You Can(’t) Pick Yourself Up By Your Bootstraps
It’s impossible to be self-made, but you do it anyway.
Baron Munchausen rides around town on his horse, showing off his pigtails.
Yes, everyone hates goddamn Baron and his ridiculous pigtails, but there he goes — riding through town every goddamn day.
Baron knows that everyone can’t stand him, but he can’t help himself. He’s proud of his pigtails. He’s got good genes, and his barber says he’ll never go bald.
Bedsides, the butcher’s daughter likes his pigtails, despite what everyone else thinks. One day, he approaches her. “Do you want to go see the spring flowers with me?”
She blushes.
“Get lost, you pigtail-having idiot,” says the butcher.
But Baron keeps his eyes on her. Finally, she nods.
The next day, Baron gazes at the wildflowers while riding on his trusty horse. He’s on the way to pick up the butcher’s daughter, but the road is very muddy from the winter thaw.
They fall into a mud hole. No matter how much they thrash, they only sink deeper. And it looks like no one is coming to save them. Maybe he should just drop dead since everyone hates him and his pigtails so much…
The mud rises to his chin. Things are looking grim.
Then, he has an idea.
He pulls on his pigtails so goddamn hard that he yanks himself free from the mud. His horse, too.
That’s Actually Where ‘Bootstrapping’ Comes From
That ridiculous story is actually where the term “pull yourself up by your bootstraps” comes from.
Well, kinda. I read the summary and then added some… color. But the main parts are there — a man named Baron pulls himself from the mud by his pigtails.
From there, there are scattered anecdotes about using your “bootstraps” to pull yourself up — just as impossible as using your pigtails.
That’s also how we get the term “boot up” when talking about a computer.
It refers to a seeming paradox: You need a program to start a program. So, which program starts the program starting program? And so on.
Thus, we still say “boot” a computer to indicate that the process should be impossible. Isn’t that awesome?
It’s the same problem that you’re getting at when you ask, “What came first, the chicken or the egg?”
The Chicken or The Egg?
The answer is simple: the chicken and the egg simultaneously yanked themselves out of non-existence by a seemingly impossible “bootstrapping” effect.
I know what you’re thinking — evolution. But “evolution” is a pretty simplistic answer to this question. Go back far enough, you get single-celled things that no one could have ever guessed would possibly make neither a chicken nor an egg. Go back a little farther than that, you get soup-ish “pre-life.” Just some bumpin’ molecules who were lookin’ mighty protein-like.
Fast-forward a billion (ish) years later, you have a full-on chicken and the egg it hatched from.
That’s all to say: how the hell?
Pick Yourself Up By Your Goddamn Bootstraps!
When I was growing up in small-town southern USA, you sometimes heard people say this. “He needs to pick himself up by his bootstraps!”
It’s basically an old-fashioned conservative saying — so cliche that you can’t even say it in good faith anymore. People still do, but it’s easy to laugh it off.
When I went off to college, I learned that those people were foolish!
Pulling yourself up by your own bootstraps is physically impossible, you hillbillies!
Systemic Oppression Stole My Bootstraps
In college, I learned about the millions of things that oppress us.
Economic inequality, systemic racism, familial trauma, and so on and so on. I was pretty much at the bottom of the list of oppression since I was white and a male. Still, I figured out ways I could feel like a victim. Maybe I had ADHD, or maybe slight autism…
I know I’m teasing these arguments, but the thing is — they’re true. Everyone is oppressed, and some of us are oppressed a lot more than others.
You, reader, are terribly oppressed. You’re likely in some minority group. Even if you're white and male, you might be old. Even if none of that, in all likelihood, your grandparents were probably still dirt farmers (as opposed to having some generational wealth).
We are not as well off as we could be. Hell, most of us could be more attractive… taller… could stand about a dozen IQ points or so.
Here’s the point I’m making: we did not choose most of what we were given in this life.
Let’s make it a lot worse: improving your situation is akin to a computer trying to start itself. Who’s going to self-improve the self which is improving?
Bootstrapping Is Impossible… Before You Do It
The same strange “bootstrapping” effect is happening right now.
You’re taking in information and then doing something amazing… you’re thinking. How does that work? Literally, we have no idea. Not just me — no one has a goddamn (word of the day) clue how we manage to think.
Who’s the thinker watching the thinking and reporting back what you’re thinking? What thinker is watching the thinking-watcher… I’m already having a seizure.
Life is full of absolutely strange paradoxes. The seemingly impossible is nearly always happening.
If you want something better out of your life… just pull yourself up by your bootstraps.
Just know that it’s technically impossible.
That shouldn't stop you.