The Power of Agency

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Yesterday, I kicked off the first Kanso Reset45 cohort.

27 people, five countries, one mission: to take control of their relationship with technology and re-invest their time into the things that truly matter.

It was incredible. Not just because of the ‘scale’, but because of what it represented: a room full of high-agency people making a conscious choice to better their lives.

And if there’s one thing I’ve learned in my years working with high-growth startups, it’s this: agency is everything.

We like to imagine that modern life is a parade of choices. Every morning, we pick from endless options — what to watch, what to read, what to wear, what to eat, what to scroll etc.

But the truth is, most people aren’t making real choices. They’re following scripts. Participating in a game where the rules have already been set and where the next move is dictated not by personal conviction but by invisible social contracts and algorithms.

Tech didn’t create this phenomenon, but it has heavily amplified it.

Today, I see two types of people around me:

1) Those who recognize that shaping a healthier relationship with technology requires real, uncomfortable effort and choose to endure it.

2) Those who have quietly accepted that digital addiction is simply the ‘cost’ of existing in modern society and fall deeper into the trap.

The knowledge gap between these groups is only expanding and will have a far larger impact on society than most people realize. One set is fighting to remain at the wheel. The other has, consciously or not, handed over the keys.

A few days ago, I was listening to Tim Ferriss’ most recent podcast with Seth Godin (btw, I’m a huge Tim Ferriss fan), when Seth landed on a telling observation: consuming certain media is now a form of social status.

Consider Game of Thrones at its peak. When it was appointment television, not watching was almost criminal. It dominated watercooler talk, Twitter discourse, and the broader cultural zeitgeist. For years, Sunday nights became a nationwide ritual that funny enough strengthened the social fabric of society. You watched because everyone watched. It was participation, not just entertainment.

Social capital was embedded in consumption.

The same cycle repeats daily with viral memes and internet personalities, TikTok trends, and the endless churn of new ‘must-watch’ TV shows fetching multi-million-dollar deals from streaming giants.

The dopamine hit of participation and acceptance keeps us in the loop, lest we risk irrelevance.

Humans crave belonging. We want to be accepted, to be part of the ‘inner ring.’ That pull is strong.

But the fear of missing out is exactly what keeps people locked in ‘passive’ consumption.

And this, in many ways, is the great trick of the algorithmic age: it rewards those who conform. The more you optimize for what’s trending, the more visibility you get. The more you align with what’s popular, the more your presence is affirmed.

I try to be conscious of it, but I’m as guilty as anyone (and so are many of my highly ambitious friends who recognize the value of distribution and audience).

Part of me wants to never create another piece of content, delete my entire online presence, and build a garden on a farm somewhere. The other half knows why that won’t happen.

In many ways, both content creation and consumption are survival mechanisms. A way of signaling: I am here. I matter. I belong.

It’s easy to dismiss this as the natural evolution of culture. The natural way humans have always organized themselves around shared experiences. But the difference now is that these choices are no longer entirely ours.

The things we consume, the ideas we engage with, the topics we debate, most of them arrive pre-selected, carefully engineered to hold our attention just long enough to move us to the next thing.

To have agency in this environment requires something uncomfortable: opting out. Being okay with missing out. Deciding that some conversations aren’t worth having, some distractions aren’t worth indulging, some trends aren’t worth following.

That’s harder than it sounds. To resist the pull of constant engagement is to risk feeling invisible. And for many, invisibility is a fate worse than addiction.

The difference between those with agency and those without is simple: one group decides. They determine what deserves their time. They are authors, not characters.

Most people won’t do that. Not because they can’t, but because they don’t realize they have a choice. They’ve spent so long being characters that authorship feels impossible.

The question isn’t whether you have agency. We all do.

It’s how much of it have you already given away?

That’s all for this week. If you’ve been enjoying these essays, I’d greatly appreciate it if you shared them with friends, fam, on social, etc, would mean the world.

I’m on a mission to impact as many people as possible, and this is only the start :)

And if you want to join the next Kanso Reset45 cohort, just drop me a message. Will launch later this Summer.

Now stop scrolling & go do something great!

— Randy