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.
Nick Butter · Ultramarathon runner
Tomorrow is not promised, so run with intent.
Nick Butter set out to run a marathon in every country on Earth for a friend dying of prostate cancer. Muggings, a dog bite and 43°C in Haiti have only sharpened his point.
Asked what inspired the challenge:
It all has to do with Kevin Webber who has terminal prostate cancer – he is a good friend who I met in the Sahara Desert running the Marathon des Sables. He and I were in the same tent and we really got on but I had no idea he was dying from cancer – he dropped that bombshell and through many hot days in the desert we bonded a bit further. Afterwards I decided I wanted to do something for prostate cancer.
Asked how he stays motivated, marathon after marathon:
I do have a psychologist to make sure I stay sane – it’s great having an impartial person I can have a cry down the phone to every now and then! The bit that gets me through the hard times is that the world is incredibly diverse but the majority of it is poor. We are in the top fraction of a percent of privileged people, and especially living in the UK, we are all so lucky and we have no idea.
Asked whether the journey has reminded him what counts:
The talks that I do in companies and schools are all about appreciating your time and living with intent. Most of us just fumble through – and I am guilty of it as well – but you just take for granted that tomorrow will exist. I have had friends who have died in car accidents and of cancer really young – you never know when your time is going to be up. So, whenever it is tough when I’m running, or a rainy day, or horribly hot I remember that, bloody hell, we’re all really lucky to be wherever we are, doing whatever we are doing.