Proper examination should ruin the life that you’re currently living. It should cause you to leave relationships. It should cause you to reestablish boundaries with family members and with colleagues. It should cause you to quit your job. . . . If it doesn’t do that, it’s not real examination. If it doesn’t come attached with destruction of your current life, then you can’t create the new life in which you will not have the anxiety.
— Naval Ravikant
Naval Ravikant (@naval) is the co-founder and chairman of AngelList. He is an angel investor and has invested in more than 100 companies, including many mega-successes, such as Twitter, Uber, Notion, Opendoor, Postmates, and Wish. You can subscribe to Naval, his podcast on wealth and happiness, on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Overcast, or wherever you get your podcasts. You can also find his blog at nav.al.
For more Naval-plus-Tim, check out my wildly popular interview with him from 2015, which was nominated for “Podcast of the Year.”
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SCROLL BELOW FOR LINKS AND SHOW NOTES…
Want to learn more about cryptocurrency? Listen to the conversation Naval and I had with cryptographer Nick Szabo, in which we discuss the problems cryptocurrencies were designed to solve, wet versus dry code, quantum thought, future occupations, and the existential risks of blockchain governance.
SELECTED LINKS FROM THE EPISODE
- Connect with Naval Ravikant:
- Naval Podcast | Apple Podcasts
- The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness by Naval Ravikant, Edited by Eric Jorgenson
- AngelList
- The Person I Call Most for Startup Advice | The Tim Ferriss Show #97
- Naval Ravikant on Happiness Hacks and the 5 Chimps Theory | The Tim Ferriss Show #136
- The Lion of Olympic Weightlifting, 62-Year-Old Jerzy Gregorek (Also Featuring: Naval Ravikant) | The Tim Ferriss Show #228
- The Quiet Master of Cryptocurrency — Nick Szabo | The Tim Ferriss Show #244
- Tribe of Mentors — Naval Ravikant, Susan Cain, and Yuval Noah Harari | The Tim Ferriss Show #442
- Jamie Foxx on Workout Routines, Success Habits, and Untold Hollywood Stories | The Tim Ferriss Show #124
- “Surely You’re Joking, Mr. Feynman”: Adventures of a Curious Character by Richard P. Feynman
- “What Do You Care What Other People Think?”: Further Adventures of a Curious Character by Richard P. Feynman
- Manhattan Project National Historical Park | US National Park Service
- What is Science? | Richard Feynman
- “The Opposite of Education Is Not Ignorance; It Is Education in Social Science.” | Nassim Nicholas Taleb, Twitter
- “It’s Much Easier to Bullshit at the Macro-Level Than It Is to Bullshit at the Micro-Level.” | Nassim Nicholas Taleb via Naval, Twitter
- Scientific Method | Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
- Cited Richard Feynman Quotations | Wikiquote
- Richard Feynman on How His Father Taught Him about What Is Most Important | Brain Pickings
- GPT-3: A Robot Wrote This Entire Article. Are You Scared Yet, Human? | The Guardian
- A Brief History of the Grand Unified Theory of Physics | Nautilus
- An Intuitive Explanation of Solomonoff Induction | Less Wrong
- Solomonoff Prediction and Occam’s Razor | Philosophy of Science
- The Power of Myth — The Hero’s Adventure with Joseph Campbell and Bill Moyers | The Tim Ferriss Show #456
- RationalWiki
- How to Get Rich (without Getting Lucky) | Naval, Twitter
- The Mysterious/Unsolvable Zen Koans – Henry Shukman, Associate Master of Sanbo Zen | The Kevin Rose Show
- “Understand That Ethical Wealth Creation Is Possible. If You Secretly Despise Wealth, It Will Elude You.” | Naval, Twitter
- “You’re Not Going to Get Rich Renting Out Your Time. You Must Own Equity, a Piece of a Business, to Gain Your Financial Freedom.” | Naval, Twitter
- Why You Should Learn to Code Even if You’re Not an Engineer | The Muse
- Warren Buffett Spends 8 Hours a Week Playing the ‘Only Game’ at Which He May Be Better than Bill Gates | CNBC MakeIt
- “Imagine How Effective You Would Be If You Weren’t Anxious All the Time.” | Naval, Twitter
- The Evolution of Anxiety: Why We Worry and What to Do About It | James Clear
- Samurai: A Brief Guide to Samurai Culture | InsideJapan Tours
- The Terminator | Prime Video
- Unforgiven | Prime Video
- Psychedelics — Microdosing, Mind-Enhancing Methods, and More | The Tim Ferriss Show #377
- TFRH: Meditation, Mindset, and Mastery | The Tim Ferriss Show #201
- “Meditation: The Art of Doing Nothing” | Naval, Twitter
- Naval Ravikant on Meditation | TUANVC
- 7 Lessons from My First Week of Meditating an Hour a Day | Niklas Göke, Medium
- The Way to Love: The Last Meditations of Anthony de Mello by Anthony de Mello
- Awareness: The Perils and Opportunities of Reality by Anthony de Mello
- Siddhartha: A Novel by Hermann Hesse
- Vasistha’s Yoga by Swami Venkatesananda
- Bhagavad Gita: A New Translation by Stephen Mitchell
- Tao Te Ching: A New English Version by Lao Tzu and Stephen Mitchell
- The Untethered Soul: The Journey Beyond Yourself by Michael A. Singer
- What is Inbox Zero? | Flow-e
- Think on These Things by Jiddu Krishnamurti
- The Book of Life: Daily Meditations with Krishnamurti by Jiddu Krishnamurti
- The Great Challenge by Osho
- Life Has No Goals, No Purpose by Osho | SoundCloud
- Counsels and Maxims by Arthur Schopenhauer
- Direct Truth: Uncompromising, Non-Prescriptive Truths to the Enduring Questions of Life by Kapil Gupta
- The Tao of Seneca: Practical Letters from a Stoic Master by Seneca
- Moral Letters to Lucilius by Seneca | Wikisource
- Crypto Stablecoins: Choose Between Blowup Risk, Censorship Risk, and Fraud Risk | Naval, Twitter
- Stablecoin Definition | Investopedia
- Types of Cryptocurrencies: Explaining the Major Types of Cryptos | Capital.com
- What Is DeFi? | CoinDesk
- Coinbase
- CoinList
- Computerized Front Running: Another Goldman-Dominated Fraud | HuffPost
- Flash Boys: A Wall Street Revolt by Michael Lewis
- Subprime Mortgage Crisis | Federal Reserve History
- There Ain’t No Such Thing as a Free Lunch (TANSTAAFL) | Investopedia
- Cryptos Are Digital Bearer Assets | Ultimate Money
- How Swiss Bank Accounts Work | The Balance
- Trust Makes the Difference Against the Coronavirus | The Atlantic
- A Primer On Reserve Currencies | Investopedia
- What is the Gold Standard? | Investopedia
- Odds of Monkeys Randomly Typing Hamlet or Shakespeare | The Mary Sue
- ‘I Didn’t Buy It to Sell It. Ever.’ MicroStrategy CEO on Buying $425M of BTC | CoinDesk
- Bitcoin Maximalism | Investopedia
- Billionaire Paul Tudor Jones Would Buy More Bitcoin If He Really Understands It, Says Microstrategy CEO | News Bitcoin News
- Quantum Computers and Cryptocurrencies | Binance Academy
- Covid-19 Economy Fuels Faith in Crypto: Trust In Bitcoin Over Banks Increased 3X Since 2017 | Bitcoin News
- Investor Prospects for 2020 and the Wall Street Casino | Forbes
- “All Self-Help Boils Down to “Choose Long-Term over Short-Term.” | Naval, Twitter
- “The Modern Devil Is Cheap Dopamine.” | Naval, Twitter
- Compound Interest Calculator | Investor.gov
- “The First Rule of Handling Conflict Is: Don’t Hang Around People Who Constantly Engage in Conflict.” | Navalmanack
- What Self-Awareness Really Is (and How to Cultivate It) | Harvard Business Review
- “The Reason to Win the Game Is So That You Can Be Free of It.” | Naval, Twitter
- “Not Wanting Something Is as Good as Having It.” | Liad Shababo, Twitter
- Finite and Infinite Games by James Carse
- Wisdom’s Folly: The Unexamined Life Is Not Worth Living | The Guardian
SHOW NOTES
- Does Naval still agree to do this podcast — in spite of declining to appear as a guest on others — in hopes of capturing Podcast of the Year laurels that were snatched from his grasp by Jamie Foxx the first time around? [06:10]
- Who is the person currently featured in Naval’s Twitter profile, and how has he inspired us (and countless others)? [08:02]
- Why there’s no such thing as science with a capital S, and what Nassim Taleb recently said about what he considers to be the opposite of education, and what it’s easier to macro than micro. [11:32]
- The problems that arise — in humans and in AI — when jargon masquerades as knowledge, and where the most practical life lessons are really learned. [17:03]
- How to get rich (without getting lucky). [24:58]
- In what ways has Naval’s own journey followed the aforementioned tenets of getting rich without getting lucky, and why are get-rich-quick schemes for losers? [33:27]
- Where do most of Naval’s personal, pithy tweets take form? Example: “Imagine how effective you would be if you weren’t anxious all the time.” [39:10]
- How has Naval learned to cope with and take control of his own anxiety? [44:57]
- What should proper meditation give us the power to do? [48:58]
- The philosophers Naval reads before he goes to bed. [51:19]
- How Naval tries to process the thoughts that go through his head when he’s meditating. [52:25]
- What Naval’s daily meditation practice typically looks like, and why he considers it “sheer joy” even if he can’t explain in words exactly what “it” is. [54:50]
- Where might someone interested in checking out the philosophy that inspires Naval begin? [57:55]
- Naval and I agree that the reading of philosophy is especially effective as a way to counter the toxic effects of social media and current events. [59:42]
- “Crypto stablecoins: choose between blowup risk, censorship risk, and fraud risk.” What does this recent, cryptic tweet from Naval mean, and why does Naval believe that cryptocurrency has the potential to be “a whole new casino that’s better than Wall Street” in decentralized finance? [1:01:57]
- How might an absolute beginner make an informed entrance into the world of cryptocurrency? [1:10:27]
- How might cryptocurrency be utilized in the real world for practical purposes like paying rent, buying food, or hiring a contractor to put a new deck on your house? [1:17:12]
- What does Naval see as the future of cryptocurrency as it gets adopted more and more by mainstream investors? [1:21:46]
- What does all truly effective self-help boil down to? [1:30:06]
- If the modern Devil is cheap dopamine, what was the ancient Devil? Some musings on the compound interest of long-term thinking. [1:31:47]
- Why it’s important to forge relationships with people who don’t make your interactions seem like a job. Or, as the Navalmanack says, “The first rule of handling conflict is: don’t hang around people who constantly engage in conflict.” [1:36:14]
- The reason to win the game is so that you can be free of it. But what is the game, what does it take to be free from it, and is the key in realizing that not wanting something is as good as having it? [1:40:22]
- This quote from Richard Feynman reminds me of Naval: “The first principle is that you must not fool yourself, and you are the easiest person to fool.” How does Naval strive to ensure he’s not fooling himself, and what did he learn from a guy named Craig in Thailand about choosing happiness? [1:46:08]
- Parting thoughts. [1:54:16]
PEOPLE MENTIONED
- Jamie Foxx
- Richard Feynman
- David Deutsch
- Karl Popper
- Nassim Nicholas Taleb
- Abraham Lincoln
- Michael Jordan
- Ray Solomonoff
- William of Ockham
- Warren Buffett
- Charlie Munger
- Miyamoto Musashi
- Clint Eastwood
- Socrates
- Aristotle
- Arthur Schopenhauer
- Osho Rajneesh
- Jiddu Krishnamurti
- Kapil Gupta
- Rupert Spira
- Anthony de Mello
- Michael Singer
- Stephen Mitchell
- Nick Szabo
- William Shakespeare
- Michael Saylor
- Paul Tudor Jones
- Jerzy Gregorek
- Elon Musk
- Liad Shababo
- James Carse
- Jesus
- Tony Robbins
- Eric Jorgenson