CAUSE AND EFFECT

1. Insecurity is a symptom of insanity, a confirmation, as it were, of what it means to be insane. And being insane has a lot to do with what, in previous texts, I have described as the negativity of inorganic primacy ... as against the positivity of organic supremacy, and is therefore due, in no small measure, to the undue prevalence, on the metachemical level, of materialism at the expense of fundamentalism; on the chemical level, of realism at the expense of nonconformism; on the physical level, of naturalism at the expense of humanism; and on the metaphysical level, of idealism at the expense of transcendentalism.

2. Thus there would seem to be a distinction, at one elemental level or another, between the sanity of adherence to organic supremacy and the insanity of adherence to inorganic primacy, a distinction which puts fundamentalism, nonconformism, humanism, and transcendentalism on the side of sanity, but materialism, realism, naturalism, and idealism on the side of insanity, with corresponding distinctions between confidence in relation to the one, and insecurity in relation to the other.

3. Insecurity is an all-too-prevalent aspect of modern life, of life lived not in relation to organic supremacy - at least not to any appreciable extent - but increasingly in response to negative pressures arising from the prevalence of inorganic primacy, whether in relation to materialism, realism, naturalism, or idealism.

4. People have never felt more insecure; for, due to inorganic pressures, they are not able to live in harmony with the self, whichever type of self (from metachemical and chemical to physical and metaphysical) that may happen to be, but are at loggerheads with it in what amounts to a kind of antiself which is akin, speaking in Sartrean terms, to 'iron in the soul'.

5. Religion teaches the wisdom of living in harmony with self, but science too often practises a doctrine of self-division, of self-escapism through anti-selfhood in response to contemporary materialistic or realistic or naturalistic or idealistic pressures, depending on the element, viz. fire, water, vegetation (earth), or air. Hence whereas religion, when genuine, fosters self-confidence, science undermines the self through the pressures which inorganic primacy bring to bear on selfhood, turning one against oneself or, rather, one's self in a spirit which is less selfless than self-corrupted. And this breeds insecurity, which is due in no small measure to the insanity of being twisted against the self in such an inorganic manner.

6. Instead of being confident in relation to one's self, whichever type of self that may happen to be (and certainly one may, as a physical type, be more economic than religious or, as a chemical type, be more political than scientific), people demonstrate a lack of self-confidence in the insecurity which constantly surrounds them because they are obliged, by technological developments, to learn new techniques or upgrade their existing skills or expand their range of employment commitments beyond anything they had known in the past. They do not have time to cultivate self-confidence because they are too busy learning how to manipulate and exploit the various machines with which they are called upon to earn a living, and the result, all too much of the time, is an insecure individual whose insecurity in the face of new technological challenges is commensurate with the extent to which such manifestations of inorganic primacy have driven him mad.

7. In short, contemporary urban/industrial civilization is responsible, in no small measure, for fostering a race of insecure individuals whose insecurity is commensurate with the extent of their madness in the clutches of inorganic primacy. The more they are subject to the sway of inorganic pressures the madder they become and the further removed, in consequence, from that calm self-assurance which is the product of living harmoniously with the self in relation to organic supremacy. Contemporary civilization drives them mad and, short of opting out of it altogether, there would seem to be little or nothing they can do to reverse the trend of modern life towards increased insecurity. Physically they may be secure, but mentally and psychically they are all too often a bundle of nerves on the verge of a mental breakdown. For that is inevitably the consequence of what it means to be at loggerheads with the self in such an inorganic fashion.

8. Short of doing away with the root causes of modern insecurity, there would seem to be little that the individual can do to return to a more self-confident lifestyle other than to completely drop out of contemporary society, with its urban and industrial/technological madness. But that may appear a rather drastic solution, and the problem can be solved by the individual on a more personal and practical level, if only he takes the trouble to reduce his commitments to inorganic primacy and step up his commitments to organic supremacy, thereby having less to do with machine technology and more time, in consequence, for self-cultivation, whether in relation to metachemistry, chemistry, physics, or metaphysics, depending on the type of person.

9. Only thus can the crippling effects of self-division be overcome, as one establishes a closer relationship with one's self than would otherwise be possible. And in that lies the key not only to confidence but also to sanity, the bedrock of such confidence. For confidence is as much the effect of sanity, as insanity is the cause of insecurity. An organic cause will give rise to an organic effect, the secure self that is in harmony with itself and not twisted against itself by inorganic pressures stemming from an over-artificial civilization languishing in the grip of inorganic primacy.