5 Pieces of Advice from Naval Ravikant (#Almanack of Naval Ravikant)

This is part 3 of a 3-part series from the ‘Almanack of Naval Ravikant’.

Initial articles that I’ve written on this thread are shared below:

1. 8 Life Lessons from Naval Ravikant (#Almanack of Naval Ravikant) | by Anant Kasliwal | Jul, 2023 | Medium
2. 8 Life Hacks from Naval Ravikant (#Almanack of Naval Ravikant) | by Anant Kasliwal | Jul, 2023 | Medium

I broke it down into 3 parts as there’s just too much wisdom to share that it just didn’t felt right to cramp it all out in one big article. I’ve broken it down hoping this will help in getting this content out to more readers given the hopefully short and sharp read.

If you have read the earlier two articles, jump to the bullet points. Otherwise, carry on.

So who are we talking about — Naval Ravikant. As per Wiki, he’s an Indian-American entrepreneur and investor. He is the co-founder, chairman and former CEO of AngelList. He has invested early-stage in over 200 companies including Uber, FourSquare, Twitter, Wish.com, Poshmark, Postmates, Thumbtack, Notion, SnapLogic, Opendoor, Clubhouse, Stack Overflow, Bolt, OpenDNS, Yammer, and Clearview AI, with over 70 total exits and more than 10 Unicorn companies.

Ravikant is a fellow of the Edmund Hillary Fellowship. As a podcaster, he shares advice on pursuing health, wealth, and happiness.

Just so you can make your own judgment, I’ve shared some of his content below so you can decide for yourself.

• His 11 Rules for Life YouTube audio: Naval Ravikant — 11 Rules For Life (Genius Rules) — YouTube
• His best-selling book, ‘(which I’ve read and again, I would highly recommend) — Almanack of Naval Ravikant (navalmanack.com)

I have consumed quite a bit of his content and in this article, I’ve tried to share the nuggets of wisdom that resonated most with me. His tips are practical and useful and based on my own experience, can be applied and implemented in your life pretty much starting NOW (if you choose to do so). On that note, let’s get into it.

1. Choose to be yourself: Beating yourself up is the most common thing happening in today’s world. You need to find the project that needs you. Building frameworks and checklists based on what other people are doing will not help you. Remember, ‘You will never be good at being somebody else’.
2. Choose to care for yourself: Your health (mental and physical) should be your number one priority in life. If you are not mentally and physically healthy, neither can you help yourself or be of help to anyone else. Here’s a food for thought, ‘Harder the workout, better the day’. Your workout should be your number one priority (above your work, your family, and everyone and everything else). Meditation is intermittent fasting for the mind. Time spent alone and undistracted in self-examination, journalling, and meditation resolves the unresolved and takes us from mentally fat to fit. Depending on what you like to do, any activity can be a form of meditation. Hiking is walking meditation, journaling is writing mediation, praying is gratitude meditation, showering is accidental meditation, and sitting quietly is direct meditation.
3. Knowing what you want: The hardest thing is not doing what you want, its knowing what you want. You’ll have to figure it our yourself and do it (as no one else can do it for you). “It isn’t normal to know what we want. It is a rare and difficult psychological achievement.” — Abraham Maslow. One good starting point in trying to ‘figure out’ what you want is to break the habit of uncontrolled thinking. And remember, there’s NO endpoint to self-discovery and self-awareness. You will work on these aspects till you are alive.
4. Live by your values: All benefits in life come from compound interest, whether its money, relationships, health, love or habits. Hence try and be around people you know you’re going to be around for the rest of your lives. Work on things you know have a long-term payout. Peer relationships are best as compared to hierarchical relationships. And remember, anger is like hot coal you hold in your hand while you prepare to throw it at someone else. So, don’t be angry and cut angry people out from your life.
5. Definition of Wisdom: Understanding the long-term consequences of your actions is wisdom. If wisdom could be imparted through words alone, we’d all be done here.

And that’s it. Hope you enjoyed this read and gained some perspective that you can apply in your life. Share in the comments what resonated the most with you (or didn’t). I’m keen to hear. Thanks for reading.

If you liked what you read and want to read more, I would recommend this one — 8 Tips For Self-Development from Dr. Jordan Peterson | by Anant Kasliwal | Medium, from Dr. Peterson (or Uncle Peterson as he’s fondly called by some of his fans — including me :))