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.
Neil Campbell · Cyclist, speed record holder
Do not be the weak link. Build the nerve bit by bit.
Towed behind a Porsche, then cut loose on a Yorkshire runway, an architect rode a bicycle at 174mph. Neil Campbell on doubt, full commitment, and taming fear a little at a time.
Asked how he prepares his mind for a record attempt:
I tell myself that I don’t want to let the team down. So if you have doubts yourself, you have to say: I am not going to be the weak link in this chain. It is an amazing sensation when you’re riding that fast, but the danger is so real. [...] The key is to learn when to switch off and when to focus. It has taken me a lot of time to learn that about myself. [...] So, it is better to progress bit by bit so it just feels... not normal but more normal. In the months before, you build yourself up and you manage your own fear so when the moment comes it’s like you just press a button. And then you go...
Asked what he told himself before the record run:
Initially the big challenge was not to break the record but to test myself – to see whether or not I had the bottle to do it, quite honestly. The first time I broke 100mph I realised we could do this. But the scariest doubt I ever had was before the last run, which broke the record this year. [...] That was because the subsequent run had not gone well and I was really nervous. But you have to get into a state of full commitment. If this goes wrong, it is going to go wrong in a big way. So even though I had mega doubts, I had to get into the frame of mind to fully commit. To do it and survive was pure relief.
Asked about the most frightening moment:
I was far more relaxed when I dropped the tow line than when I was behind this Porsche Cayenne with 700 brake horsepower. When it was accelerating literally as hard as it could, so the pedal was basically floored, it is honest to God the most scary thing. [...] I had to stop reading some of the social media comments afterwards, like: “Yeah, I could do that on my six-year-old’s bike.” No, you can’t. The amount of stress is incredible.