days. I think I saw him again this morning, but it could be a different osprey. For the sake of a good story, I'll pretend it's the same one and we're bros now.

It's gonna be a good week. Saturday night I was part of a really good business meeting that detailed a strategy for the next few weeks, months, and years for a project I'm part of. My involvement mostly involves me sitting in my sweatpants and a dirty t-shirt on the phone with everyone and saying, "Yeah, I dig that idea," and "Nah, that idea blows," on a subject I have little to no knowledge about, so naturally I'm very important to the team.

Enjoy today. Find something positive. And everyone read this book. Everyone.

PS: here some pointers –not to be taken for the Moon..

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Alan Watts' The Book: On the Taboo Against Knowing Who You Are

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Alan Watts' The Wisdom Of Insecurity

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Alan Watts' Become What You Are

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Charles Tart's Waking Up

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There are zillions of bibliographies and references on the sub for healing from dysfunctional upbringings and other situations of systematic abuse: r/CPTSD

Search such authors in there for instance, and feel free to follow posts and comments speaking about this reprogramming and many other areas of the 'recovery' work; you may start by detecting, dissecting and unraveling the Consensus Trance.

For a first introduction, another book I can think of is Wayne Dyer's 'Your Erroneous Zones', which you'll find referenced over there too. Enjoy!

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For me, meditating on no-thought daily. Reading into zen philosophy, and incorporating it into my life. I absolutely adore Alan Watts, and he's a great place to start - I'd recommend The Book if you want to jump in the deep end, or The Wisdom of Insecurity if you want to start more shallow.

Once you re-orient your life-philosophy (dorky as that sentence sounds) to focus on the now and the recognition that reality goes far beyond the labels we apply to it, the daily maintenance is rather easy. I meditate to clear my mind and re-orient myself, contemplate, and listen to what my body needs - not every person that follows zen does this, but I do, and for me, it's the healthiest, best thing I could possibly do.

https://www.amazon.com/Wisdom-Insecurity-Message-Age-Anxiety/dp/0307741206

Alan Watts is very good at dealing with problems in contempary western america. despite being written over 50 years ago I think it's still relevant

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=emHAoQGoQic

here's a fun little video of his lectures

Alan Watts in amazing. I highly recommend this book.

http://www.amazon.com/The-Wisdom-Insecurity-Message-Anxiety/dp/0307741206

There are things we need to live from nature, like oxygen, heat, complex molecules to make up our physical body, etc. There are also things which are not beneficial to the body, like deseases. Does that mean nature is good or bad? Not necessarily, it means nature just is, "the rain falls equally on the just and unjust".

In that case, you can say it's good, and you can say it's bad, and both would be right. Is that useful? Not really.

There are things on the internet debunking everything, if you care to look for it. It even debunked the David Hume's statement you shared. So what's the point on picking some and discarding others?

It might help to start out with the question: Who am I? You can build your metaphysics on your point of view of that answer. Alan Watts is a great author but it's kind of hard to understand him if he's your first exposure to this topic.

Anyways, maybe he's what you need, check out The Wisdom of Insecurity and/r Out of Your Mind, it might help with your anxiety.

I think the question you're asking is one of the fundamental questions humans face.

There is an Alan Watts book called "Wisdom of Insecurity" that explores this question. Corey Anton (a Philosophy prof) mentions it on his youtube channel briefly here:
http://youtu.be/C62zJ7ppf_M?t=1m35s.

"The desire to be secure, and the feeling of insecurity are the same thing." Quite interesting if you think about it.

http://www.amazon.com/The-Wisdom-Insecurity-Message-Anxiety/dp/0307741206

This one is really good, I read it a few months ago and loved it.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0307741206?pc_redir=1405351634&robot_redir=1

Have you read The Wisdom of Insecurity by Alan Watts? I mistakenly avoided it for a long time and now it's practically my bible. It's essentially a distillation of Buddhism: Watts' opinion on the human condition and how transcended ego experience is the cure. A great companion for meditation imo

Get the book. You'll be glad you did. (I am not kidding.)

I had severely debilitating Complex PTSD for nine years from 1994 to 2003. Comiing to grips with "As One Thinks so Shall One Feel." And How One Can Change All That. was the first order of business for me. Then I moved from the therapies in section 7a of this earlier post into those in section 7b... and then into those in section 7c. Now I'm at Choiceless Awareness for Emotion Processing.

"Progress, not perfection," and all that.

My daughter was born at 31+4 just like your son. We were in the NICU for 53 days. She is now 13 months and is completely caught up.

Based on the picture you posted, your little guy is doing great. To be off the nasal cannula and breathing unassisted at 6 days is quite an achievement!

One thing that helped us get through the first few weeks was kangaroo care and reading. My wife and I would take turns: I'd read while she held the baby, or she'd read while I held the baby. We read The Wisdom of Insecurity by Alan Watts, which helped us to realize that worrying about things that might happen, or fixating on the way things could have been were both pointless exercises in fantasizing about imaginary realities. It became a little easier to just accept the way things were and stay in the present as much as possible.

Enjoy the kangaroo time...it really is precious. A year from now your little bug won't stay put long enough to get a solid cuddle in.

Buddhism can be considered a form of psychotherapy.

See : https://www.amazon.com/Wisdom-Insecurity-Message-Age-Anxiety/dp/0307741206

I also agree that most of the books by Alan Watts are great to read. Picked this up last week and am loving it

The Wisdom of Insecurity: A Message for an Age of Anxiety https://www.amazon.com/dp/0307741206/ref=cm_sw_r_awd_K-SQub1FNVRH6

Okay so idk if you're looking for a more clinical manual sorta thing, but as a depressed person or whatever this is a book that I really really enjoyed and helped me to articulate parts of my depression that I hadn't been able to before.

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https://www.amazon.com/Wisdom-Insecurity-Message-Age-Anxiety/dp/0307741206

Try to do nothing, or read a book

Might I recommend a few of my personal favorites:
https://www.amazon.com/Way-Zen-Alan-W-Watts/dp/0375705104

https://www.amazon.com/Wisdom-Insecurity-Message-Age-Anxiety/dp/0307741206

https://www.amazon.com/Book-Taboo-Against-Knowing-Who/dp/0679723005

Sorry! Forgot to reply, was on the go when I read this.

I haven't read much, in truth. I'm a musician, so sound is my thing. I've listened to probably over 500 lectures/audio recordings by Alan Watts and Adyashanti over the past year. Those two changed my life and opened my mind, allowing me to begin the process of becoming the real me. I'll leave you a few that really, really helped me. In terms of books, though:

https://www.amazon.com/Wisdom-Insecurity-Message-Age-Anxiety/dp/0307741206/ref=pd_lpo_sbs_14_t_0?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=HD4HJV4XGZMFYQQ8YHYY

https://www.amazon.com/Become-What-You-Alan-Watts/dp/1570629404/ref=pd_lpo_sbs_14_t_1?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=HD4HJV4XGZMFYQQ8YHYY

https://www.amazon.com/True-Meditation-Discover-Freedom-Awareness/dp/1591794676/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1493318617&sr=1-1&keywords=adyashanti+true+meditation

https://www.amazon.com/End-Your-World-Uncensored-Enlightenment/dp/1591797799/ref=pd_sim_14_4?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_i=1591797799&pd_rd_r=NTAKM081ZBWQN84XRDF5&pd_rd_w=GbrQB&pd_rd_wg=4ikC1&psc=1&refRID=NTAKM081ZBWQN84XRDF5

https://www.amazon.com/Power-Now-Guide-Spiritual-Enlightenment/dp/1577314808/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1493318650&sr=1-1&keywords=eckhart+tolle+the+power+of+now

http://www.lawofone.info/

Now, below I will list a few audio recordings that I absolutely love:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PZ4_75nT6_M

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=om1hJX4JN8U

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ESVoQzOhZNQ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YbbCkdrAdeI

Try reading or listening to Alan Watts.

https://www.amazon.com/Wisdom-Insecurity-Message-Age-Anxiety/dp/0307741206

There is only one book you need to read of Alan Watts. It is The Wisdom of Insecurity. It is the basis for all the rest of his works.

The Wisdom of Insecurity really helped me to realize I was in control of my anxiety, and that most of the issues I was dealing with were the product of our modern lifestyle and way of thinking. Watts is really effective at making Eastern philosophical ideas accessible to a Western audience. I can't recommend the book more, and I hope it helps you work through what you're going through.