Rule 1 - Don’t be shit.

If I could only give one rule it would be this. A general encapsulation of how to not have a shit life is to just not be shit.

More complex, it means if you are going to bother to do something at least make the effort to do it. It doesn't mean you need to be amazing at everything but you shouldn't accept shit. Or be shit. Just don't be shit. I find this to be so simple and yet such good advice.

What I like most about this rule though is that it does not demand perfection. Perfection is a high bar that is a barrier to getting things done. You don’t need perfect. You need it to not be shit.

This rule applies to everything.

I talk to my kids all the time about this rule (although I remove the swearing). Don’t let people down, don’t half ass stuff, have a growth mindset and accept that you don’t have to be rubbish even if you are right now.

As founders, we spend hours perfecting the product, the sales pitch, and the content—the stuff the world sees. But behind the scenes, we let the "shit" systems creep in: scattered notes, slack messages, disorganised files, and administrative chaos. That is a failure to "make the effort to do it" right.

When you tolerate a "shit" system, you don't just waste time; you cause yourself more stress. A creaking system means you're leaving money on the table, wasting your team's energy, and losing your own mental space to the pure grind of administrative firefighting. You become the bottleneck in your own business.

Homework

The 30-Minute Task: Tackle something you know is shit. Set a strict 30 minutes to solve the issue or find a long term solution to the issue.