5 Things you can learn from the movie Fight Club

Fight Club was released more than 20 years ago and it bombed at the box office. After two decades, it has developed a cult following across the globe as the movie is still discussed in various online forums.

I was 18 when I watched it for the first time and I was blown away. I have watched it more than 25 times since then. As an 18-year-old, I couldn’t relate to the central character played by Edward Norton. But as I enter into the early thirties, the movie can’t get more relatable than ever.

If I have to write about Fight Club for a year, I could end up writing an entire book. But, I will sum it up into 5 key things that I learnt from the movie.

“We are consumers. We are the by-products of lifestyle obsession.”

Every quote by Tyler Durden (played by Brad Pitt) gives a dopamine hit. He doesn’t speak of things that we never knew, but he speaks the truth that we have kept it under the rug. It’s no secret that we have been eternally buying things that we never needed in the first place. If you start making a list, you will be able to clear the clutter around your house as well as your head.

The compelling advertisements on the TV convince us that this is the solution to your problem. It’s only after we have bought it, we realise that we never had a problem in the first place. You could still be fine with one less pair of shoes or the extra-wide flat-screen television set.

In a particular scene, Edward Norton is seen ordering the right set of furniture for his living room — a set that will define his personality. In another scene, his alter ego, Tyler Durden burns down his well-designed condo only to move out into a dilapidated structure. Things that he would think that mattered to him, eventually stop making any sense.

We associate our materialistic belongings with happiness. It’s only after living the life of discomfort he realises those things never gave him what he was looking for — happiness.

“On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero”

• We do better when we have nothing to lose

Tyler barges into a general store and pulls a shotgun on the store manager, a young Chinese boy. He threatens the chap to pursue his goal of becoming a Vet in six weeks, else he would end up dead. This is a situation we face every day, to make a change or to maintain the status quo, except there’s no Tyler Durden to hold a gun at our head.

We always hold ourselves back from doing something because we have something to lose. You are not writing that novel or making that video because you are concerned about judgements. You assume you have a certain position in society that you might lose because people would laugh at you. Once you convince yourself that you are nothing, you will be free to do anything.

“We’re the middle children of history, man. No purpose or place. We have no Great War. No Great Depression. Our Great War’s a spiritual war… our Great Depression is our lives”

If nothing gets you, boredom will. This is more of a revelation than learning. Now, Edward Norton, the narrator is an average American guy with an average job. Although he doesn’t have any real sorrow, he suffers from insomnia. He is so bored that his alter ego floats the idea of starting a fight club. He gets his face smashed over and over again, night after night and still finds it more amusing than a desk job.

Modern jobs have made us rethink the purpose of our lives. Are we supposed to spend our lives in front of the computer? Or selling a structured product that gets you a hefty bonus? Eventually, the law of diminishing marginal utility kicks in; and the more of what we do, the lesser we want.

“Advertising has us chasing cars and clothes, working jobs we hate so we can buy shit we don’t need”

My last point resonates with my first point. There is a huge amount of external influence that drives our choices. If I have to talk in millennial parlance, it induces a FOMO factor (Fear Of Mission Out). We have been chasing things that sell us happiness.

You buy a particular brand of underwear and you will be the coolest guy in your class; else you will feel insecure if it shows off accidentally and you are not wearing the right kind. Here, the right kind means something that makes him feel like a man. The accomplishment of being a man — happiness.

You keep buying stuff for small bouts of happiness. Happiness - that was sold to you by million-dollar corporations only because of your insecurities that were created by marketing campaigns.

“You met me at a very strange time in my life”

The movie ends with this quote as the narrator gets rid of his alter ego — Tyler Durden. Now, he doesn’t need to be someone else and he could be whatever he wants to be without creating an alternate image.

We all have a Tyler Durden suppressed inside us.

The article was originally published in this blog.