The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Book Review.

This was a different kind of book where the author wasn’t Ravikant himself (directly). The book is written by Eric Jorgenson, who did a collection of Naval’s wisdom and experience from the last ten years, shared as a curation of his most insightful interviews and poignant reflections. 

There are many “WOW” moments in the books. Since these are pin-point collections of Naval Ravikant’s Tweet (now X), blogs, podcasts, and other materials, it was so precise that each line was hitting one node or the other. I cannot emphasize enough how much I liked this book, as it highlighted some key principles for life, self-realization, and a perspective on how we should take life overall. Some of the quotes that were mentioned in the book made me look back at myself and think about how I am reacting to different aspects of life.

The best thing about this book is that Naval put it online for free. You can get it from his website.

In a nutshell, the book can be summarized into these learning categories:

• Learn the skill of decision-making.
• Learn the importance of reading.
• Happiness is a choice.
• Understanding how to create actual wealth and what actual wealth means
• Importance of personal brand in life

There were many quotes from the book that made me keep reading it, but here are a few that I liked the most:

• Earn with your mind, not your time.
• A happy person isn’t someone who’s happy all the time. It’s someone who effortlessly interprets events in such a way that they don’t lose their innate peace.
• If you have nothing in your life, but you have at least one person who loves you unconditionally, it’ll do wonders for your self-esteem.
• The hardest thing is not doing what you want—it’s knowing what you want.
• All the returns in life, whether in wealth, relationships, or knowledge, come from compound interest.
• Learn to sell. Learn to build. If you can do both, you will be unstoppable.
• Make time for the important things. “I don’t have time” is just another way of saying, “It’s not a priority.”
• Intentions don’t matter. Actions do. That’s why being ethical is hard.
• Wealth is an asset that earn while you sleep.
• Desire is a contract you make with yourself to be unhappy until you get what you want.

I recommend this book to everyone who wants to revisit their perspectives on wealth, self-actualization, value building, personal brands, and decision-making.