become hot and (un)bothered

Building your founder fitness flywheel, automating audiobook writing, and we found the secret to life.

Author

Morgan Tate
July 04, 2025

In partnership with

Every founder needs a flywheel.

Not a business flywheel—I mean a personal one. The kind that keeps you steady when everything else goes sideways. For me, that’s fitness.

More specifically: Founder Fitness.

(Read more here if you missed that issue.)

While the subject line talks about being hot (that's a nice benefit), the greatest benefit of the fitness flywheel is becoming unshakable.

I believe the Stoics had it right: if you want to endure stress, uncertainty, and emotional volatility (a.k.a. customer emails), you need a body and mind built for resilience.

So what does that look like in practice?

Front-load your day with peak difficulty

When you train your body, your mind follows.

Physical activity is proven to improve mental health. But it doesn't stop there. When you're fit, you're also:

  • More decisive under pressure

  • Less reactive when things go wrong

  • Confident enough to say "I got this" (even if maybe you don’t)

It's the flywheel effect:

→ Better physical shape → Better self-image → Better decisions → Less fear → More action → Repeat.

And here's the real unlock:

Start your day with the hardest thing you'll do.

The rest becomes manageable. Questioning whether you have asthma during a brutal 7 AM run makes that failed sales call at 9 AM feel like a pebble rather than a boulder.

"We suffer more in imagination than in reality." — Epictetus

When you push your body beyond discomfort, you realize how much suffering is self-created. That email you're dreading? C'mon, it's an email. Starting each day with a difficult workout (challenging your mental strength) builds resilience over time by resetting your baseline.

Daily workouts = daily wins

As a founder, you take losses all the time. Deals fall apart. Team members quit. Campaigns flop. It's nice to have at least one guaranteed "W" per day—and sometimes that's just showing up for 45 minutes of sweat.

Every second counts.

Every workout is a chance to prove to yourself that you're the kind of person who shows up even when it's hard.

The habit that beats motivation

When motivation fades (and it will), habit is what carries you through. Research shows that consistent exercise creates neurological pathways that make working out feel more natural over time.

The key is building a fitness routine so ingrained that it becomes strange to not do it—like brushing your teeth or checking your phone in the morning.

This is especially important for founders because:

  • Your energy levels directly impact your decision-making

  • Physical resilience translates to mental fortitude in negotiations

  • Consistent workouts create a reliable structure amid business chaos

Remember: Fitness isn't about looking good in a mirror (though that's a nice bonus). It's about building a foundation that supports everything else in your life.

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idea of the week 💡

Credit to Idea Browser for this week’s idea:

  • problem: Authors struggle with costly audiobook production ($5,000+) and lengthy timelines, missing opportunities in the rapidly growing audio market.

  • idea: "AudioScribe" - A desktop app that converts manuscripts into professional-quality audiobooks within hours using AI voices, all offline for manuscript security. Authors simply drag in their document, select a voice style, and get a ready-to-sell audiobook. Credit: Idea Browser

  • how it makes money: $199 per audiobook conversion with premium upsells including voice packs ($29/month), multi-character fiction mode ($49/month), publisher dashboards ($199/month), and an audiobook marketplace taking 10% commission.

  • why it might fail: Quality concerns compared to professional voice actors. Potential legal issues around AI voice rights. Competition from Amazon/Audible developing similar technology in-house. Resistance from traditional publishers and voice actors.

workout of the week

Three different workouts to challenge yourself this holiday weekend:

at-home workout:

Complete 5 rounds:

  • 15 explosive push-ups

  • 20 bodyweight squats

  • 30 mountain climbers (total)

  • 45-second plank

Rest 60 seconds between rounds

gym workout:

  • 5x5 squats

  • 4x8 weighted pull-ups

  • 3x12 dumbbell shoulder press

  • Finisher: 5 rounds of 30-second battle rope waves + 10 burpees

outdoor workout:

Complete 4 rounds:

  • Run 400m

  • 20 bench dips

  • 10 single-leg squat jumps (each leg)

  • 15 decline push-ups (feet elevated)

Rest 2 minutes between rounds

tweet of the week

Man on internet claims to have found the secret to life—what do we do with that? I would say too many people drift through life "searching" for the thing that will get them to jump out of bed every morning. Maybe this guy is right.

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