In times like these, when anxiety clouds our collective consciousness and uncertainty seems to be the only constant, I find myself returning to the profound lessons and meaning I’ve learned in an unlikely place: prison classrooms.

After fifteen years of working with incarcerated individuals, I’ve witnessed how traumatized people navigate life’s most extreme uncertainties. And I’ve come to a realization that challenges conventional wisdom about criminal behavior. Beyond poverty, opportunity, or moral failure lies something more fundamental: a universal human search for meaning.

Viktor Frankl, Holocaust survivor and psychiatrist, wrote, “Man’s search for meaning is the primary motivation in his life.”

This insight resonates powerfully with how I understand both the individuals I work with and our shared human struggle to find purpose when everything feels unsteady beneath our feet.

Rod: Finding Dignity and Meaning When The System Seems Rigged

At seventy, Rod Johnson has spent a third of his life inside correctional facilities. His decades of pool hustling and drug dealing began in the 1970s—an era when opportunities for black men were limited by systemic racism.

“It’s a beautiful thing, man, this American dream,” he told me. “But you got to know how to grab a piece of it,” he said with a wry half-smile, then suddenly turned serious. “I’ve been fed up, I’ve been harassed. Sometimes I get so mad it makes me want to go out and do something.”

In a society that denied him full personhood, selling drugs gave Rod agency—a distorted path to dignity when legitimate avenues felt inaccessible.

Now seventy, Rod has found a different source of meaning: mentorship.

“Can’t change my past,” he tells the young men he counsels in jail, “but I can help you see what I couldn’t.”

“When I’m out,” he tells me,  “I’ll create my program to help black kids avoid what I went through. I want to raise us up some leaders.”

In our own moments of uncertainty, Rod’s journey reminds us that even when legitimate paths seem blocked, our search for meaning continues. The question becomes: Will we choose constructive alternatives or destructive ones?

Kory: The Dangerous Allure of Simple Narratives

At just 22, Kory Brooks was sentenced to over four decades in prison for the execution-style murder of his girlfriend’s ex-boyfriend. He initially framed his crime as heroic protection: “He was going to do something to her,” Kory insisted shortly after we met. “He had a real bad reputation.”

But as Kory began reflecting more deeply, a different picture emerged. “When I pulled the trigger, I felt powerful,” he said. “I kept pulling it. Bam! Bam! Bam! That’s real power right there. I wanted to be the hero.”

Kory’s story resonates in our current moment, when simplistic narratives offer tempting relief from complexity. In uncertain times, the impulse to cast ourselves as heroes—and others as villains—provides temporary escape from the anxiety of ambiguity.

“I never dealt with my anger issues or my brother’s death or the murder of my friend,” Kory admitted. “Easier to blame [the victim] than face my own crap.”

Many of us, amid today’s uncertainties, seek similar refuge in black-and-white thinking. Kory’s journey reminds us that the quest for certainty—for clear roles and simple narratives—has the potential to lead us tragically astray while causing irreparable harm.

Will: Seeking Belonging When Everything Feels Fractured

Will Fears, thirty-six, facing charges for his participation in the violent 2017 Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, represents another dimension of our current struggle for solid ground.

After a lifetime of perceived rejection by an incarcerated father, dismissive teachers, and later, romantic partners and employers, Will embraced extremist ideology. “I felt like I was nothing. Those guys online, they told me it wasn’t my fault. Said it was the Jews, the blacks, the system.”

“They were like family. They gave me somewhere to go when everything else was quicksand,” Will reflected. “It didn’t matter that it was built on lies.”

Will’s journey mirrors a wider social phenomenon: in times of heightened uncertainty, extremist ideologies offer seductive promises of belonging and explanation. They transform nebulous anxiety into focused anger, replacing complex realities with straightforward villains.

When our worlds feel uncertain, the promise of community—of finding “our people”—exerts a powerful gravitational pull. Will’s story cautions us to examine critically where we seek belonging when everything feels fractured.

Finding Authentic Ground in an Age of Anxiety

These stories illuminate universal human responses to uncertainty that have particular relevance today: When familiar paths to security feel closed, we might forge alternative routes—some constructive, others destructive.

These patterns appear not just behind prison walls, but in our workplaces, our politics, our relationships, and our internal dialogues. They emerge whenever uncertainty shakes the foundations we stand upon.

If we recognize that our worst responses to uncertainty often represent distorted searches for meaning, we can develop greater compassion—both for others and others.

For Rod, meaning now comes through mentorship, transforming painful experience into wisdom that benefits others.

For Kory, through maintaining connection with his three-year-old son despite incarceration—finding purpose in being the father he never had, even from behind bars.

For Will, through questioning ideologies that promised belonging but delivered only hatred, slowly rebuilding an identity based on honesty rather than blame.

We can all ask better questions when anxiety rises: What am I really seeking here? What solid ground am I trying to establish? What story am I telling myself to make sense of this uncertainty? What meaning can I create even when I cannot control outcomes?

In acknowledging our shared journey, perhaps we can navigate the uncertainties ahead with greater wisdom and compassion.

***

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