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.
Craig Jones · Grappler
Face the famous names early, and find out they are human.
Trained in a garage in Australia, one hard hour a day, he rose to catch the sport's elite in his heel hook. A grappler who learned more by stepping in than by waiting.
Asked what it is like to face the big names:
I used to think: “Oh, you should probably spend as much time at purple belt and brown belt as possible to get the experience and confidence to face those famous guys.” But now I think: “You know what, man? Get your black belt as fast as possible so you can have the experience of getting in there and facing those guys… so that you know that they’re just human.” You’ve got to lose that hero-worship, and I don’t think that happens until you face one of them.
Asked about the first time he faced a name:
At ADCC 2013 I had Romulo Barral in the first round. I was a purple belt, 83kg (183lb), and he was the defending champion, cutting down to 88kg (194lb), totally jacked. I went in there all afraid and he just kicked my arse. The first name I felt good against though, I fought a guy called Nathan Orchard and landed a flying triangle on him – I couldn’t finish it, I gassed out and he heel-hooked me. But that was kind of when I realised: these guys are beatable, and they’re beatable even if you don’t train at one of these big American or Brazilian teams.
Asked how he structures one hard hour a day:
Well, when I was training at one of the big US gyms they’d do two hours of ten-minute rounds, and it totally changed the way I fought. I’m a guy who likes to get in there and finish the fight as quickly as possible. Say I’ve got two hours of training ahead of me: I just want to get to a good position and hold on until the end of the round, score my points and survive. The first time I went there I started jumping on positions and I was exhausted after 15 minutes. You compete how you train and doing more hours a day, I think, would actually make my game worse.