Last weekend I was in Budapest for the first time in probably ten years, and I have no idea why I waited so long to visit this old beauty again.
Elegant Austro-Hungarian architecture everywhere you look, hinting at Zagreb, Vienna and Beograd rolled into one.
Small bistros tucked into side streets, and most importantly specialty coffee shops in every neighborhood.
The kind of "spice of life" moments where city rewards you for just walking around without a plan (like getting into breakfast place that looks more like a proper botanical garden)
It's funny how I always have my eyes set on far away destinations while there are beautiful places right under my nose - literally less than 2.5 hours away.
When presented with a choice, my mind always goes: well, these neighbouring destinations (Italy, Hungary, Czech Republic, Austria) are so close, you can visit them whenever.
And I almost never do.
Interesting how that works with other things too.
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Meet my new best friend: ferritin
Since last week marked two years since my emergency surgery (missed that story? Letter 018 has the full thing), I decided to finally do the responsible adult thing and get a proper blood panel done.
Over the past couple of years I'd had slightly lower iron levels, but never really followed up properly. My doctor had mentioned checking something called ferritin, essentially the body's storage room for iron, but never insisted, so I kept skipping it (my mistake!).
This time I remembered and asked for the full picture.
Turns out I'd probably been running on chronically low ferritin for years. My body was managing the day-to-day okay, but had nothing left in reserve for anything that actually demanded more: intense training, long focused work blocks, surplus.
For a while I felt like something was off. Couldn't focus as long or needed more recovery time.
At some point I just accepted that I'd probably imagined being more energised in the past. That this was just how things were now.
The doctor put it plainly: I'd probably been functioning at around 70% of my actual capacity.
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The two routes
I wanted a second opinion, so I saw two different doctors, and predictably got two different answers.
The first - suggested the straightforward route: iron supplement pills, give it 3 to 6 months, let the body stabilise on its own timeline.
Cost: patience, and maybe €30 in supplements.
The second - suggested an iron IV instead. Faster acting, with visible improvements likely within 2 to 4 weeks.
Cost: one clinic visit and €500 for the procedure.
My immediate reaction to the second option was something close to suspicion, honestly. €500 for something that takes 30 minutes felt like exactly the kind of "private clinic sales pitch" you'd tell someone to be careful about.
But then I actually sat with the decision for a bit and realised the cost wasn't really what I was weighing. The real question underneath it was something a little more uncomfortable:
Do I actually deserve to feel 30% better if I didn't earn it the hard way?
Which is a strange thing to notice yourself thinking. But there it was.
Because something in me felt like the slow route was the legitimate one - that the struggle was somehow part of what made the result valid. That taking the more direct path was a kind of shortcut I hadn't earned.
I sat with that for a moment and then booked the IV.
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Writing this from a very comfortable clinic chair
With what feels like an ungodly amount of iron going directly into my bloodstream, thinking about how long I'd been quietly adapting to a reduced version of my own capacity without really questioning it.
Because despite disagreeing on almost everything else, both doctors landed on the same point: getting my ferritin up is only half the job.
If we don't figure out what caused it to drop in the first place and actually fix that, I'll be back in this chair in a year doing it all over again. A few more tests to run, a few more answers to find - because treating the symptom without understanding the cause is just a more expensive version of the same problem.
The IV buys me capacity, but it doesn't fix the system.
I sat with that for a moment, because it's a surprisingly easy thing to miss when you finally have a solution in front of you. The relief of knowing what to do can make you forget to ask why it happened at all.
Which is when I started thinking about you.
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The part that made me think of you
Most of the coaches and founder I speak with are doing something similar - just in their business instead of their body.
Launching harder. Adding more content. Showing up with more energy and enthusiasm and hoping it moves the needle.
Trying to work their way through what is actually a structural problem, because the structural problem is harder to see and easier to blame on effort.
Clients aren't disengaging because you're not trying hard enough. More often, the program just doesn't have a mechanism that keeps momentum alive once the initial excitement settles.
There's nothing producing visible progress in the messy middle. The end of the engagement arrives quietly and nobody quite knows what comes next.
You can't willpower your way out of a systems gap.
This is the same willpower trap I named for builders in letter 023 - the Founder Block.
What changes when you finally get the actual number, the real diagnosis, isn't the problem itself. It's the clarity. You stop blaming the wrong thing. You stop trying to fix your energy when the issue is the architecture underneath.
And then you can actually start fixing the right thing.
If you want to know where your gap actually is, that's exactly what The Gameplan is for - a 90-minute 1:1 retention diagnostic, a guided self-paced FlowOS diagnostic before the call, and a written 60-90 day action plan covering the Three Blocks (Momentum, Founder, Upgrade).
and let's find out what's been costing you capacity.
- Filip "call me Ironman" Sardi
Frequently Asked Questions
What does 'you can't willpower your way out of a systems gap' mean?
It means that when something structural is broken in your business - like a program that has no mechanism to keep momentum alive in the messy middle - working harder, launching more, or showing up with more enthusiasm won't fix it. The architecture underneath is the issue. More effort applied to a structural problem just produces a more exhausted version of the same outcome. The fix is diagnosing the gap and rebuilding the mechanism, not adding more energy on top.
Why do coaches blame effort instead of structure when retention drops?
Because effort is visible and structure is invisible. When clients disengage, the immediate instinct is to add more content, send more check-ins, or push harder on launches. Those feel like progress because they're tangible. But most retention drops are caused by missing mechanisms - no visible progress in the middle of the engagement, no clear arc to the end, no momentum system. Effort is easier to blame because it's easier to see than the architecture that's actually missing.
What is a retention diagnostic and why does it matter?
A retention diagnostic is a structured look at where your client experience is leaking momentum, belief, or progress. Instead of guessing whether to add more content or push harder, you get the actual number - the real gap. The clarity matters more than the fix itself. Once you stop blaming the wrong thing (your effort) you can start fixing the right thing (your architecture). That's what The Gameplan exists for.
How do I know if my retention problem is structural or effort-based?
Effort-based problems get better when you do more of what's working - more check-ins, sharper content, faster responses. Structural problems don't. You push harder and the same pattern repeats: clients fade in the middle, end of engagement arrives quietly, nobody knows what comes next. If you've already tried 'launching harder' and the numbers haven't moved, the problem isn't your energy. It's the mechanism that should be carrying clients through the messy middle without you white-knuckling it.
What's the parallel between low ferritin and a coaching business retention gap?
Both feel like personal failings until you measure them. Low ferritin made me think I was just less energetic now - I'd accepted a 30% drop in capacity as 'how things are.' A retention gap makes coaches think they're not trying hard enough. In both cases the diagnosis changes the frame. You stop blaming yourself for the symptom and start fixing the actual cause. And in both cases, treating the symptom without understanding the cause means doing it all over again next year.
Client Flow Letter
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