Speed and Systems

Welcome to the Inner Edge, where I explore insights on wealth, fulfillment, growth, and mastery.

There’s something I’ve realized after years of building and failing learning.

Some people move fast. They see an idea, and execute immediately.

Others hesitate, overthink, and wait for the "perfect moment."

The first group always wins.

Because they’re the ones to do anything at all.

They succeed = win

They fail = learn = win

Win. Win.

But you can’t do either unless you start.

This essay is about just that. What I wish I knew years ago about failing fast.

Let’s talk about it.

I used to push things off for weeks, months and even years.

Telling myself, “I’ll get to it later.”

Until I realized… I was just sacrificing my own opportunities.

Because later never came.

Now, I’m learning:

1. The quicker I move, the faster I fail.

2. The faster I fail, the quicker I learn.

And learning faster is how you win.

So how do you get yourself to move quicker?

Well, let’s start with the most common thing people ask.

Am I too late to start?

You see someone 10 steps ahead and think, "If only I started earlier."

But.. I think there's always time.

You could be 65 years old reading this and still change your life today.

Again, you gotta be realistic. As Shaan Puri says, you likely won’t make the NBA anymore.

But you can probably improve your dribbling skills.

But what if you’re young?

Well, you literally have the advantage of compressing time.

What the heck does that mean?

Well, what are you currently spending all your time on that you don’t even love?

And why are you doing it?

Probably because you think it’ll get you closer to your goals. And it probably will. I’m not saying to stop doing it.

But here’s the thing.

What if instead of suffering through it slowly, you just moved faster?

What if you learned the same lessons in months instead of years?

This realization alone can propel you into alternate ways of thinking to get to your goals faster.

Okay so…

You want to move faster, but you don’t.

You don’t know why you don’t, but you literally just don’t.

Hmm.

Let’s dive into a random scenario I came up with.

I want you to imagine this.

One night, as you’re scrolling on your phone, you get a message from an unknown number.

It says: “If you can make $1,000 in the next 7 days, I will hand you the exact life you’ve always dreamed of.”

But there’s a catch.

If you don’t hit the goal, the offer disappears forever.

You look at the message again.

You have seven days. Not sure why seven. Probably because that’s a week.

Anyways, what do you do?

What would you do?

Would you tell yourself, “I’ll start next week”? or would you just get going?

You’d get going.

_{*for all you over-thinkers just go along please*}

So you just do whatever it takes to get it done.

And the crazy part is that you’d actually find a way.

Not because you magically became more skilled overnight.

But because the deadline was real and the reward was big enough.

But Here’s the Truth…

In your life, the deadline is real and the reward is big enough.

You don’t have unlimited time. But you just might not be seeing that.

We’re all on a ticking clock.

But because the time horizon feels long, you don’t notice it.

So instead of urgent action, your biggest dreams become “someday” projects.

Except someday never comes.

I’m not saying you’ll never do it. There might come a day you do it because an opportunity arises. But saying some random day is as good as never doing it at all. Why not now?

What if instead of waiting, you acted like success had a 7-day deadline?

I know, it’s not easy. Especially when you have so much responsibility and other things. But, what if you made a small change? Then another? And another?

I like this video that Alex did around this: https://www.instagram.com/hormozi/reel/Ct2zx94onmh/?hl=en

How different then would your life look in 6 months?

Let’s look at it another way.

The faster you build, fail, and improve, the faster growth compounds.

“But isn’t direction as important as speed?”

Yes. It is.

I know there’s a difference between moving fast and climbing up the wrong mountain.

Because you totally could be climbing up the wrong mountain.

And that’s not so good is it.

But the thing is, I found that my younger self was screwing around not climbing at all.

I didn’t even know there was a darn mountain to climb.

It was only after I started climbing that I started realizing which mountain I want to climb.

Why is why failing fast is actually a pretty good thing.

So, how do you move faster?

Let’s talk about what my brother swears is my favorite thing in the world: systems.

It’s not. My favorite thing is Pokiri.

Jokes aside, systems are anything that can get you lots of output for not so much input.

Think about it this way. We only have a finite amount of time in a day.

And we need to cook, clean, eat, lift, pretend to be productive, scroll mindlessly, rewatch the same three shows, contemplate our life choices etc. etc.

So, that’s where systems come in.

Systems are basically a form of leverage.

There’s a great Archimedes quote that goes something like: “give me a lever long enough and I’ll move the world.”

Systems are the lever that you build.

I can go on and on about systems. So much so that my brother calls me the systems guy.

But I won’t. I’ll just hit you with some examples (if you’d prefer not to read, please skip to closing this tab as that about wraps up this newsletter).

Here’s some random examples of how I use systems in my life to move faster.

• I have a set day of recording 2-3 podcast episodes (rn it’s Sunday).

• I place my mic right next to my desk on Sunday mornings

• I have a big blue screen (greenscreen, but blue), lights and a camera placed in the exact place I need them to record short-form content

• I have a project management system setup with my virtual assistant and a few editors (they have their own systems I’ve built for them)

• I created a template & system to make writing newsletters easy.

• I built rituals like going to the library and listening to the same soundtracks while writing the newsletters.

Content is just one small area where systems have helped me a lot.

But systems are nothing without action.

Even to build systems, you need to take some form of action.

And yes, at first, it’s pretty messy and you feel like you have no idea what you’re doing.

But trust me, it gets better.

And if you find laziness creeping in, then here’s what I can add (based on prior lazy experience).

Laziness isn’t just inaction.

It’s a slow and quiet decision to let your future self suffer for your present comfort.

The longer you wait, the heavier it gets, until one day you realize you’ve built a life out of avoidance instead of action.

But remember: as you take action, the momentum will solve the laziness.

To wrap it up..

If I had to give advice to my younger self, it would be this:

Stop waiting for the “right time.” It doesn’t exist. The only thing that does is right now.

Move fast. Start messy. Figure it out as you go.

Because while everyone else is still thinking about it, you’ll already be doing it.