Almanack of Naval Ravikant
About the book
Book author: Eric Jorgenson
The book is a condensed version of Naval Ravikant’s philosophy and ideas about wealth, happiness and philosophy. We get one chapter on each topic. Eric has supposedly gathered and browsed most of Naval’s podcast appearances and tweets, and with Naval’s help, created this book, even though Naval did not write it. The book is available for free online, but I like to buy books and put them in my bookshelf to remind myself of what I have read.
Reflection and takeaways
Naval is very clear that his take is not the truth, it is just what works for him. I also believe that there is a lot more good content in this book than what I particularly reflect on here. The book is 200 pages and the writing is already succinct. This is 2 pages, even succincter.
Wealth Chapter
What is wealth and how do you get it? Wealth can be several things, but in most cases people define it as much money. Navals take is that it is not necessarily the money people are after, but the freedom it gives. However, that kind of freedom can be achieved in 3 ways:
- Financial burn rate smaller than your passive financial gain rate – often achieved with capital
- Become more monk-like – lower your burn rate
- Find purpose – something that feels like play instead of work and then do that, which is what you would do if you had wealth anyway. I guess this is what the japanese call Ikigai (but Naval does not mention this)
How do you get capital? You must find leverage that can work when you sleep. There are some forms of modern leverage. Code is one of them. Writing books and courses is another, but the main idea is you build once and sell several times. It is very difficult to become wealthy through working, you can only get leverage that is exponential by owning assets, such as stocks or real estate. If you want to own assets through creating a company, realise that you should not copy what someone else is doing, but must find your own unique niche. A common sense tip is to value integrity in business partners over all else. Not very revolutionary thinking to me, but good advice.
Naval recommends to learn a lot of mental models. You can find a lot of these in books because people distill a lifetime of work into a digestible format. He seems to preach Nassim Nicholas Taleb’s books which are some of my absolute favourites; it’s packed with mental models about probability and non-linearity. He also recommends learning to love reading. I already love reading! His tips is to think of no book is scary, and when picking up a new concept, go to the originals, not a filtered summary or condensed work.
“A calm mind, a fit body and a house full of love. These cannot be bought. They must be earned”
Happiness chapter
Naval has an attitude of not taking oneself too seriously. That is important. Think of the real world, and think of yourself as a little amoeba in it. Life is what life is, there is a neutrality to it! Realise this when dealing with your chatty monkey-mind.
He has a mental model that life really is a single-player game. The happiest people are the ones who “exit” out of the conventional multi-player game packed with expectations and goals such as social status, wealth and what not inherited from society and parents. Those concepts are all in your head. The people who do not need anything from anyone are the happiest.
Start saying “Wow!” instead of asking “Why?” – make absurd things curious instead of cynical
Some people dedicate their life towards building some sort of legacy. Naval thinks this is ridiculous, and I agree. He illustrates his thinking well: 10 000 years ago there were a lot of summerians, who I’m sure did a lot of brave and smart things. Have you ever heard of a summerian? Name a single one. This is what people in the future will think of Americans or people from any country today.
“People who live far below their means enjoy a freedom that people busy upgrading their lifestyles cant fathom”
Naval is wealthy. He speaks of the hedonic treadmill. Upgrading your lifestyle just makes that new lifestyle your normal, until it becomes rather difficult to upgrade. You will still not be satisfied. Instead – focus on being happy with what you have. It is a rather stoic concept. Don’t be a slave to the idea that your life will be better “when you have X”. Naval openly says that other people in his wealthy circles are not particularly happy. Perhaps because they thought they would be once they were rich, only to discover at that summit that it was the wrong mountain.
“A taste of freedom can make you unemployable”
I agree with this quote above. Becoming a freelancer was a defining moment for me. Now I have clients instead. However, that requires enough wealth that you can survive through times where you have no clients. In any case, I think the relationship is much better than being employed.
Naval advocates tons for “mental fitness”: reading, meditating, journaling and yoga. His claim is that you must keep mentally fit as well as physically fit. Not revolutionary stuff again, but for some reason people tend to forget this.
The modern struggle:
Lone individuals summoning inhuman willpower, fasting, meditating and exercising..
Up against armies of scientists and statisticians weaponizing abundant food, screens and medicine into junk food, clickbait news, infinite porn, endless games and addictive drugs.
Philosophy chapter
When asked “What is the meaning and purpose of life?” we get 3 answers from Naval, although the actual answers are much longer. I like he has multiple takes. After all, why is that not more common or acceptable with the big questions?
- It’s personal. You have to find your own meaning, and it will become fundamental for your life.
- There is no meaning. Do your best to find one. Anything you will do will fade away with the age of the universe.
- Physics-inspired meaning: we are just some process that will help thermodynamics reach its final state faster.
This chapter is very short. He speaks about “rational Buddhism” that works for him: ignore pseudoscience but steal the good parts. Ignore chakra and rebirth, but believe in evolution and that meditation is healthy. There is a reason why buddhism has been around for so long. I like that.
Why did I pick it
I have seen Navals content appear in several places, and often liked it.
Verdict
I really enjoyed this book. It was just long enough but got a ton of content and insights across. 4.5 / 5