The Almanack of Naval Ravikant

The Book in 3 Sentences

Being good to others is being good to yourself. Read more. Buddhism is basically true.

Impressions:

Naval weaves rationality + buddhism + optimism + a love of life, learning and fun together in a very satisfying and fun way.

My Top 3 Quotes:

Figure out what you’re good at, and start helping other people with it. Give it away. Pay it forward. Karma works because people are consistent. On a long enough timescale, you will attract what you project. But don’t measure—your patience will run out if you count.
My definition of wisdom is knowing the long-term consequences of your actions. Wisdom applied to external problems is judgment. They’re highly linked; knowing the long-term consequences of your actions and then making the right decision to capitalize on that.
I think people believe neutrality would be a very bland existence. No, this is the existence little children live. If you look at little children, on balance, they’re generally pretty happy because they are really immersed in the environment and the moment, without any thought of how it should be given their personal preferences and desires. I think the neutral state is actually a perfection state.

Who Should Read it?

If you are a nerd you should really read this book. Sort of like Derek Sivers, Naval just perfectly strikes this balance between doing what makes you happy and getting stuff done. He's not selling you productivity porn or a silver bullet, but he's got a great way of summing up ideas in an inspiring and thought-provoking way.

How the Book Changed me

This book reminded me a lot of Wherever You Go There You Are. A lot of the ideas in this book I have heard before or had had similar thoughts before, but Naval brilliantly sums up these ideas into the smallest kernels that make them easy to remember and feel the truth of. Although there's tons of wisdom in here and something that didn't resonate with me may resonate with the main thing I got out of it was how important and advantageous it is to prioritize my own well-being no matter how you slice it. No matter what you're trying to do, if you can do it happily, while you're playing, it will all follow more easily.

Ideas

Don't take things too seriously -> ?The Strength of Humor

Enjoyment is an advantage

Technology Gives Individuals Infinite Leverage

The real downside is often tiny

The path and goal in life and business is helping others

Being poor is not having too little, it is wanting more

You want to be time-rich, not money-rich

You become your community

praise specifically, criticize generally.

Explain what you learned to someone else. Teaching forces learning.

Everything was made up by someone no smarter than you

If you’re not willing to do a wholesale, 24/7, 100 percent swap with who that person is, then there is no point in being jealous.

“I don’t have time” is just another way of saying “It’s not a priority.” - can get caught thinking, if only I just had one more hour. But that's not it. Daylight savings time isn't the best day of your life every year Pain is certain, suffering is optional

Vipasanna idea of previous conditioning

Whenever we say we’re going to try to do something or try to form a habit, we’re wimping out. We’re just saying to ourselves, “I’m going to buy myself some more time.” When you really want to change, you just change. But most of us don’t really want to change—we don’t want to go through the pain just yet. At least recognize it, be aware of it, and give yourself a smaller change you can actually carry out.

Notes

Reminding myself that I don't actually care much about these book notes, I more care about reflecting on the ideas in this book that I find interesting, and my own ideas that this book inspired. It's not about summarizing the book.

I'm still a little stuck on this idea of whether I think it is good to become one of these blog internet people and build a following. That's definitely not the goal in and of itself but it still seems like a good way to help people. I think the path needs to be helping people to, which is what it is supposed to be.

If you are genuinely adding value to people's lives then I see it.

You are waiting for your moment when something emerges in the world, they need a skill set, and you’re uniquely qualified. You build your brand in the meantime on Twitter, on YouTube, and by giving away free work. You make a name for yourself, and you take some risk in the process. When it is time to move on the opportunity, you can do so with leverage—the maximum leverage possible. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 539-41

The success and work you get that this quote is referencing only counts if you actually love that work, otherwise getting whatever that special offer was is worthless.

So it still comes down to do what you genuinely find interesting + help others, but still doing it in public is a great strategy to be able to do more of what you love and help more people. Basically it is not worth modifying what you do to please people, only if you think it would actually help more people and you're still just as passionate about it.

Whenever you can in life, optimize for independence rather than pay. If you have independence and you’re accountable on your output, as opposed to your input—that’s the dream. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 575-77
- freedom or just doing what you love, it's not work if you love it, so you're essentially getting paid more. -if I'm not getting paid 500 dollars an hour it's not worth doing something I don't love

All Quotes

I take Naval seriously because he: Questions nearly everything Can think from first principles Tests things well Is good at not fooling himself Changes his mind regularly Laughs a lot Thinks holistically Thinks long-term And…doesn’t take himself too goddamn seriously. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 127-32

Specific knowledge is found by pursuing your genuine curiosity and passion rather than whatever is hot right now. ↓ Building specific knowledge will feel like play to you but will look like work to others. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 262-65

Fortunes require leverage. Business leverage comes from capital, people, and products with no marginal cost of replication (code and media). -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 275-76

Code and media are permissionless leverage. They’re the leverage behind the newly rich. You can create software and media that works for you while you sleep. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 284-85

Study microeconomics, game theory, psychology, persuasion, ethics, mathematics, and computers. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 295-96

Become the best in the world at what you do. Keep redefining what you do until this is true. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 305-6

Technology democratizes consumption but consolidates production. The best person in the world at anything gets to do it for everyone. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 331-32

Specific knowledge cannot be taught, but it can be learned. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 352-53

Very often, specific knowledge is at the edge of knowledge. It’s also stuff that’s only now being figured out or is really hard to figure out. If you’re not 100 percent into it, somebody else who is 100 percent into it will outperform you. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 389-91

“Escape competition through authenticity.” Basically, when you’re competing with people, it’s because you’re copying them. It’s because you’re trying to do the same thing. But every human is different. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 399-400

If you are fundamentally building and marketing something that is an extension of who you are, no one can compete with you on that. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 401-2

It’s much more important today to be able to become an expert in a brand-new field in nine to twelve months than to have studied the “right” thing a long time ago. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 409-10

I love working with Elad because I know when the deal is being done, he will bend over backward to give me extra. He will always round off in my favor if there’s an extra dollar being delivered here or there. If there’s some cost to pay, he will pay it out of his own pocket, and he won’t even mention it to me. Because he goes so far out of his way to treat me so well, I send him every deal I have—I try to include him in everything. Then, I go out of my way to try and pay for him. Compounding in those relationships is very valuable. [10] -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 434-38

Intentions don’t matter. Actions do. That’s why being ethical is hard. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 439

I say this because you should be very thoughtful and realize in most things (relationships, work, even in learning) what you’re trying to do is find the thing you can go all-in on to earn compound interest. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 452-53

when you find the 1 percent of your discipline which will not be wasted, which you’ll be able to invest in for the rest of your life and has meaning to you—go all-in and forget about the rest. [10] -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 458-59

Only around 2014, 2015 did I start talking about philosophy and psychological things and broader things. It made me a little nervous because I was doing it under my own name. There were definitely people in the industry who sent me messages through the backchannel like, “What are you doing? You’re ending your career. This is stupid.” -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 473-75

Realize that in modern society, the downside risk is not that large. Even personal bankruptcy can wipe the debts clean in good ecosystems. I’m most familiar with Silicon Valley, but generally, people will forgive failures as long as you were honest and made a high-integrity effort. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 482-84

Everybody who really makes money at some point owns a piece of a product, a business, or some IP. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 508

Following your genuine intellectual curiosity is a better foundation for a career than following whatever is making money right now. [11] -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 514

If it entertains you now but will bore you someday, it’s a distraction. Keep looking. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 517-18

By doing things for their own sake, I did them at their best. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 523-24

Whenever you can in life, optimize for independence rather than pay. If you have independence and you’re accountable on your output, as opposed to your input—that’s the dream. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 575-77

A leveraged worker can out-produce a non-leveraged worker by a factor of one thousand or ten thousand. With a leveraged worker, judgment is far more important than how much time they put in or how hard they work. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 580-82

Forty hour work weeks are a relic of the Industrial Age. Knowledge workers function like athletes—train and sprint, then rest and reassess. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 597-98

The higher the creativity component of a profession, the more likely it is to have disconnected inputs and outputs. If you’re looking at professions where your inputs and your outputs are highly connected, it’s going to be very hard to create wealth and make wealth for yourself in that process. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 606-8

But you want to work your way up to try and get higher leverage, more accountability, and specific knowledge. The combination of those over a long period of time with the magic of compound interest will make you wealthy. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 656-58

Judgment—especially demonstrated judgment, with high accountability and a clear track record—is critical. [78] -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 678-79

Being at the extreme in your art is very important in the age of leverage. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 682-83

Another way of thinking about something is, if you can outsource something or not do something for less than your hourly rate, outsource it or don’t do it. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 710-11

The business world has many people playing zero sum games and a few playing positive sum games searching for each other in the crowd. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 726-27

Spend more time making the big decisions. There are basically three really big decisions you make in your early life: where you live, who you’re with, and what you do. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 749-51

Figure out what you’re good at, and start helping other people with it. Give it away. Pay it forward. Karma works because people are consistent. On a long enough timescale, you will attract what you project. But don’t measure—your patience will run out if you count. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 760-62

Once you can solve your money problems, either by lowering your lifestyle or by making enough money, you want to retire. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 790-91

Well, one way is to have so much money saved that your passive income (without you lifting a finger) covers your burn rate. A second is you just drive your burn rate down to zero—you become a monk. A third is you’re doing something you love. You enjoy it so much, it’s not about the money. So there are multiple ways to retirement. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 796-99

If you love money, and you make it, there’s never enough. There is never enough because the desire is turned on and doesn’t turn off at some number. It’s a fallacy to think it turns off at some number. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 826-28

I think the best way to stay away from this constant love of money is to not upgrade your lifestyle as you make money. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 830-31

To the extent money buys freedom, it’s great. But to the extent it makes me less free, which it definitely does at some level as well, I don’t like it. [74] -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 836-37

For someone who is early in their career (and maybe even later), the single most important thing about a company is the alumni network you’re going to build. Think about who you will work with and what those people are going on to do. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 852-54

If you are a trusted, reliable, high-integrity, long-term-thinking dealmaker, when other people want to do deals but don’t know how to do them in a trustworthy manner with strangers, they will literally approach you and give you a cut of the deal just because of the integrity and reputation you’ve built up. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 884-87

Trying to build business relationships well in advance of doing business is a complete waste of time. I have a much more comfortable philosophy: “Be a maker who makes something interesting people want. Show your craft, practice your craft, and the right people will eventually find you.” -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 898-900

I have great people in my life who are extremely successful, very desirable (like everybody wants to be their friend), very smart. Yet, I’ve seen them do one or two things slightly not great to other people. The first time, I’ll say, “Hey, I don’t think you should do this to that other person. Not because you won’t get away with it. You will get away with it, but because it will hurt you in the end.” -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 905-8

I cut them out of my life. I just have this saying inside my head: “The closer you want to get to me, the better your values have to be.” -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 913-14

The only way to truly learn something is by doing it. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 929

People are oddly consistent. Karma is just you, repeating your patterns, virtues, and flaws until you finally get what you deserve. Always pay it forward. And don’t keep count. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 930-32

My definition of wisdom is knowing the long-term consequences of your actions. Wisdom applied to external problems is judgment. They’re highly linked; knowing the long-term consequences of your actions and then making the right decision to capitalize on that. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 969-72

If you can’t explain it to a child, then you don’t know it. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 981-82

If you can’t rederive concepts from the basics as you need them, you’re lost. You’re just memorizing. [4] -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 987-88

The number one thing clouding us from being able to see reality is we have preconceived notions of the way it should be. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 995

If all your beliefs line up into neat little bundles, you should be highly suspicious. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 1047

Radical honesty just means I want to be free. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 1064-65

praise specifically, criticize generally. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 1072

When you are the principal, then you are the owner—you care, and you will do a great job. When you are the agent and you are doing it on somebody else’s behalf, you can do a bad job. You just don’t care. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 1122-24

If you cannot decide, the answer is no. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 1158

Simple heuristic: If you’re evenly split on a difficult decision, take the path more painful in the short term. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 1168-69

Read a lot—just read. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 1185

Explain what you learned to someone else. Teaching forces learning. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 1241

Read the greats in math, science, and philosophy. Ignore your contemporaries and news. Avoid tribal identification. Put truth above social approval. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 1245-46

Then, when new things come, they judge the new idea based on a foundation they already built. Your foundation is critical. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 1256-57

Because most people are intimidated by math and can’t independently critique it, they overvalue opinions backed with math/pseudoscience. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 1258-59

Don’t take yourself so seriously. You’re just a monkey with a plan. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 1314

Every positive thought even has a seed of a negative thought within it and vice versa, which is why a lot of greatness in life comes out of suffering. You have to view the negative before you can aspire to and appreciate the positive. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 1340-42

To me, happiness is not about positive thoughts. It’s not about negative thoughts. It’s about the absence of desire, especially the absence of desire for external things. The fewer desires I can have, the more I can accept the current state of things, the less my mind is moving, because the mind really exists in motion toward the future or the past. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 1342-44

There are no external forces affecting your emotions—as much as it may feel that way. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 1357-58

I think people believe neutrality would be a very bland existence. No, this is the existence little children live. If you look at little children, on balance, they’re generally pretty happy because they are really immersed in the environment and the moment, without any thought of how it should be given their personal preferences and desires. I think the neutral state is actually a perfection state. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 1366-69

Real happiness only comes as a side-effect of peace. Most of it is going to come from acceptance, not from changing your external environment. [8] -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 1379-80

We spend so much time and effort trying to change the external world, other people, and our own bodies—all while accepting ourselves the way we were programmed in our youths. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 1393-94

Really. This one. What is lacking? In way is this moment not enough?

What if this life is the paradise we were promised, and we’re just squandering it? -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 1408-9

the most common mistake for humanity is believing you’re going to be made happy because of some external circumstance. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 1431-32

Happiness is being satisfied with what you have. Success comes from dissatisfaction. Choose. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 1459-60

success is internal and has very little to do with external circumstances. One has to do the external thing anyway. We’re biologically hard-wired. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 1469-71

To me, the real winners are the ones who step out of the game entirely, who don’t even play the game, who rise above it. Those are the people who have such internal mental and self-control and self-awareness, they need nothing from anybody else. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 1483-85

In reality, peace is not a guarantee. It’s always flowing. It’s always changing. You want to learn the core skill set of flowing with life and accepting it in most cases. [8] -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 1495-97

The enemy of peace of mind is expectations drilled into you by society and other people. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 1508

All the real scorecards are internal. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 1521

If you’re not willing to do a wholesale, 24/7, 100 percent swap with who that person is, then there is no point in being jealous. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 1528-29

If you have peace of body, it’s easier to have peace of mind. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 1596

Caught in a funk? Use meditation, music, and exercise to reset your mood. Then choose a new path to commit emotional energy for rest of day. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 1603-4

First, you know it. Then, you understand it. Then, you can explain it. Then, you can feel it. Finally, you are it. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 1620

Here’s a hot tip: There is no legacy. There’s nothing to leave. We’re all going to be gone. Our children will be gone. Our works will be dust. Our civilizations will be dust. Our planet will be dust. Our solar system will be dust. In the grand scheme of things, the Universe has been around for ten billion years. It’ll be around for another ten billion years. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 1657-60

To make an original contribution, you have to be irrationally obsessed with something. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 1693-94

“I don’t have time” is just another way of saying “It’s not a priority.” -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 1751-52

Once you’re in, you’re in. It’s not suffering. It’s just cold. Your body saying it’s cold is different than your mind saying it’s cold. Acknowledge your body saying it’s cold. Look at it. Deal with it. Accept it, but don’t mentally suffer over it. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 1803-5

The ability to singularly focus is related to the ability to lose yourself and be present, happy, and (ironically) more effective. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 1892-93

You are basically a bunch of DNA that reacted to environmental effects when you were younger. You recorded the good and bad experiences, and you use them to prejudge everything thrown against you. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 1906-7

Whenever we say we’re going to try to do something or try to form a habit, we’re wimping out. We’re just saying to ourselves, “I’m going to buy myself some more time.” -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 1954-56

When you really want to change, you just change. But most of us don’t really want to change—we don’t want to go through the pain just yet. At least recognize it, be aware of it, and give yourself a smaller change you can actually carry out. [6] -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 1968-69

For self-improvement without self-discipline, update your self-image. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 2016-17

If you walk down the street and there are a thousand people in the street, all thousand are talking to themselves in their head at any given point. They’re constantly judging everything they see. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 2077-78

I never want to be in an environment or around people where I have to watch what I say. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 2137

I only want to be around people I know I’m going to be around for the rest of my life. I only want to work on things I know have long-term payout. -- Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, loc. 2144-45

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