Thread by @SlowwCo

Highlights from Naval's first podcast interview in a year!

Here are the top 50 @naval quotes from this 50-minute podcast with @SamanthaRyNZ.

Including: Wisdom, Long-Term Thinking, Decision Making, Self-Image, Authenticity, Work as Play, Peace, Happiness, & More

(THREAD)

https://twitter.com/naval/status/1258212798762414080

"Wisdom is just understanding the long-term consequences of your actions."

— @naval

"If you look at the long-term, the 30-year consequence of the big decisions—like what I do, who I spend time with, and where I am—then all the little details after that barely matter."

— @naval

"We have so many choices and options, it’s really about good decision making."

— @naval

"I think at a core level, what I like to do … I like to understand things. And I like to understand them from the ground up on what some people call first principles. I like to be able to figure everything out for myself."

— @naval

"I read it somewhere. I read almost everything. I like to synthesize."

— @naval

"What are the problems you have in life? You basically have let’s say four important things:

1) All the Material problems
2) Love
3) Physical Heath
4) Eternal Mental Health

Another way is:

1) Money
2) Relationships
3) Happiness / Peace of Mind
4) Physical Health"

— @naval

"The holy grail would be to get all of them at once."

— @naval

"You get to give love, you don’t have the right to expect love."

— @naval

"The ideal life would be one where you had a hobby that as a byproduct made you money. You had a hobby that as a byproduct that kept you healthy. You had a hobby that as a byproduct made you smarter and more creative."

— @naval

"The truth is, as humans, we’re always trying to do what we enjoy. We’re pleasure-seeking machines. We’re always optimizing in our environment for what we like to do."

— @naval

"If it’s your passion, then it’s not work. It’s not going to feel like work for an instant to you."

— @naval

"To whatever extent you can choose, just find the thing that you enjoy that is good for you. And then just go all-in on that."

— @naval

"What are the unique skillsets—the specific knowledge—that I have to offer? What is the thing that I can do almost effortlessly that doesn’t feel like work to me—but might feel like work to others—that I can do all day long?"

— @naval

"If I don’t enjoy the process itself, I’m not going to do it."

— @naval

"The only thing you can do is do your best work, and the way you do your best work is not by doing it for anybody else. You do it for yourself because humans connect on commonality, they connect on shared interests."

— @naval

"If you’re not enjoying it, you’re not going to do it that much. You’re not going to be the best in the world at it. And the world really rewards people for being the best in the world at something these days no matter what it is."

— @naval

"If you’re authentic, you can just be the best at something. If you’re the best at something, you can make a living doing it because you can out-compete everybody else."

— @naval

"Humans are naturally meant for free exchange. We like to create things, we like to share them, we like to trade them."

— @naval

"I am an animal that’s evolved to get up and move around and do things … so I will do the things that come most naturally to me and that I enjoy."

— @naval

"You escape competition through authenticity."

— @naval

"It doesn’t matter what I think I should do or be. I’m just going to do what I’m just going to do. And it’s up to me to accept that—there’s no point in fighting it."

— @naval

"The ones who have already lost have the best chance of winning. If you start from a position of loss, then you have nothing to lose further so you can just try new things."

— @naval

"You have to be more into the art than to be worried about the failure. There is no failure because the victory, the success, the joy comes in practicing the art—it comes in genuinely learning new things."

— @naval

"Your only power in life is to inspire other people. And the only way you can inspire them is by living the most genuine and authentic life to yourself possible."

— @naval

"If you want to save the world, save your little corner of the world—the part that is truly, completely under your control—and then perhaps others can be inspired."

— @naval

"Try to be the model citizen—if there’s enough of us, then people will aspire to be that."

— @naval

"Build your own garden, tend your own lawn, clean your own mind, tend to your own household and make sure your household is a paragon before you go out and try and fix the world."

— @naval

"Ethical wealth creation is absolutely possible in a positive-sum game."

— @naval

"Positive, ethical wealth creation—solving society’s problems—is absolutely possible."

— @naval

"What matters much more is internal happiness and peace than any external material attachments."

— @naval

"I did all the things that you could possibly want to do, and then you always kind of return back to who you are. And that’s just your normal mood."

— @naval

"Anything you get, human beings are built to return to the baseline of where they started. That’s how we’re designed.”

— @naval

"It’s important to get to the endpoint. You don’t want to spend 90% of your life trying to figure out how to be happy and then 10% being happy. You want to be happy right now."

— @naval

"I’ve always been my own #1 fan … Self-love isn’t even in my equation, it’s not even in my vocabulary—it’s the air that I breathe and the water that I swim in."

— @naval

"One of the most powerful things to realize is that you can change your own self-image. And whatever your new self-image becomes, that you will follow."

— @naval

"It’s very easy for self-improvement to degenerate into self-conflict, and self-conflict to self-misery—that’s you beating yourself up."

— @naval

"It’s very important to be honest with yourself so you can actually succeed without hurting yourself, without being in self-conflict all the time, and without being ineffective. Because if you’re effective, and you just get what you want, you can trade it."

— @naval

"I’ve recently grown to dislike the word ’spirituality’ because I think there’s too much magic and holiness associated with it, whereas what I’m trying to do is just be practical."

— @naval

"If it’s working, it’s real."

— @naval

"It’s only pain that can make you change."

— @naval

"You can’t trick yourself. At some deep level, you always know."

— @naval

"Suffering is great because when you suffer, you’re forced to see the truth for what it is."

— @naval

"Most people deep down are truth seekers, they just don’t necessarily acknowledge it or realize it because the whole process of your life is testing to see what works, and whatever works becomes your truth."

— @naval

"The only opinion of me that I care for is my own, and the only timeframe is now."

— @naval

"Someone who doesn’t care, can’t be hurt."

— @naval

"For something to hurt you—for something to affect you—you have to let it."

— @naval

"Trying to leave a legacy is again one of those illusions like trying to imprint a single meaning in your life or your universe. If there’s a single meaning to your life, then those are shackles. That means that you have to be a slave to that meaning."

— @naval

"Anything you do that’s not congruent with that meaning is a mistake, and you no longer have freedom. And the environment is always changing, the future is always changing."

— @naval

"If society convinces you that what you did matters after you’re dead, then society can control you."

— @naval

"You have to be very careful because sometimes the voices talking in your head that you think is you is actually social programming. So whenever you feel guilt, guilt is just society’s voice speaking in your head. So, you have to be very careful to remove that."

— @naval