Fight Club, directed by David Fincher, was released to theaters in 1999 and pretty much bombed. I didn’t see it in the theater. However, when it was released to DVD it gathered a cult following. I’d consider it more of a generational following since I barely know any Generation X men who haven’t seen it. I know plenty of women who are fans too, but that’s hit or miss. It’s one of my favorite movies. I recently read the 1996 book on which the movie was based, by Chuck Palahniuk. I’ve often pondered why I like it so much.

This is your life and it’s ending one minute at a time

The protagonist of the story is a young urban professional man whose ambivalence for life and work leaves him depressed, consumeristic, and sleepless. Even though he is physically healthy, he joins group therapy sessions for the terminally ill so he can release his emotional numbness and feel something authentic. Shortly thereafter, he meets Tyler Durden. For those of you who haven’t seen the film, and may be inspired to watch it for the first time due to this blog, I will spare you the primary plot spoiler.

Tyler is everything the protagonist is not. He is cool, confident, unstressed, and constantly spouts his own custom blend of Generation X Nihilism. The best way to experience the essence of Tyler Durden in this blog article is for me to offer you some of his most famous quotes:

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

It’s only after you’ve lost everything that you’re free to do anything.

You’re not your job. You’re not how much money you have in the bank. You’re not the car you drive. You’re not the contents of your wallet. You’re not your [explicative] khakis. You’re the all-singing, all-dancing crap of the world.

We buy things we don’t need with money we don’t have to impress people we don’t like.

Advertising has us chasing cars and clothes, working jobs we hate so we can buy [stuff] we don’t need. 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. We’ve all been raised on television to believe that one day we’d all be millionaires, and movie gods, and rock stars. But we won’t. And we’re slowly learning that fact. And we’re very, very pissed off.

The solution portrayed in the film and book is violence and self-destruction in Fight Clubs followed by terrorism and the eventual downfall of modern civilization through Project Mayhem. I think I like the film because the problem resonates with me, even if the solution doesn’t. I’m not a violent person. I don’t go to the gym to blow off steam. The closest thing I do is listen to Rage Against the Machine on my way home from work. That’s about it. So if Fight Club and Project Mayhem aren’t the real solutions, what is?

The things you own end up owning you

Let’s go back to the beginning. The protagonist is on the treadmill of life, working to make money and spending money for temporal material satisfaction. He hates his job. He likes his stuff. With insomnia, he is neither fully asleep nor fully awake. “Everything is so far away, a copy of a copy of a copy.” The consumer drive is real. We all think that we are immune to advertising but we aren’t. I purposefully limit my television viewing, in part, to limit exposing my subconscious to too much advertising. I also intentionally drive an older-than-average car and live in a smaller-than-average house. It doesn’t solve the consumer drive for more stuff, but it helps keep it at bay.

But now for the main purpose for writing this blog article: How do we solve the fact that the protagonist hates his job? That strikes a chord with me. It’s actually the #1 reason and singular purpose why I wanted to get into leadership in the first place. People spend so much time at work. They shouldn’t do it at a company they don’t believe in and they shouldn’t work for a boss they don’t like, but people do it all the time. Over time, they become like the protagonist in Fight Club: numb, ambivalent, and cynical. Work shouldn’t be a means to an end. Work has an intrinsic purpose in itself. I’m determined to maintain it for myself and create that possibility for others.

That’s why I’m a leader: to be a good boss, to inspire purpose in others, to align a team to a worthwhile mission, and to make work worth doing. Tyler Durden says self-improvement is the problem and self-destruction is the answer. Self-improvement driven by fear and want is empty, but self-improvement driven by servanthood, passion, humility, and mastery is altogether good.

I am Jack’s smirking revenge

The genesis of Fight Club is when Tyler Durden says, “I want you to do me a favor. I want you to hit me as hard as you can… I don’t want to die without any scars.” I too don’t want to die without any scars. I don’t care if they are literal or figurative. I want to be tested to the limit and pressed hard. I want to try, and fail, and try again. I like to take risks and see what happens. Read my article on The GoPro Approach to Leadership for more thoughts on that.

This isn’t a how-to blog article. I’ve covered how-to’s on various ways to be a good leader many times. This article is about why. Just like Tyler Durden says, we are a generation without purpose and too many of us hate our jobs. Unlike Tyler Durden, I don’t think we should start up a bunch of Fight Clubs, and then go tear down society. Instead, we should be real leaders who inspire, but not demand, authenticity, vulnerability, passion, love, drive, compassion, tenacity, collaboration, inter-dependency, and achievement. That’s what our generation needs.

I know this because Tyler knows this

Sometimes our team members act like the protagonist. They are compliant. They do what we tell them. They stop thinking. They stop trying so hard. They keep quiet. When that happens, we need to turn up the Tyler Durden in our leadership style. Confront team members with startling truth, just like Tyler does. Focus on what is most important and forget everything else: “No fear! No distractions! The ability to let that which does not matter truly slide!” Let go of perfectionism and blame: “I say never be complete, I say stop being perfect, I say let’s evolve, let the chips fall where they may.” Just as Tyler freed the protagonist to be himself, as leaders, we need to free our team members to bring their creativity and do their best work. Just remind yourself, “I know this because Tyler knows this.”

You met me at a very strange time in my life

Most stories have common characters like a hero, a mentor, and a villain. In Fight Club, the mentor becomes the villain. The hero slowly figures that out and spends the last act trying to stop him before it’s too late.

There’s a powerful leadership lesson there. The protagonist would have remained lost had Tyler not intervened. Yet had he kept following him, Tyler would have turned him into a monster. Leaders follow principles more than people. Like the protagonist, know when it’s time to take your own path.

I’ll end this article with a quote from Brad Pitt, who portrayed Tyler Durden in this film: “Fight Club is a metaphor for the need to push through the walls we put around ourselves and just go for it, so for the first time we can experience the pain.”

Like my article and love Fight Club? Please share it with your colleagues. You can’t talk about Fight Club, but you can certainly talk about my blog.

Here are the rules of Fight Club:

1. You do not talk about Fight Club.
2. You DO NOT talk about Fight Club.
3. If someone says “stop,” goes limp, or taps out, the fight is over.
4. Only two guys to a fight.
5. One fight at a time.
6. No shirts, no shoes.
7. Fights will go on as long as they have to.
8. If this is your first night at Fight Club, you HAVE to fight.