The Importance of Losing Your Reputation

(On Bilbo Baggins ‘The Burglar’)

‘This is a story of how a Baggins had an adventure, and found himself doing and saying things altogether unexpected.  He may have lost the neighbours’ respect, but he gained – well, you will see whether he gained anything in the end.’

I recently had a dream guest-starring a friend who was also strangely Friedrich Nietzsche (not at all strange if you knew him).  We had just robbed a bank and were engaged in a thrilling car chase with the police.  Bags of cash in hand, we climbed a tower and hid in an old monastery.  Sensible.  It was Easter day.  The monks were filing into a chapel for early morning mass.  One of the monks stopped and spoke to me: ‘This is the meaning of crucifixion and resurrection.’  I knew the monk was referring to the burglary.  I woke up.  And I think I understood the dream.  There was something about dying to my moral-ego that was necessary in actualising my greater, truer and freer self.  Something nice, amenable and pleasing had to be crucified in order for resurrection to take place.   

After my strange dream I thought of Bilbo, and connected it to the awkward and uncomfortable fact he needed to become a burglar to complete his quest.

‘You can say Expert Treasure-hunter instead of Burglar if you like.  Some of them do.  It’s all the same to us.’

It seems perhaps that the quest always demands sacrifice.  And one of the hardest things to sacrifice is our moral ego.  Our reputation.  What others think of us.  Our ethical self. 

I think Nietzsche’s appearance (excellently casted as my friend) is probably significant.  Often misunderstood as being anti-ethical, Nietzsche observes that we can use morality as an excuse for what is in fact fear.  I can easily convince myself that embarking on my individual quest is irresponsible and immoral.  It’s selfish!  And so, security, respectability and self-sacrifice get confused for goodness.  When in fact, it’s fear.

Something I have noticed about stepping out on the road to The Lonely Mountain, is that it does feel immoral at times.  It involves letting people down.  Looking bad.  Despite much internal resistance, I have had to grow much more of a spine.  Put up boundaries.  Be less nice (which, incidentally, is the working title of a twelve-step-programme I’m thinking of starting for people chronically addicted to being relentlessly polite, cheerful and charming.  ‘Be Less Nice’ or ‘Polite People Anonymous’ - I can’t decide). 

It’s not easy being less of a people-pleaser.  It’s sometimes quite horrible in fact.  The high one gets from others’ approval is like nothing else (on, and off, the market).  And when that approval-drug is withdrawn, it feels like a painfully sad death.  But I think Bilbo teaches us that it is a necessary stage on the road to the treasure we long for in the heart of The Lonely Mountain.