Your life is an experiment. Own it and run it hard.
The first rule in the codex is the most important because it is the precondition for every other rule. In this team it is the first amendment worth dying for. Your entire life and every variable touching you is an experiment by definition. The only open question is whether you are the one controlling the experiment or whether you are simply going along with the flow.
You are an N=1 science experiment. The trajectories of your outcomes are influenced by forces only you can act upon. Act accordingly, and take absolute charge.
This stance collides with the fact that we are social animals. Social animals move with the herd, and there is real value in that. But the levers you choose to control will isolate you around exactly those levers. Control costs double. First, there is the cost to do the work and exercise the control. Second, there is the cost inflicted by the herd. Many cultures will cut the tallest poppy. Fortunately, we are Americans, and that grants us the freedom to select herds of people seeking an exceptional life over an ordinary life.
Now, is there anything wrong with an ordinary life? The deeper question is what it even means to be human. Are you simply another animal ready for the cosmic slaughter of the next evolutionary layer of consciousness, or are you something more?
In Frank Herbert’s Dune, the Reverend Mother tests the young Paul Atreides with the gom jabbar. She holds a poisoned needle against his neck and orders him to place his hand inside a black box. The box does not cut or burn; it induces pure, escalating nerve pain designed to trigger the animal reflex to withdraw. If he pulls his hand out, she drives the needle home and kills him. An animal, driven by instinct, would yank its hand free and die. A human is defined by the capacity to override that instinct through will, to remain still while the nervous system screams, and to endure the cost. Paul keeps his hand in the box. He passes the test.
I choose to believe we are more than animals. That belief is not free. It requires accepting the burden of command over your own life. Every day you must exercise high agency across a short list of experimental levers while treating the rest of the social flow as controlled variables you do not waste energy fighting.
It is expensive to run a billion experiments. Be intentional. Some people dress this up as mindfulness or “life’s purpose” or other woo-woo nonsense. At the core the constraint is simple: bandwidth is finite. Focus it.
Do or do not, there is no try here; the experiment runs its course whether you like it or not, and you will die at the end of it. Remember, you will die. The only question is what outcomes came of it. Did you fight as hard as you could? Or did the instinct win, hand out of the box, poisoned with mediocrity of the flow of a herd animal?
The rule applied to us
The failure is surrendering to the flow. Effie has multiple sclerosis, a progressive disease of the highest order. No one would blame Effie for simply quitting. In the modern culture she could play the victim every day of her life; except that isn’t allowed in our house. We are a team, and as such we take care of each other and overcome the trials of this modern world.
The modern world has too many concurrent experiments running wild, so we opt out. We live in the country away from the congested cities to minimize external variables as much as possible. We eat real food that drives real results, and our focus is around everything this site will promote.
We have selected a new environment away from civilization where we can maximize our health and figure this shit out. Effie eats a lion diet consisting of ruminant meat, salt, and water. I eat a carnivore diet of beef, butter, bacon, and eggs. We both exercise and do wellness hacks like red light, cold plunge, sauna, and other things that are awesome.
Now, with AI, we believe there is no excuse for not getting healthy. It’s simply just do it. We believe we can reverse MS. This is an insane belief, but it’s why we go hardcore. We go hardcore because why not? Why accept lesser results when we can believe, try, and go hard?
At the heart of N=1 is a belief. Every science experiment starts with a belief called a hypothesis, and you can test it. You can test it at home. You can just buy equipment and do things. Life is amazing if you simply act as if your life depends on you taking agency with urgency to act right fucking now. For you there is no settled science because no scientist will live your outcomes. Yes, they may finger-wag if you are wrong, but why do you care?
Caring what others think is the nature of the herd, because our survival historically depended on the herd in many ways. The biggest benefit of the modern world is that each of us has the capacity to push and pull levers that will drive outcomes we care about. But we have to be clear and honest about the outcomes to avoid it becoming an ideology built on faith. Treat the variables in your life like a science experiment. Measure the inputs and the outputs. Do the work.
That’s it: Own the trajectory and do the work to get great outcomes.