You were built spiky.
Don’t let conformity sand you smooth.
School taught you to compete, not differentiate. Work rewards fitting the box, not breaking it. Self-help gives you labels that sit in a drawer.
The Zag is a newsletter about the opposite: figuring out how you’re wired and building something extraordinary with it.
By Chris Blachut · Join 3,000+ subscribers
Most driven people don’t have a motivation problem.
They have an articulation problem.
You know you have something different in you — capability, ideas, drive — but you can’t explain what ties it all together. So you collect inputs: assessments, books, journals, maybe a coach. Each gives you pieces. None gives you the whole picture.
Meanwhile, the world keeps filing you into categories that don’t fit. You keep describing yourself in language that doesn’t differentiate. And your effort keeps scattering on projects that don’t build on each other.
The Zag is about bringing everything together.
“Within months, I went from feeling stuck in a strategy consulting career to thriving in an executive role that fits me perfectly. ARC transformed how I see my potential.”
Seb
“Chris’ ARC process didn’t just tell me what I was good at—it proved it with eye-opening evidence from my own life. I’ve been confidently building on it ever since.”
Juan
“Chris helped me develop a practice that closes the gap between what I want and what I am actually doing. Now I feel more connected and intentional.”
Talgat
“Chris’ approach is structured but personal. It gave me the direction and motivation I needed.”
Jenny
“One month in, I’ve reclaimed my attention and refocused it in what matters. The changes are small but life-changing.”
David
The Latest
How to Burn 60 Million Calories
Minimize wasted friction by seeking alignment to convert as much energy as you can into contributing something of value.
Don’t Be Replaced Without Difficulty
What can only you contribute, in a role you’d never trade away?
A Recruiting Pitch for a Hard Life
“Hard choices, easy life,” but who actually wants easy? The better bet is the hard hard choice: a quest that tests what you’re made of.
The Friend Billionaire’s Next Move
Decoding the pattern beneath Nick Gray that made him a ‘friend billionaire’ yet lonely, and how aiming it could solve his problem, and ours.
About Chris
I spent my twenties in corporate finance building spreadsheets that saved millions. At 27, I quit and spent a decade trying to find my fit — running a hostel, failing at startups, exporting blueberries, blogging about travel. Each thing taught me what I’m not. None of them taught me what I am.
When my first son was born, I got obsessed with one question: what’s innate and what’s conditioned?
That obsession became Innate Edge — a methodology for decoding how people are uniquely wired and building it into a system they actually use. The Zag is where I write about the ideas behind it.
Ready to go deeper than reading?
The Innate Edge methodology helps driven professionals decode their wiring and design where it fits.
You get two tools: an Operating Manual (your decision framework) and a Positioning Report (how to explain your edge to the world).