Kill Your Clone

Every night you will meet.

Just you and your clone.

And you will fight to the death.

The only difference between you and your clone is the work you did in the past 24 hours.

What have you done today?

KILL YOUR CLONE

In 2016, I got hired to do a TV show called Chance. It was based on a novel of the same name, a gritty psychological thriller about a neuropsychiatrist who teams up with a violent antique furniture restorer. Even describing it makes me smile.

The furniture restorer also happens to be a specialist in edged weapons. He’s dangerous, intelligent, the epitome of a badass. His name is D. I played him.

The title character, Dr. Chance, was played by Hugh Laurie. But D? D was the mirrored edge of the blade. The guy you sent in when talking stopped working. D was inspired by a real person: Tom Kier, a combatives expert and instructor who trained special forces, law enforcement, and anyone else who needed to learn how to end violence quickly and decisively.

Kem Nunn, one of the show’s creators and writer of the book, had met Tom while working on William Friedkin’s, The Hunted, and D became a kind of tribute. Tom’s presence, his philosophy, bled into the character, and into me.

Training with Tom changed how I thought about violence, but more than that, it changed how I thought about discipline. Because violence, when it’s real, is not chaos and it’s not rage. It’s force, space, and timing. It’s control and preparation.

One of Tom’s drills stuck with me.

Every day, you train. Every day, you improve, even just a little. And then, every night, you face your clone. It’s the you of 24hrs prior. The you that doesn’t have the benefit of that day’s opportunities. You square off against the old you. And you fight.

Only one of you makes it to the next day.

That metaphor infected me. It took hold. It still drives me. Because you can’t lie to the version of you who did the work. You can't fake it when the fight starts.

So here’s the question that matters:

Did you train today?

Mentally or physically, it doesn’t matter.

Did you improve?

Tonight, the clone will be waiting.

The old you.

Without the benefit of today.

Kill your clone.

Listen to this week’s episode with Tom Kier.

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