Bet on Systems, Not Sparks

Photo by Jez Timms on Unsplash

We keep mistaking the highlight reel for the work. We see the headline, the launch, the million views — and forget the months, sometimes years, of invisible scaffolding beneath it. We’ve been trained to look for the sparks: the moment of inspiration, the viral post, the Hail Mary that lands, the product that explodes.

It’s intoxicating.

And deeply misleading.

Sparks are bright, short-lived, and dramatic. Systems are quiet, repeatable, and sustainable. If you build a system — a real one, with feedback loops, structure, constraints, and long-term incentives — you don’t need to keep summoning brilliance out of thin air. You don’t need to go viral. You don’t need to chase luck.

The myth of the solo genius and the miracle moment is good for headlines but bad for builders. Because if you believe it, you start optimizing your life for ignition, not endurance. You chase lightning instead of building a grid. You wait for a muse instead of learning to wire your workflow. And when the spark doesn’t come, you think you’re the problem.

But sparks are noisy data. They tell you what might be possible, not what’s dependable. The real work is quieter: showing up every day, iterating your process, testing your assumptions, and watching the compound interest of consistency. Systems are slow to impress and fast to…