Law 13 · Build Before You Are Ready
The man who paid for his own risk.
Tom Hardy put $2.5 million into Taboo knowing half the room would hate it. On why permission never arrives, and why he stopped waiting for it.
Tom Hardy · Actor
Law 18 · Become Dangerous, Then Govern It
The challenges on the mat are bigger than on set.
The director has a black belt in Brazilian jiu-jitsu. He says the mat is harder than any film set, because nobody can help you there.
Guy Ritchie · Director, jiu-jitsu black belt
Law 13 · Build Before You Are Ready
Doing things rather than dreaming about them.
DJ, actor, kickboxer, and now director. Elba on a father who died at seventy-two and the urgency that followed.
Idris Elba · Actor
The first cup is the quiet one.
A washed Colombian for the hour before the day gets its hands on you.
Red apple, panela, a long clean finish. Roasted in the UK to order and posted through the letterbox, so it is on the counter when you come down. Grind it while the kettle runs. Drink it before the phone.
Inside every bag there is a card. One of the twenty-two laws, printed on thick stock, yours to keep or pass on. The coffee is the point. The card is the gift.
250 g · Huila, Colombia · Washed · Whole bean or ground
More stories
All stories →One story a week.
Someone who earned their ground, read slowly, in your inbox on a Sunday. The coffee ships to the list first.
About the author
Shane Quigley
The people I interviewed
Actors, athletes, adventurers and founders. Tap a face to read their story.
A code · not motivation
The 22 Laws
of Growth & Freedom
Twenty-two patterns, found in the lives of people who had to earn their ground. Read them slowly. Come back to one.
A man does not rise in one heroic moment. He rises by returning to the work after comfort, failure, resentment, fear, and distraction have all invited him to stop.
One slow, painful brick at a time.
In life, everything meaningful is earned.
Rise Strong. Nothing’s Given.
A new story every week.
RSNG Coffee · No. 01
The Foundation
Washed Colombian. Red apple, panela, a long clean finish.
The first coffee in the range. A clean washed lot from Huila, roasted light to medium for clarity rather than weight, so it is as good black at six in the morning as it is with milk at ten. Roasted in the UK the week it ships, posted flat through the letterbox.
- Origin
- Huila, Colombia
- Process
- Washed
- Roast
- Light-medium
- Weight
- 250g
- Roasted
- UK · to order
- Inside
- One law card
The first roast is on its way.
Inside every bag
A card in every bag
Thick uncoated card, one colour, one of the twenty-two laws on the front and the whole of it on the back. It comes stapled to the back of the bag and tears off clean. Keep it on the fridge. Give it to someone who needs it.
Stop wishing it was. Start building.
rsng.com/laws/1
Later · the tool
Pocket will hold you
to the code.
It reaches you only when it needs you.
An agent on your phone that carries the 22 Laws as its operating code and runs one practice a day in the law's voice. It is not ready. The coffee, the laws and the proof are. Leave your email and you will hear when it is.
No blue. No streaks you did not earn. The accent appears only when something needs you.
Today
Become Hard To Threaten
You named your salary yesterday. If it stopped on Friday, what is the first thing you would do on Monday?
Practice
Do the work.
Short, plain exercises. Each one serves a law. Most take minutes a day. Pick one and start tonight.
Alain Moussi · Actor, martial artist
Twenty-five years of practice buys the control behind every brutal hit.
He took up martial arts after watching Van Damme in Bloodsport, doubled Henry Cavill, then led the Kickboxer films opposite his hero. Alain Moussi on control, repetition and real hits.
Asked how he controls a kick that has to land for real:
So, there's a way to do it where the person kicking has to have tons of control – you can almost compress into your hip to create the reaction as opposed to just keep pressing right through their face to create a reaction. You have to place your foot in exactly the right spot when it's a kick and then the face connects to it. I've done this, I've been on the receiving end before. You're running, the guy kicks you so as the foot comes through, you have to be able to react in such a way that you're not in the hit too long and get knocked out. I have a lot of control with my kicks. That's one skillset I have, I've been working at it for 25 years.
Asked whether he trains hard to avoid injury on set:
Sometimes I do 12 hours of fighting on set during the day and some of that is being beat up for about ten hours a day. I get there, I'm prepared, my body is conditioned, I can face it no problem and get up the next day and do it over again. So it's all about the preparation but for me it's not a chore to go and train. I love it, I need it actually, it keeps me sane.
Asked how to improve kicking control:
Then it's all about repetition, proper repetition and sometimes that gets boring, but you know what? That’s what I did. It’s no secret, it’s really a lot of repetition and very specific techniques for control – things like keeping my leg up in the air, doing a high kick and suspending it. I'm putting my hand on the wall, bringing my leg up and kicking out; keeping it there to work the proper muscles and I just go higher, higher, higher. Over time it would get better, but I would work my kicks every other day, and I still do.