Jack Reacher's Rules

“Everyone’s life needs an organizing principle, and relentless forward motion was Reacher’s.”

Always move on and never look back. Never do the same thing twice.

The best place for a nomad to sleep is a motel. It has beds and doors that lock. Pay cash and don’t give your real name.

“Part of being a drifter means you look forward, not backward. You concentrate on what’s ahead.”

Arrange the smallest details in your life so that you can move on at a split second’s notice.

Own nothing, carry nothing.

Two days in one place is about the limit.

“Mostly he had rocked and swayed and dozed on buses, watching the passing scenes, observing the chaos of America, and surfing along on memories. His life was like that.”

“I’m a nomad.”

“Nomads have animals. They move around to find pasture. That’s the definition.”

“Okay, I’m a nomad without the animal part.”

Transience is a habit you can’t break.

A wad of dollars means … a few more weeks when you don’t have to find a job.

Don’t do permanent, be a Reacher, not a Settler.

Take the first bus out.

“They say you need to ride the rails for a while to understand the traveling blues. They’re wrong. To understand the traveling blues, you need to be locked down somewhere. In a cell. Or in the Army. Someplace where you’re caged. Someplace where smokestack lightning looks like a faraway beacon of impossible freedom.”