"Self-improvement is masturbation"

Eyeswears · 2016-12-03T20:35:49+00:00

I think in the context of the film, Tyler is viewing self-improvement entirely through the lens of building muscle by going to a gym and lifting weights. This clashes with his idea of the fights as being the ultimate form of male expression. So to build a Greek god physique by fighting is the only authentic way Tyler can see a man becoming lean and strong, while going to the gym, where there is no confrontation and each person goes to their little corner to work on themselves, all caked in social anxiety and self-absorption, is the epitome of cowardice and desperation.

This is ironic because the fights are all fake. They're staged. You won't die in fight club, and after a brawl, the fighters will embrace each other and tell each other everything is okay. Really, Fight Club is as much masturbation as going to the gym is in Tyler's mind because everything is on rails and bumpers.

They're not really putting anything on the line because the fights are meaningless. They aren't fighting for something they believe in. They're just fighting because it makes them forget how directionless their lives are and how unwilling or incapable they are of figuring out where to go next without becoming sycophants of a personality cult.

Fight Club is nothing more than a self-help cult gone awry and I think Chuck Palahniak knows this. His "nihilism" never strikes me as sincere but as a mockery of people like Tyler who take themselves way too seriously and end up causing even more problems than the ones they had to begin with.

At the end of the day, if you want to be a person worthy of respect from yourself and others, you have to be able to be honest with yourself about what you want, set goals, and work hard and smart against fear and discomfort, and not burn the bridges you traveled across to get to the point where you are now. It's pretty simple, really.

Apexk9 · 2016-12-03T21:53:47+00:00

Self improvement is to get others validation. His message is that a man is improving to pleasure himself not better himself.

conotocaurius · 2016-12-03T20:16:39+00:00

Chuck Palahniuk is pretty close to a nihilist, so of course he feels that self improvement is masturbation.

Just because somebody says something doesn't mean that it's true, right? Fight club is a great flick but don't take every quote in it too seriously.

GreenPiller · 2016-12-03T23:23:20+00:00

"Self destruction is the answer" Going to the gym and self improving felt great. Stroking my ego every time I looked in the mirror, but it was all appearances... I was still pretty beta inside even though I was jacked. Months later I finally got my oneitis and we "fell in love". After a while I found out she was fucking Chad Thundercock behind my back. She put my heart in a blender and ripped it to shreds. After destroying me on the inside I actually feel "indestructible" Nothing scares me anymore, nothing surprises me anymore. Granted its all fiction but before all this I was always wondering what that quote meant but now I know. Imagine the girl you thought was "the one" getting railed and Chad blowing a huge load in her face. Emotional pain makes you a hundred times stronger.

TheInkerman · 2016-12-03T23:53:26+00:00

To some extent the Tyler Durden character is contradictory. He 'lives' in this abandoned house, essentially survives by social parasitism, and actively rejects society's rules and preferred behaviours when not exploiting them.

But then spends 99% of his time enacting this elaborate plan to bring down the society he ostensibly cares so little about.

In a bizarre way he is an extreme version of the Narrator's 'Anger Phase'. He has subconsciously come to reject society's facade of polite behavior and consumerism (arguably a less sexual dynamics focused form of what CH calls the 'Cathedral'), but rather than attempting to change his behaviour to adapt to and thrive in this environment now that he is aware of the 'true' and 'false' rulesets, he sets out to destroy the 'false' one.

Rather than adopt internal change to improve himself, he instead seeks external change; essentially a "Fuck Society" approach. Neither mature nor what TRP ultimately teaches.

The Narrator essentially is still 'beta'. Instead of improving himself he creates a character which will do it for him; which is where this quote by Tyler comes from;

All the ways you wish you could be, that's me. I look like you wanna look, I fuck like you wanna fuck, I am smart, capable, and most importantly, I am free in all the ways that you are not.

The "Self-Improvement is Masturbation" comment from Tyler may even be a form of self-preservation; if the Narrator began to truly try and improve himself internally Tyler would cease to exist.

BigRedRover · 2016-12-03T23:10:40+00:00

Google "chuck palahniuk guts" and read the first result. It's a very quick read, and it might help to give you some more insight on how Palahniuk felt about things. It's also fucking hilarious.

Officer_Dick_Johnson · 2016-12-04T10:00:28+00:00

In my apinion it goes like that…

The quote has 2 parts:

Self improvement is masturbation.

and

Now self destruction...?

About part 1"

The time the book was published (late 90's) and when the movie came out (late early 00's) in that time frame Self-Improvament industry was very prevalent on TV, the Golden Age of Infomercial on TV.

And most of the products and seminars and whatever they tried to sell was, well shit. Business man were just running a simple money grab strategies on a platform that had massive profit margins.

So in that context "Self improvement is masturbation." makes sense. Now you could safely say the same about all the "Self-Improvement & Motivation Blogs" that exists in higher on the Internet numbers than you can count.

On part 2:

Taking the context of the movie in to consideration, the Narrator ("Jack") is a 30 yea old beta boy, who basically was ingrained growing up with (what we would call in TRP) Blue Pill way of living (it relates in general terms of living life not only sexual strategy).

And taking into account what it takes to change your shitty life for a batter one it comes down to:

"If you want to be different (have a good life), you have to do different things than you do now."

Which you can more dramatically say in a way of "You have to destroy who you are (bad habits, limiting belief etc.), to build what you want to be."

And going back to the context of the first part of the quote. Most shitty Self-Improvament ideas and philosophies tend to preach less drastic/confrontational idea of "building on who you are", in a sense saying that you can become amazing and still remain how you are right now, which in reality is bullshit.

When you achieve something in your life there's an inner change that happens, the old you dies for a new you to be born.

Anyways, that's how I see that quote.

hhex · 2016-12-03T22:09:24+00:00

I think you should stop taking fiction so seriously

Title	"Self-improvement is masturbation"
Author	kabhi23
Upvotes	10
Comments	23
Date	December 3, 2016 7:27 PM UTC (9 years ago)
Subreddit	Posted in /r/askTRP
Original Link	https://old.reddit.com/r/asktrp/comments/5gb87k/selfimprovement_is_masturbation/
Archive Link	https://theredarchive.com/r/askTRP/self-improvement-is-masturbation.78534 https://theredarchive.com/post/78534

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