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.
Andrzej Bargiel · Ski mountaineer
Prepare so well that nerve is never needed.
Andrzej Bargiel climbed K2 without bottled oxygen, clipped into his skis on the summit and became the first man to ski down it. In his own mind, it was never in doubt.
Asked how sure he was of success:
The awareness of just how dangerous K2 is certainly didn’t fill me with confidence, but I tried not to think too much about the risk. I just knew that it was possible and that if you’re prepared enough, and the conditions are appropriate, you can do it safely. If at any point there were any doubts, or the conditions were uncertain, I was ready to stop the whole project. But I fully believed that it would work. Otherwise, I wouldn’t do it.
Asked how he held his nerve above a 3,000-metre drop:
If I hadn’t meticulously prepared the route of my descent, or analysed the time of day I should be descending in certain parts of the mountain, or if I felt any fear at all, I wouldn’t attempt it. Once I feel ready for such a challenge, everything is checked and the conditions are favourable, there is no need for me to hold my nerve. It’s all under my control and that’s exactly how I felt. It was amazing to be there at such altitude and feel in control of the situation – despite the magnitude of the task and difficulty of the terrain.
Asked whether this is a young man's game:
I’m aware that you have to be able to walk away at the right moment. I’m young and I can still develop, but on the other hand, it is so risky that I know that the moment will come when I will have to let go. At the moment, skiing is my greatest passion, but I don’t feel the need to ski down every 8,000m summit to enjoy it.