Motivated by boredom, I decided to walk across the house to the TV room, where my roommate and his friends were watching a movie. I plopped myself on the couch next to a guy named Todd, who had scooted over to make room. I instantly recognized what they were watching as soon as I saw a young Anakin Skywalker piloting in a pod race. Although Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace was one of the movies I disliked the most in the Skywalker Saga, it was embedded in the trilogy I enjoy the most (Episodes I-III, also known as the Prequel Trilogy).
What makes The Phantom Menace so compelling is in the title. Without giving too much away (although I think spoiling this movie is fair play considering how long it’s been available), the idea that there’s this thing that’s practically invisible and threatens to harm you is an amazing concept. The worst type of enemy is one you can’t see. Days after watching this film with people (and suffering through Jar Jar Binks), I realized that I had my own phantom menace in my life. It wasn’t necessarily as dangerous as the one in the movie, but still something worth my attention and effort to address.
My phantom menace was the queues that were waiting on me.
I’m one of those people who likes to be in the know; some might say I like to be cultured. The thing about culture, though, is that there’s so much of it. Luckily (sarcastic tone), we live in a digital age where it’s easier to track all the culture you need to know. My smartphone is packed with apps to keep track of what books I need to read (Goodreads), what funny videos, memes, and trending stories I need to store in my memory bank (Instagram, TikTok, and X), what music albums I need to listen to (Spotify), what movies I should eventually watch (Letterboxd), and even what interesting YouTube videos I need to circle back to when I have time (YouTube — specifically my Watch Later playlist). This doesn’t even include the video games I want to play, which are listed on a spreadsheet I made, categorizing each game by console and approximate playthrough times (thank you, How Long to Beat).
Lists aren’t bad. In fact, I think lists are great. I like to think of them as bringing order to chaos. Lists can help us organize, make sense of, and prioritize things. I function best with a list; otherwise, I’m overwhelmed by all the things I could do. A good list promotes good life management. Where it becomes an issue is when lists add to the things you need to tend to.
And these lists, or queues, are the phantom menace I’m talking about. Life already comes with a list. Relationally, I’m many things to people (brother, friend, uncle, etc.). I’m also an employee with a list of tasks that come with my role. I own things that need maintenance and care — clothes that need to be cleaned regularly, a car that needs proper care, miscellaneous things that need to be organized, a newsletter that needs regular updating 😉. When you consider all that life puts in front of you already, a long list of books just feels like adding more weighted plates to an already heavy load.
While listening to a language learning tool, the instructor was explaining a concept about ownership. I don’t know why this particular lesson got so deeply philosophical, but he explained that ownership is much more of a two-way street than we care to admit. He went on to say we don’t just own things — they own us. All of our belongings require our care, attention, and ability to maintain them. We have a responsibility to tend to the things we own, and that responsibility, in a way, makes it so we serve the things we own.
While I was chipping away, trying to create order around the obvious, there was my queue, lurking in the shadows, whispering at me to tend to it, and adding to my anxiety. Unlike the characters in the movie, I have an opportunity to stop this phantom menace. I’m not bound to any queue and its (what feels like) trajectory toward infinity. I can simply choose not to follow it. I can choose to set boundaries. I can walk in the other direction and decide that the small voice beckoning me to it is just a figment of my imagination — a phantom without the power to menace.