Fight Club

by Chuck Palahniuk

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

• “May I never be complete. May I never be content. May I never be perfect.”

• I just don’t want to die without a few scars, I say. It’s nothing anymore to have a beautiful stock body. You see those cars that are completely stock cherry, right out of a dealer’s showroom in 1955, I always think, what a waste.

• Nothing is static. Even the Mona Lisa is falling apart.

• “Sticking feathers up your butt does not make you a chicken.”

• Worker bees can leave. Even drones can fly away. The queen is their slave. Flowers bloom and die. Wind brings butterflies or snow. A stone won’t notice.

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

• There will be mistakes, and maybe the point is not to forget the rest of yourself if one little part might go bad.

• “I’m breaking my attachment to physical power and possessions because only through destroying myself can I discover the greater power of my spirit.”

• “The liberator who destroys my property is fighting to save my spirit. The teacher who clears all possessions from my path will set me free.”

• “We are the middle children of history, raised by television to believe that someday we’ll be millionaires and movie stars and rock stars, but we won’t. And we’re just learning this fact. So don’t fuck with us.”

• How everything you ever love will reject you or die. Everything you ever create will be thrown away. Everything you’re proud of will end up as trash.

• The men fight the men. Sometimes, the women fight one another. They fight the way they have for centuries. In their world, with little income or wealth, few possessions, and no education or opportunity, it’s a festival they look forward to all year long. Then, when they’re exhausted, the men and woman go to church. And they get married. Being tired isn’t the same as being rich, but most times it’s close enough.