I introduced my wife to Fight Club last night. This is not a movie I’d recommend to everyone – actually, probably not to many. It is a dark film with a lot of language and unrestrained male aggression. That said, there are a number of quotes that I just love. To spare you who have not seen the movie, I’ve posted my favorites below. Let me know what you think. Also, while many quotes are talking about actual brutal fist-fighting, try using the word “fight” for any struggle you have, whether internal or external.
- “This is your life and it’s ending one minute at a time.”
- “Only after disaster can we be resurrected.”
- “Man, I see in fight club the strongest and smartest men who’ve ever lived. I see all this potential, and I see squandering. —-, an entire generation pumping gas, waiting tables; slaves with white collars. Advertising has us chasing cars and clothes, working jobs we hate so we can buy —- 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.”
- “It’s only after we’ve lost everything that we’re free to do anything.”
- “The things you own end up owning you.”
- “After fighting, everything else in your life got the volume turned down.”
- “Without pain, without sacrifice, we would have nothing.”
- “We’re consumers. We are by-products of a lifestyle obsession.”
- “I flipped through catalogs and wondered: What kind of dining set defines me as a person?”
- “I can’t get married – I’m a thirty-year-old boy.”
- “Every word you read of this useless fine print is another second off your life. Don’t you have other things to do? Is your life so empty that you honestly can’t think of a better way to spend these moments? … Prove you’re alive. If you don’t claim your humanity you will become a statistic.”
- “How much can you know yourself if you’ve never been in a fight? I don’t wanna die without any scars.”
I think there is a lot of truth in these lines. A lot of misdirected angst and rage, as well. Though the movie is now 10 years old, I think what it says about society still holds true. Most of us have given our souls to the American dream. Most of us are in a self-induced coma. And most of us are happy to stay that way.
We’ll never grow up if we don’t get out of this cycle we call “living”. Living should be more than merely existing. It should involve struggle and victory. It should involve progress. If we have not made an impact, have we truly lived?
Paul said this, in 2 Cor 4:16-18:
“Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.”
Paul was beat, stoned, shipwrecked, bit by snakes, and imprisoned, yet he persevered. And he called these things “light and momentary troubles”!! I don’t want to diminish any of your current struggles, but have you ever been encircled by people who threw stones at your head until they were convinced you had been killed? Yikes.
I think the following line by Tyler sums up the source of a lot of his rage. While his ultimate conclusion is not accurate, it gives you an idea of what is probably inside the heads of today’s generation:
“Our fathers were our models for God. If our fathers bailed, what does that tell you about God? … You have to consider the possibility that God does not like you. He never wanted you. In all probability, he hates you.”
This statement is not true. But many today think that it is. What are you going to do about that?
You may have put your faith in Jesus. You may have repented and told him you wanted a transformed life. If so, you have new life in Christ. Prove you’re alive. Don’t become another statistic.
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