Something Tookish
I, The Bottomless Bag
“Sorry! I don’t want any adventures, thank you. Not today.”
—Bilbo Baggins, The Hobbit, J. R. R. Tolkien, 1937
I didn't sign up for this. It’s too hard. I’m a hands-on learner. I don't have any experience. I’m too young. College is too expensive. I don’t want to go into debt. Degrees are useless anyway. There’s too many options. I'm dyslexic. I’m not ready. I’ll never get a good job. It’s all nepotism, cronyism, soulless networking. I won’t play the corporate game. I’m better than that. The world isn’t made for people like me. I will not change. I have too many things going on. I’m scared. People are going to laugh at me. There’s not enough time. I’ve got deep childhood trauma. I’m antisocial. I cannot change. I can’t. I just can’t. I was never trained for this. It’s not in my wheelhouse. I’d rather stay home. I’m comfortable here. The outside world is cruel. The system is working against me. I’m too stressed out. I’m being discriminated against. I’m depressed. I don't like going out. I didn't choose to be born. It’s not fair. Everything is a scam. It’s all luck. Only psychopaths are successful in this capitalist netherworld. I’m better than that. I won’t compromise my values. I don’t want to be a slave to the wage. My morals are superior. I’m doing better than most people my age anyway. Adulting is too confusing. I’ve tried it. It didn’t work out. It never works out. Everything should be free anyway. It’s not fair. It’s all stupid. I’m too old. I can't focus. I have ADHD. There are plenty of people just like me; they’re doing fine. Learning an instrument is too complicated. It takes too much time. I lack the hand-eye coordination. I’m clumsy. Some people are born gifted; I’m not one of those people. I’m dumb. I can’t write. I have writer’s block. No one is going to read my stuff anyway. Just thinking about it makes me anxious. Talking to people makes me nervous. It’s not my fault. It’s my parent’s fault. They didn’t prepare me for this. It’s not my responsibility. Someone else should handle it. I’d probably fail anyway. I’m not that smart. What's the point, anyway. Everyone dies. The universe will end. Everything is meaningless. Success can't be measured. It's all subjective. Nothing matters. I’d rather stay home, smoke weed, play games, and read. I just want to be left alone. I’m not hurting anyone. Who cares.
And those are only some of the excuses in my bottomless bag of excuses.
Whenever I’m presented with a new thing—a challenge, something I’m uncomfortable with—I start pulling excuses out of the bag, almost instinctually, as a way to deflect, avoid responsibility, stay in my zone, and remain comfortable. Because, really, when we get down to it, I just want to chill out and coast through life, doing as little as possible while remaining relatively happy while doing so. That’s all I want, to relax into infinity—unwaveringly in my zone, forever. I would love to just put myself in a bubble, freeze time so that I don’t have to deal with the responsibilities of life, so I don’t have to watch as time ravages the things I love. I hate how everything decays, how nothing can last, how innocence is lost, how children grow up and adults forget. It depresses me. Time is my mortal enemy. It’s better to just pretend that it doesn’t exist, in my temporal bubble.
But most of that is lie because, in short, I’m just risk-averse, lazy, and I hate change. And I’m scared. I’m scared of failure, of ridicule—but if I don’t try, then I don’t have to deal with those things to begin with. This is where the excuses come in handy. I can just coast through life, telling myself that I don’t want or need anything more than what I have at this very moment, right here, right now—and when that cognitive dissonance kicks in, I can just reach into the bottomless bag.
But these, too, are just more of my excuses: sophisticated self-aware excuses, but excuses nonetheless. Because time marches on regardless, and no matter how many excuses I make, it doesn’t change the fact that I want more—I want to learn how to play an instrument, I want to become a better writer, I want to feel more fulfilled and happier, all the standard self-help stuff—but the prospect of achieving these goals is frightening and uncomfortable, because to achieve these things, there is often a trial, a long scary trial, and at the end of this trial is often a big scary dragon. And dragons scare the hell out of me. So I reach into the bottomless bag, and I cope. I cope hard.
But one day, I know something will happen—something blatant, something that forces me to face the trial, something that forces me to make a decision. Perhaps one day, when I’m sitting alone in my home, not doing much at all, just blowing smoke rings, someone—a wizard, let’s say—will show up at my door, asking me for help. Perhaps the wizard might say something like, “I have no time to blow smoke rings this morning. I am looking for someone to share in an adventure that I am arranging, and it’s very difficult to find anyone.” And at that point, I will have to make a choice:
Do I close the door on the wizard, stay unwaveringly in my zone, my faux temporal bubble? Or do I take a walk on the wild side, let the wizard in, and do Something Tookish?
This was the choice Bilbo Baggins faced in The Hobbit, and this is also the choice I want to examine with this essay, because it’s actually a choice I’m faced with every day, all the time, even though sometimes I don’t like to admit it.
But first, I want to talk a little bit about Bilbo.
II, A Baggins & a Took
“We are plain quietfolk and have no use for adventures. Nasty disturbing uncomfortable things! Make you late for dinner! I can't think what anybody sees in them.” —Bilbo Baggins, The Hobbit
Bilbo Baggins was both a Baggins and a Took. His father was the wealthy Bungo Baggins, and his mother was the famous Belladonna Took, of the three daughters of Old Took, who had lived across The Water somewhere near Tuckburrow, in the Greenhill country, close to Waymeet, in Tookland, The Shire, or something like that. It was often said that the Took line had some fairy blood mixed in because there was something “not entirely hobbit-like” about the Tooks; members of this line supposedly had a strong desire for adventure, often disappearing for months at a time—which was something that hobbits just didn’t normally do.
And that’s because hobbits don’t like adventure. They like staying home, in their hobbit-holes, which are mounds of earth all tunneled through, with paneled walls and many hooks for hats—because they do enjoy visitors—and small round doors that most people have to duck through, because hobbits are small, real small, a little smaller than a dwarf, in fact, who are about half the size of an average human, who are just a little shorter than elves, who are about half the size trolls, themselves about half the size of a full-grown dragon standing on its hind legs, which means that hobbits are about the size of a dragon’s paw—that is to say, hobbits are very small indeed, little people who like to dress in bright colors, and they’re typically on the portly side, and they don’t usually wear shoes—because their feet get so hairy that they don’t need them—and they like to laugh “deep fruity laughs,” and they have big pointed ears, and they enjoy smoking long pipes and blowing fat smoke rings, and they eat six meals a day, and they enjoy sitting around, telling stories, relaxing, reading, painting, and tending to their gardens, all from the safety of their own little hobbit-holes, which is a compound noun synonymous with the word “comfort,” according to Tolkien. All this is to say that, while hobbits may enjoy telling heroic tales around a fireplace, they do not like being the subject of those heroic tales themselves, because they do not like adventure, they do not like it one bit. In fact, hobbits are just like me: they’re risk-averse, they hate change, they’re unwaveringly in their zone, and some might even say they’re lazy—although hobbits would just say that they’re comfortable with the way things are.
That’s why, when Gandalf arrived at Bilbo’s hobbit-hole—Bag-End—that fateful Middle-Earth morning, Bilbo at first might have offered the wizard some tea and pipe tobacco, and he might have even said something like, “Sit down, we have all day!” But the moment the word “adventure” was uttered by the old wizard, Bilbo was having none of it—in fact, Bilbo was done, instantly, quickly hurrying Gandalf out of his home: “Why not tomorrow? Come tomorrow! Goodbye!” Closing the door behind him as politely as possible, excising any notion of adventure from his humble little hobbit-hole.
But that didn’t stop Gandalf, who proceeded to trick thirteen dwarves into believing that Bilbo was some sort of master burglar, perfect for the heist of the century—stealing back the Lonely Mountain from the great dragon Smaug—so these dwarves barged into Bilbo’s hobbit-hole and made themselves at home: feasting, drinking, and singing heroic songs all throughout the night. And one might think that this would have upset Bilbo—and maybe it did, a little, at first—but instead of flying into a fit of rage, something else happened, something sparked inside him, something like courage, spunk, something a little reckless, a little radical, something not entirely hobbit-like.
Something Tookish.
So Bilbo, who had no expertise in thievery, didn’t know the first thing about adventuring, had never held a sword in his life, and had never once stepped outside of The Shire, still full of self-doubt and excuses, but feeling a little Tookish, decided to take a chance. He reluctantly agreed to accompany the dwarves on their adventure—and the next morning, they set off to the Lonely Mountain to face the mighty dragon Smaug, among other nasty things.
This ended up being a year-long adventure through desolate wastes, misty mountains, spooky spider forests, troll lands, caverns full of goblins, and all sorts of other dangerous, not-hobbit-like places, all of which put Bilbo’s resolve to the test. And each time—despite having no experience in adventuring, no expertise in thievery, never having held a sword in his life, and all that other stuff—he passed the test, sometimes just barely, like when he got the group captured by trolls and needed to be saved by Gandalf. But it didn’t take long for him to rise to the occasion, becoming more confident with every step and misstep, eventually becoming the most overpowered member of the party—partially thanks to the Ring, which had the power to render him invisible, but mostly because of his free will, perseverance, and Tookishness. He even saved the group multiple times, all while internally doubting his own abilities and wanting to return home: He saved the party from giant spiders in Mirkwood, and helped the dwarves escape imprisonment at the hands of the Elvenking, and when the time came to face Smaug, he did it—alone—despite his fear, even taunting the great worm while doing so, showing just how much the adventure had changed him for the better.
But “change” isn’t really the right word here, because Bilbo didn’t really change at all; he was always a clever, sneaky, Tookish, wise hobbit—he just never had a reason to be when he was sitting around, smoking, reading, telling stories, tending to his garden, and eating six meals a day in his hobbit-hole. His fear of change—of risk, of adventure—stagnated him, kept him unwaveringly in his zone, frozen in time, a faux temporal bubble, never fully realizing his full potential. And for most hobbits, this type of stagnation is fine—after all, what’s the use in all that adventure stuff when they could just live comfortably in hobbit-holes their whole lives—but the difference with Bilbo was that he wanted more. All those dwarven songs about treasure and dragons sparked something in him, and suddenly he wanted to see the world, prove himself, achieve something, and in that moment, back in his hobbit-hole, with Gandalf and the dwarves, moved by the magic of adventure, he had a Tookish thought: What if? What if I went on this adventure, with the dwarves, with Gandalf? What if I faced the dragon? And despite all his doubt, and his fear, and his excuses, which were all there in spades, Bilbo gave in and did Something Tookish.
This is all to say that, while I myself may be a little hobbit-like, I am certainly no Bilbo Baggins—and I'll prove it to you.
III, School, Dragon, Proof
“There was a most specially greedy, strong and wicked worm called Smaug. One day he flew up into the air and came south. The first we heard of it was a noise like a hurricane coming from the North, and the pine-trees on the Mountain creaking and cracking in the wind.”
—Thorin, The Hobbit
I never was a good student.
I remember, back in middle school, when I myself was quite hobbit-like, they put me in special education classes, because I refused to do the work or anything school-related at all. The special ed classroom, itself very inviting and animated and colorful, was off the main hall, through the big lobby near the entrance, down the slope to the basement floor where no kid dared tread because there was nothing else down there apart from janitor closets, so if you were going down that slope—which everyone could see you doing, on account of it being off the main hall—everyone knew you were going to special ed. And being in special ed classes, in grade school, was akin to being a leper, pretty much social suicide. American kids are not very nice, in general, especially those who fit in with the pack, because they’re primed for conformity from a young age, and conformity begets a certain level of cruelty, because it carries with it a certain set of standards that, if you don’t meet—on account of being deformed, slow, weird, ugly, or whatever—you are ridiculed and more or less ostracized from the greater social groups; and this is especially pronounced in grade school where labels are assigned quickly and taken very seriously, with all the jocks, punks, nerds, preps, drama-class kids, and what not. So, in a way, grade school is the perfect microcosm of human socialization; which is my long-winded way of saying that I went to great lengths to hide the fact that I was in special ed classes, mostly because I was embarrassed about it, but also because I could fit in with normal middle school social groups provided the kids in those groups didn't know I was in special ed; a detail that, if ever discovered, would immediately be used against me as persistent ridicule, which would eventually lead to me being pushed out of any social group I might have been part of, which means that I would sneak out of the basement-floor backdoor and walk up a hill, around the school, and back through the front door, or vice versa, so no one would see me going in or out of the special ed class. But this whole avoidance routine didn’t matter in the long run, because I wasn’t very social to begin with, so I never made much of an attempt to insert myself into the popular social groups in the first place, which meant that, for about a year there, the only social group I was really a part of was the special ed social group, which wasn’t actually a bad social group to be a part of, because the kids in that group were very nice when they weren’t throwing tantrums or refusing to talk or eating crayons or hyperfocusing on Egypt or shoving three Twinkies in their mouths at once or drawing nonstop or banging their heads against their desks or talking to themselves or just otherwise screaming and acting crazy. (I was the one who wouldn’t stop drawing. The Egypt one was Haley; she had sandy-blonde hair in a bowl cut and wore square glasses, but aside from that, she looked like any normal girl—except when she was wearing pharaoh headdresses or pretending to be Cleopatra—and she was also really nice to me.) The point being, the special ed kids were much nicer than your average Algebra 1 kid, which is my way of saying that special ed wasn’t all that bad. In fact, the only bad thing about special ed was the fact that non-special ed kids made fun of you for being in special ed, which forced the special ed kids to a special table in the cafeteria, not because of any school policy, but because the other kids would make fun of us so badly that we had to band together—and when I say “us” and “we” there, I really meant “they,” because I was quite ashamed of being in special ed back then, to the point where I wouldn’t eat in the cafeteria; instead, I would go into an empty classroom so I wouldn’t be seen because, even though the special ed kids were nice and all, I really didn’t feel like I belonged in their social group to begin with.
(By now, you’re probably wondering how the hell any of this relates to The Hobbit, to which my response would be: I’m getting there, please be patient.)
But, of course, back then, I didn’t feel like I belonged anywhere. I didn’t care for anything, really, other than myself—and being able to play my video games and watch my TV shows. I especially didn’t care for school, so I refused to do the work, and of course, this meant that I was failing most classes, which meant that obviously something had to be wrong with me—according to the teachers—and so I was put in special ed, which, at the time, I was embarrassed about, but now, in my thirties, I realize that the only reason I had been embarrassed at all was because of the whole stigma around it, and the constant bullying; but that’s a lie because, like I said, I wasn’t bullied much—because I went to great lengths to hide my special ed-ness—so I was mostly just embarrassed because I was lying to myself, because even as a young kid I had a little bit of introspectiveness, so lying to myself made me feel like a capital-P, capital-C Phony Cringelord, acutely so.
And the lie was simple: I wasn’t actually refusing to do schoolwork because I didn’t care for school; I was refusing to do it because I was afraid of failure. I was afraid of being seen as stupid, less gifted than the other kids. I was afraid that, if I applied myself and failed, then I would truly feel like a legit failure, and I didn’t like the idea of feeling like or being seen as a legit failure, so I simply refused to do the work, which meant that, when I did fail, I could say, “Well, I wasn’t even trying,” which meant that no one could prove that I was a legit failure because I had never tried to begin with, because, in my mind, there was nothing really to fail at, which meant that I got to live in my faux temporal bubble, unwaveringly in my zone, for a long long time, never having to face my fear of true failure; as if failure itself were some sort of dragon, and by avoiding the trial, I never had to confront the dragon at all. But, as a side effect of this dragon-avoidance, I never had the opportunity to slay the dragon, so the dragon just continued to live in my mind, rent-free, like Smaug in the Lonely Mountain, hoarding all that treasure, spooking all the dwarves away. Because dragons are scary as hell, and if you fail to defeat a dragon, well, you die, which is kinda how I felt back then, as if school were a dragon that I had no hope of defeating, so why even try? And, of course, I didn’t want to die.
But I wasn’t that introspective back then because, in an ironic roundabout way, by trying to avoid failure (by doing nothing at all), I was put in special ed—basically scarlet-lettered—and considered a failure by my peers, so I might as well have been a legit failure anyway. This, of course, was a paradox my younger self had not considered.
(And in that last paragraph, when I used the term “failure,” I meant it in the sense of what my adolescent brain considered a “failure” back then: someone who, upon trying, failed and was relegated to special classes because of it, reflecting the common belief about failures among quote-unquote “normal” kids at the time, which is why I was embarrassed about being in special ed. But at the time, I would tell myself that I was not a legit failure because I didn’t even try to begin with, which was actually just my way of coping with the whole thing. Of course, now I recognize that this failure-slash-not-a-failure way of looking at things was entirely misguided and immature because kids in special ed are not failures at all—they are simply kids with different needs. In fact, I now believe that no child can be a failure by any definition, only the adults and systems around them can be [which is a topic for another essay]. And now, thinking back, I recognize that I was actually right where I needed to be because I was one of those very kids with special needs, considering my inability to apply myself, antisocial proclivities, and inclination to get all mixed up in the head with weird conflicting thoughts—and while I can recognize all this now, at the time, it was terrible.)
My outlook back then hurt me in the long run because I maintained this contrarianism fueled by a fear of failure well into my college years, back when Mom paid tuition, and I would tell her I was getting good grades when, in reality, I was skipping class and flunking out because I was scared as hell of the dragon. I thought, if no one knew I was failing, then I wasn’t failing. I was stuck in my faux temporal bubble, pretending all was good. And it hurt me because even now I’m stuck in this faux temporal bubble, in a soulless corporate job, sitting behind a computer all day, pretending that sending emails and creating slide decks is deeply meaningful when, in actuality, the whole thing is just pointless busy work in the grand scheme of things, and really I’m just a big phony because I never wanted to be in corporate America to begin with. In fact, corporate America was kinda the antithesis of everything I stood for when I was younger—I wanted to be an artist, a musician, someone who followed their dreams no matter the cost. But back in school, where the foundation of one’s dreams is laid, I squandered the opportunity because I perceived attaining my dreams as a trial with a scary dragon at the end, and I couldn’t face the dragon—no way, no how.
So when I was scheduled to attend Fine Arts at 11 a.m. every Tuesday at the local community college but instead stayed home and played Final Fantasy XI, there was always this dissonance lingering in the back of my mind, something like: “I know I should be going to class right now, getting a degree in something I actually care about, but that’s too hard, so instead I’m living in a faux temporal bubble, pretending that nothing will ever change, that I will be able to sit in my hobbit-hole forever, playing games, pretending that ignoring the trial somehow slays the dragon—or at least makes him leave me alone—even though I know that’s stupid as hell, because eventually all this is going to catch up with me, because the dragon’s still there, curled up on my treasure, softly snorting sparks in his sleep, because I’m too scared to sneak into the Lonely Mountain and slay him, so instead I stay unwaveringly in my zone, pretending that everything is fine, still knowing that the dragon is there, yet still being too afraid to confront him, so, once again, I’m back to pretending that everything is fine,” and so on and so forth.
And I’m still doing this, to this day, with all sorts of stuff. I want to learn how to play guitar, make pop music, record an album, but it’s “too hard,” so I say stuff like, “It’s too hard. It takes too much time. I lack the hand-eye coordination. I’m clumsy. Some people are born gifted; I’m not one of those people.” When, in the back of my mind, I know that anyone can do whatever they set their mind to provided they just start doing the thing, keep at it, and never give up, because I’ve seen it done before by the most unlikely of hobbits—yet, for some reason, I tell myself that I’m exempt from this, that I’m stupid, untalented, clumsy, and all the rest of those adjectival excuses that we’ve been over before.
In fact, I use a ridiculous amount of brainpower coming up with excuses for why I don’t follow my dreams, and then I use even more brainpower coming up with excuses for those excuses—to trick myself into believing that I am not, in fact, making excuses—and then, of course, I have to come up with even more excuses for those excuses, and so on, until I am just brain-dead stupid, unable to actually do anything, which is, of course, just another excuse, so you can see how this becomes very problematic indeed.
Good thing that I have a bottomless bag.
The truth is, I’ve just been coasting my entire life, from one soulless job to another, sticking around way too long, riding one sick lazy wave, just lucking out, really. I worked the same call center job for twelve years, doing the bare minimum, with barely any promotions, all while living in a rundown trailer where, one time, some raccoons fell through the ceiling because of mold and water damage. And this was fine because the lifestyle was relatively easy and comfortable—as long as, after work, I could smoke my weed and play my games and watch television—or at least, that’s what I told myself, when really I was just headfirst in the bottomless bag. Because I didn’t really want to work in a call center my whole life—who would?—I wanted to be an artist, I wanted to follow my dreams. But following my dreams required me to leave my faux temporal bubble, which was my comfort zone, so instead of taking a chance, applying for a new job that actually paid a living wage, I would say something like, “I’ll never get a good job. It’s all nepotism, cronyism, soulless networking. I won’t play the corporate game. I’m better than that.” Which all goes to show that I have been pretty much coasting my whole life, lucking out, putting in the minimum amount of effort required to get by—and I have a whole bunch of excuses as to why that’s perfectly OK.
But how long will my luck last? Can I really expect to coast from one soulless job to another, hardly caring about anything, while remaining unwaveringly in my zone, relatively happy and comfortable, forever? Would my apathy not catch up with me eventually? Would I not need to take some risk or do something a little Tookish every now and then to maintain my comfortable homeostasis? Is the dragon not still there, in the Lonely Mountain, sleeping on my treasure? I can ignore him, but for how long? How long until the dragon wakes and razes my hobbit-hole to a smoky cinder? Not to mention, how long can I pretend that my dreams are not there, swirling around in my head, constantly wishing to be fulfilled, without falling into a deep depression?
I can ask all these introspective, thoughtful questions—but really, what’s the point? Everyone dies, the universe will end, everything is meaningless, success can’t be measured, it’s all subjective, nothing matters. I’d rather stay home, smoke weed, play games, and read. I just want to be left alone, and I’m not hurting anyone, so who cares?
So, there’s your proof—I’m no Bilbo Baggins.
IV, Bilbo and I
“Then something Tookish woke up inside him, and he wished to go and see the great mountains, and hear the pine-trees and the waterfalls, and explore the caves, and wear a sword instead of a walking-stick.”
—The Hobbit
What I’m realizing, after reading The Hobbit, is that Bilbo and I are similar in many ways—we both like to stay home, read, tell stories, play games, make excuses, and blow smoke rings—but we’re different in one crucial aspect, the most important aspect, the thing that makes Bilbo, well, Bilbo:
Bilbo took a chance, despite his fear—and while Gandalf may have prodded him a little, it was still Bilbo’s choice in the end to go on the expedition to the Lonely Mountain. And he took that chance because Bilbo, like me, really wanted to do Something Tookish—go on an adventure—but he was afraid, afraid of the trial, afraid of the dragon, afraid of failure, so he made excuse after excuse, fighting the urge for adventure until something woke inside him, and he could not deny it any longer. The dissonance created by his desire for adventure and his fear of the trial was so great, and so diametrically opposed, that his excuses could no longer hold back his Tookishness. He reached a breaking point. Suddenly, sitting in his hobbit-hole, fantasizing about adventure, was no longer enough; he had to experience it for himself: see the great mountains, hear the pine trees and the waterfalls, explore the caves, and wear a sword instead of a walking stick.
So he made a choice: he chose to do Something Tookish.
And Bilbo, upon returning from his year-long journey, did not regret it. His need for adventure was fulfilled, and he became good friends with dwarves and elves and even men, and he was a happier hobbit for it, even if the other hobbits ended up thinking he was a little weird upon his return—which just goes to show that you shouldn’t care about what other hobbits think of you; as long as you yourself are fulfilled. And Bilbo was very fulfilled, but he wouldn’t have been if he had dived headfirst into the bottomless bag that day Gandalf showed up at his round hobbit-hole door.
And there was a secondary benefit of going on the adventure too, one that Bilbo didn’t even realize at the time: By helping the dwarf party reclaim the Lonely Mountain, they neutralized Smaug, who may have razed The Shire and the lands around it later on. So, in a roundabout way, Bilbo saved The Shire—and also all of Middle Earth, if we’re counting the The Lord of the Rings—which meant that he essentially preserved his ability to stay home, read, play games, tell stories, and blow smoke rings for a long long time. Because sometimes a hobbit needs to leave their faux temporal bubble and do Something Tookish if they wish their hobbit-holes to last forever.
So, what I’m really trying to say is, Bilbo Baggins is a hero—and not one of those phony comic book heroes, either, but a mundane, everyday kind of hero. He’s just a regular hobbit, like you and I, who trembles with fear, makes excuses, and doesn’t think he can face the dragon—but he tries anyway; that’s what makes Bilbo such an inspirational character.
And thanks to Bilbo, twenty years after middle school, I’m now realizing that I’m no hero and that I myself am full of excuses. I have a whole bottomless bag full of them. And I use them with great precision, all the time, for almost anything that’s not just sitting around playing video games or watching television or doomscrolling on my phone—all things that would be fine if they were actually things I wanted to be doing—but most of the time, I’m doing those things in spite of other things that I’d rather be doing, Tookish things, because I have a desire for more than just doomscrolling and consuming media. I want to learn how to play an instrument, I want to be a better father, I want to write more often, and so on. But all this stuff is hard, scary, dragon-esque, so I retreat into my hobbit-hole, my faux temporal bubble, and I never do anything Tookish.
So, yeah, I’m no Bilbo Baggins—but I’m realizing now, as I’m typing this out, that maybe I don’t need to be. Besides, I can’t be Bilbo anyway, because I’m 6’2”, have rounded ears and mostly hairless feet, and I definitely cannot eat six meals a day—not without getting very sick, at least—so maybe becoming Bilbo is a bit unrealistic, maybe, instead, I just need to adopt some of his Tookish qualities.
The question is—how?
V, Disclaimer
“Many character names, places, events and other elements from The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, including the titles of those works, are trademarked by Middle-earth Enterprises, LLC.”
—The Tolkien Estate
Before we go any further, I want to clarify something important: From that last chapter, you may have picked up some notion that I look down on hobbies like playing video games or watching television or whatever—but that would be an incorrect assumption. I see all that stuff as akin to reading a book. They’re all hobbies that people find comfort in, and that’s all that matters for the purposes of this essay: These things provide comfort. They are hobbit-holes. And who am I, really, to say that someone should leave their hobbit-hole? I am not trying to cast judgment on anyone who enjoys partaking in these hobbit-hole hobbies; in fact, I partake in these hobbit-hole hobbies myself, quite liberally, all the time, so I’m really in no position to judge.
But (yes, there’s a but) these hobbit-hole hobbies, which provide so much comfort, are often partaken in despite other things that the partaker might want (or need) to be doing instead. I know, personally, I’m constantly fighting this inner battle of, “I’m playing video games right now, but I really need to be writing, but I feel like I have writer’s block, so I’m just going to keep playing video games instead.” And the dissonance this causes feels unpleasant, so I often just double-down on video games to distract myself further from the unpleasant dissonance, which is a loop that only ends up causing more dissonance, relieved only once I start doing the thing I felt like I needed to be doing in the first place.
But the real point I’m trying to make here is that “video games” as the distraction could be replaced with anything else in my previous example, as the distraction doesn’t matter—the distraction isn’t the thing making the excuses; the thing making the excuses is actually me, myself, and I. Furthermore, it’s important to note that this “thing I need to be doing” (in my case, “writing”) is totally subjective and that any cultural standard that tries to assign greater worth to one activity over another (such as writing being of greater worth than playing video games, for example) is just that: a cultural standard, which is subjective, meaning you should analyze it and decide for yourself if that’s what you need (or want) to be doing. Of course, arguments could be put forth that one hobby is indeed greater than the other, but that’s not the purpose of this essay. I am not trying to open that can of worms here.
What I’m ultimately trying to get at with this prolix parenthetical is that your personal “thing I need to be doing” is going to be unique to you—it’s totally your own thing, something only you know. It could be writing, it could be painting, it could be spending time with your family, it could be applying for a new job, and it could even be playing video games. It could be anything. I don’t know the thing that you actually need to be doing, and I don’t pretend to know, but I do know that there is something that you need to be doing, and I know that you’re deeply passionate about that thing, and I know that you know what that thing is, and I also know that perhaps sometimes you make excuses for not doing that thing—or maybe you don’t (only you would know)—but I do know that I certainly do, make excuses, that is.
So let’s move on.
VI, The Four-Step Path
“Be good, take care of yourselves—and DON’T LEAVE THE PATH!”
—Gandalf, The Hobbit
So, back to the question: How do I become more Tookish?
Well, Bilbo Baggins had the advantage of being born a Took, which, unfortunately, is an advantage that we, as humans, do not have. But actually, I don’t believe that Bilbo’s Took bloodline had anything to do with him going on his adventure—I think that’s just an excuse that other hobbits use, a way to otherize hobbits who don’t conform to the play-it-safe, stay-at-home hobbit standard—“He’s not like us hobbits, he’s a Took!”—when all hobbits, deep down, want to go on adventures but are scared, just like Bilbo was, yet don’t know how to deal with it other than by blaming the urge for adventure on some evil foreign gene.
And besides, attributing someone’s character and choices to some sort of ancient bloodline is a little too deterministic for my tastes, and it promotes the idea that certain bloodlines excel at certain things, which leads to some pretty nasty ethical conclusions—the entire concept of race itself being rather problematic already. So, we’ll keep the “Tookish” adjective because it sounds great, but we’ll throw out the bloodline part, because we don’t need it.
Bilbo’s choice to leave The Shire had nothing to do with his Took bloodline, but instead, his own ability to recognize when he’s making excuses and his ability to exercise good old-fashioned free will to overcome those excuses; and Tolkien made this clear in the text, because throughout The Hobbit, Bilbo constantly wishes to go home, often saying things like, “Why, O why did I ever leave my hobbit-hole!” and “I wish I was back in my hobbit-hole by my own warm fireside with the lamp shining!” and so on. Yet, despite all this, he pushes on, to the Lonely Mountain.
So, with that in mind, maybe the first step to becoming more Tookish is looking for excuses or recognizing when I’m making excuses, which is actually a lot harder than it sounds because making excuses feels really good at the time—which is why I make them—but they never feel good later, upon analysis, if I choose to analyze them, which I often don’t, because that requires me to confront my own darkness, and that’s uncomfortable. But usually, if I’m having trouble figuring out how to recognize if excuses are preventing me from doing something I truly want to be doing, I’ve found that it’s actually a lot easier than it seems: I simply close my eyes and think about the thing I want to be doing—but not the thing specifically, more so how that thing makes me feel. I think stuff like, “Does it make me feel nervous?” or “Does it fill me with dread?” or “In my mind’s eye, does it look like a big dragon?” or “Is there dissonance there?” And if there is dissonance there, then excuses are bound to be nearby; and by that point on the path, I have usually pinpointed about ten excuses already. In fact, I’ve found that the more cognitive dissonance associated with a thing, the more important that thing usually is to me; almost as if cognitive dissonance is like a psychic smoke detector of sorts.
Once that’s done, the second step is to take note of all the excuses. As an example, the next time I’m playing video games or whatever, and I feel the urge to do that special thing I need to be doing—like learning how to play guitar, which is one of the things I’ve always fantasized about—I’m going to take note of what I tell myself. It may be something simple like, “I’m too tired to do that right now,” or it may be something more complicated, like, “It’s too hard. The world isn’t made for people like me. I will not change. I have too many things going on. I’m scared. People are going to laugh at me. There’s not enough time. I’ve got deep childhood trauma. I’m antisocial. I cannot change. I can’t. I just can’t.”
Regardless of how simple or complicated the excuses may be, the third step is always to turn each excuse into a question, essentially putting the excuse on trial, forcing it to prove itself. For example: Is learning guitar really too hard? If so, how are so many other people doing it? Am I truly less talented than all these people who can play guitar, some of whom seem pretty dimwitted? Does that mean that I myself am incredibly dimwitted? And so on.
The fourth step is to start answering these questions rationally. For example: Maybe learning how to play an instrument is hard for everyone at first, and those who are good at it just stuck with it and practiced consistently. Maybe this is why even someone as stupid as Kid Rock can play guitar. Following this logic, it makes sense that those who have practiced something I haven’t are better at it than me, so maybe I’m not so dimwitted after all. Perhaps I’m just full of excuses, headfirst in the bottomless bag? And now I’m a little bit closer to becoming motivated to learn how to play guitar.
But even at this point, I’m still full of doubt. I might tell myself something like, “Well, I’ve tried guitar before and failed,” but this too is just another excuse that has to be dealt with in the same way as all the other excuses, by following the same process of breaking down the excuse’s logic or lack thereof. For example: There’s this idea that some people are just amazing at whatever they try from the start, as if they were born to be musicians, writers, painters, philosophers, or whatever. But I don’t believe any of this is true. It’s far more likely that a celebrated author, musician, or whoever only got there because they started, stuck with it, and improved over time. In fact, I’m confident most celebrated artists weren’t very good (using “good” loosely here) early on and probably had many of the same doubts I have. I doubt anyone—even a savant—is good at something the first time they try it; these are Hollywood myths, historical legends built around cults of personality that only formed after the subject of the cult had practiced enough to get good at the thing they’re known for. It follows that failing at something once doesn’t mean I’ll never be good at it—though, if I keep telling myself otherwise, I might never be good at it because doubt is a self-fulfilling prophecy, especially if I give in to it.
So, to recap, the four-step path to becoming more Tookish is the following: 1) recognize when you’re making excuses, 2) note each excuse, 3) turn each excuse into a question, and 4) answer those questions rationally.
However, this is still not enough to do Something Tookish. All I’ve done, by utilizing this four-step path, is increase my cognitive dissonance, because even though I just broke down several of my excuses for not learning how to play guitar, I’m still not learning how to play guitar; I’m just extra aware of the fact that I’m headfirst in the bottomless bag, hence the increased cognitive dissonance. But this is intentional, because increased cognitive dissonance is a good thing, as cognitive dissonance is uncomfortable, and the more uncomfortable I become, the more willing I am to do Something Tookish to get rid of that cognitive dissonance.
But it turns out that simply recognizing the irrationality of my excuses is one thing, while actually doing the thing that those excuses are preventing me from doing is a whole other thing entirely.
VII, The Fifth & Final Step
“So comes snow after fire, and even dragons have their ending!”
—Bilbo Baggins, The Hobbit
Now that I’ve flipped my excuses into questions, answered those questions, and revealed my excuses to be more or less irrational, the fifth step is turning each of those excuses into Tookish Affirmations, or little mantras that promote Tookish behavior. And it just so happens that I have a whole list of excuses right there at the top of this essay, in one long run-on paragraph, that are perfect fodder for Tookish Affirmations. So that’s what I’ll do—turn each of those excuses into Tookish Affirmations.
“I didn't sign up for this.” Neither did Bilbo nor anyone else, but lesser hobbits have risen to the occasion, so I can too. “It’s too hard.” Everything is hard starting out; rendering something easy is just a matter of practice, time, and patience. “I’m a hands-on learner.” Last time I checked, I have hands, so I don’t see the problem. “I don’t have any experience.” And I never will until I try. “I’m too young.” Which means the joys of many first-times are still ahead of me. “College is too expensive.” Loans and grants exist; money is a construct. “I don’t want to go into debt.” Money is a cultural meme, a construct; debt is invisible numbers that can’t hurt me. Defaulting and bankruptcy exist—intangible numbers will not keep me from my dreams. “Degrees are useless anyway.” Achievements should not be measured by their tangible usefulness but in the fulfillment derived from the achievement itself and the ability to say: I did it, here’s the proof. “There are too many options.” And therefore so many opportunities. “I’m dyslexic.” Challenge accepted. “I’m not ready.” Nobody is. “I’ll never get a good job.” Jobs are just a means to an end, and my end is achieving my dreams, most of which exist outside of my profession—so who cares? “It’s all nepotism, cronyism, soulless networking.” If I’m trying to get a job somewhere where this is the case, then I’m at the wrong job, and it’s time to expand my horizons. “I won’t play the corporate game.” But I will play my own game. “The world isn’t made for people like me.” The world isn’t made for anyone, and this isn’t a bad thing—it just means that I can mold my reality, make it work for me. “I will not change.” I don’t need to change; everything I need is already inside me, waiting to be released. I am full of potential, and realizing my potential doesn’t suddenly erase my unique character; if anything, it adds to it. “I have too many things going on.” Which just means I need to get better at prioritization. “I’m scared.” But I’m not alone—Bilbo and many others were afraid too; but if they can do it, so can I. “People are going to laugh at me.” Let them. Who cares? I never liked most people to begin with. “There’s not enough time.” Time is an illusion; the only time now is party time. “I’ve got deep childhood trauma.” Don’t we all? “I’m antisocial.” I can adapt. “I was never trained for this.” Doesn’t matter, training starts now. “It’s not my wheelhouse.” Wheelhouse is a cringe corporate buzzword (reminder: stop using cringe corporate buzzwords). “I’d rather stay home.” But to keep my house, I have to leave it once in a while, doing something I might not want to do, so that when I’m done, I can return home to my cozy hobbit-hole and relax without fear or stress. “I’m comfortable here.” Anyone can get comfortable anywhere via hobbit homeostasis. “The outside world is cruel.” Maybe so, but I try not to be, and what goes around comes around. “The system is working against me.” I am working against the system. “I’m too stressed out.” My mind can be tamed; things never turn out as badly as they seem in my head. “I’m being discriminated against.” Obstacles only make me stronger. “I’m depressed.” Then I need to get out of the house, experience something new, stop being idle, give my mind something else to think about. “But I don’t like going out.” Yet staying inside too long makes me depressed, so circle back to the previous excuse. “I didn’t choose to be born.” No one does; that’s just the way it goes. “It’s not fair.” I hate to sound like my father, but life isn’t fair, kid. And I can adapt. “Everything is a scam.” And I’m smart enough to see through the scam and work around it. “It’s all luck.” I make my own luck. “Only psychopaths are successful in this capitalist netherworld.” I’m not part of the capitalist netherworld; I’m part of my own world, which I mold to my liking, using my own free will. “I won’t compromise my values.” If I feel as if I have to compromise my values to achieve my goals, then my goals need to be reevaluated. “I don’t want to be a slave to the wage.” My mind cannot be shackled. “My morals are superior.” If I’m making this excuse, then I need to check myself, because any moral system that proclaims one person to be superior to another is a dubious one. “I’m doing better than most people my age anyway.” But that’s no reason to stop now. “Adulting is too confusing.” Yet there are many adults, many of whom are doing just fine, so I can too; in fact, I can do even better. “I’ve tried it. It didn’t work out. It never works out.” No one is good at something the first time they try it. “Everything should be free anyway.” True, but these are the cards I have been dealt, so I will adapt. “It’s not fair.” We’ve been over this. “It’s all stupid.” If everything is stupid, then nothing is stupid. “I’m too old.” Which only makes me wiser. “I can’t focus. I have ADHD.” My hyperactivity and ever-shifting focus allow me to stay energized and catch things others do not, which is more akin to a superpower than a neurodevelopmental disorder. “There are plenty of people just like me; they’re doing fine.” And there are plenty of people just like me doing much better, too, so why stop now? “Learning an instrument is too complicated.” Writing ten-thousand-word essays about The Hobbit is pretty complicated too, but I’m doing that, so there. “It takes too much time.” Yet I spend at least three hours a day looking at my phone, so it seems like there’s a lot of time waiting to be reclaimed for better things. “I lack the hand-eye coordination. I’m clumsy.” Maybe so, but with practice and dedication, I won’t be as much. “Some people are born gifted; I’m not one of those people.” Genetics do not define my character or motivations. I have free will. I can do whatever I want. “I’m dumb.” I’ve met dumber. “I can’t write.” Yet I’m writing right now. “I have writer’s block.” So I’m just going to throw stuff at the figurative wall and see what sticks. “No one is going to read my stuff anyway.” That’s not the point, that was never the point. “Just thinking about it makes me anxious.” My anxiety is unpleasant, but it forces me into a state of heightened awareness, allowing me to think more critically, anticipate challenges, pinpoint flaws, and correct them efficiently. “Talking to people makes me nervous.” But I am an interesting person with interesting things to share, and I’m sure the people I’m talking to are a little nervous as well, so it all evens out. “It’s not my fault.” It might not be my fault, but I can still do something about it. “It’s my parents’ fault. They didn’t prepare me for this.” My parents are regular people who make mistakes, like all parents, and I love them, and I know they want to see me happy, and following my dreams makes me happy, so I’m going to follow my dreams. “It’s not my responsibility.” If everyone thought this way, the world would fall to ruin in seconds. “Someone else should handle it.” See previous Tookish Affirmation. “I’d probably fail anyway.” Failing is a powerful teacher, and I’ve yet to fail the same way twice. “I’m not that smart.” Intelligence is an arbitrary metric, defined differently by different people and cultures, which means, ultimately, intelligence is subjective, and therefore pretty much everyone is a genius, including me.
And last but certainly not least: “What's the point, anyway? Everyone dies. The universe will end. Everything is meaningless. Success can't be measured. It's all subjective. Nothing matters. I’d rather stay home, smoke weed, play games, and read. I just want to be left alone. I’m not hurting anyone. Who cares?” And this one seems like the smoking gun, the perfect excuse to just zone out completely, ignore everything, including my own aspirations and dreams, because, hey, I’m just going to die anyway, so what worth are achievements or talents or anything, really? But the thing about this excuse is that it actually works both ways: If everything is meaningless, and everyone dies, and everything is subjective, this actually means that everything is in a state of flux, meaning everything is both meaningful and meaningless at the same time, which means this is all word games, which means that meaning is actually a matter of one’s perspective or attitude. And if I consider which attitude actually makes me feel better in the long term (and often in the short term, too), it’s the attitude that everything is meaningful, because this is all there is, I’ll never get another life like this ever again—and I do have hopes and dreams and aspirations that I want to fulfill; and I know that in the past, when I’ve achieved some of those dreams—like publishing a long essay I spent a lot of time on—I’ve felt much better than when I simply thought about writing the essay but held myself back by telling myself “everything is meaningless, so what does it matter?”
And besides, if everything is meaningless, then what am I making excuses for? Why am I doing anything? Clearly, I believe deep down that there is meaning in the things I’m doing; otherwise, I wouldn’t be doing anything at all. I would just wither away and die, because who cares. But here I am, doing things. In fact, the assertion that “everything is meaningless” is actually a meaningless assertion, undermined by its own premise—that everything is meaningless—therefore, the assertion itself is meaningless and thus can be safely ignored, by its own admission. This is the paradox of meaninglessness.
And as far as “I’m not hurting anyone,” well, I know that’s not true, because every time I make an excuse, I’m depriving myself of the feeling of fulfillment that I know for a fact—from experience—brings me joy. And, ultimately, every time I make an excuse for not facing the trial, I am letting the dragon linger in this world a little while longer, which just puts me at risk of being burned alive by the great worm’s fiery breath later on, and that would definitely hurt me, so I’m not not hurting anyone, because I’m hurting myself, in a deeply profound way, even if it doesn’t seem like it at the time, because of the short-term soothing effect of excuse-making.
I realize some of these Tookish Affirmations may sound like big-time cope, like I’m just saying empty platitudes or something to make myself feel better, but they’re only as empty as I believe them to be. These Tookish Affirmations exist to bolster both my self-esteem and motivation, to help me achieve my goals and follow my dreams. And while some of these Tookish Affirmations may not work, and some may seem hokey or self-helpy, if they get me closer to achieving my true goals, then they’re serving their purpose, regardless of their hokeyness or even their veracity—because if I can trick myself into believing that I can do something, then I might as well be able to do that thing. Believing in myself is just as good, as it will force me to start doing the things I really want to do, which brings me closer to achieving my goals and living my dreams. And if I fail at first, I will just get up and try again.
I will fake it until I make it.
That’s what Bilbo Baggins did. He was just an ordinary hobbit, like you and I, who loved his hobbit-hole, but he dreamed of something more, he dreamed of adventure. And when it came knocking on his door in the form of one wizard and thirteen dwarves, he took a chance; he was neither an adventurer nor a burglar, but he faked it, and by the end, he was stealing treasure right from under the great dragon’s nose—and if a hobbit can do something like that, then so can I.
So I think I’m ready for the final step now, but first I need to buy an acoustic guitar.
It’s time for me to do Something Tookish.
If this essay made you feel something, please let me know via email at f0rrest@pm.me.