An Invincible Love
When will I die?, Naval Ravikant, Invest with Trey, Kevin Kelly
Siblings fight. It’s a never-ending fight against the psychological fear of substation — the fear of being lost in the identity of another. When kids fight, it can be exhausting for the parents (can I get an Amen?), but we should recognize its the first step in the process of individuation — becoming an individual.
I told my kids the story this week of the younger brother and older sister who fought all the time. They never had a nice word to say about each other, only ever nagging and aggravating the other to explosive anger. The sister had a congenital blood disease that required her to get transfusions on a regular basis and the brother was pretty sure that she did it all for attention, as he often got lost in the shadow of her disease.
On one trip to the doctor’s office, the nurse informed the mother that their supply of blood for transfusions were dangerously low and it could only be tapped in case of emergency. She mentioned that the brother had the same blood type and his blood could be used. The mother sat the little boy down and explained the grave situation to him, asking kindly if he’d be willing to give blood to his sister.
To her surprise, her son seemed to hesitate. The boy looked down at the floor and his thoughts seemed very far away. It was some time before he snapped out of it, took a deep breath and said:
“Okay. I’ll do it, if it’ll save her.”
After hearing this the doctor and nurses wasted no time and immediately got the blood transfusion procedure going. With wide eyes the boy lay in the hospital bed next to all the machinery and watched as his blood flowed through the tubes, out of his body. Later on he watched as his sister in the bed next to him received the blood, and he could plainly see that the color was returning to her cheeks where before they’d been so pale.
After the nurses removed the IV lines, the boy turned to the doctor and said “Can I ask a question?” “Sure,” the doctor replied.
“When will I die?”
The doctor was aghast. What had been a very routine blood transfusion to him, was a life and death decision for the young boy — and he had made the decision to save his sister’s life.
“In ever human interaction a person is either asking for love or showing love.”
—Brad Chandler
Naval Ravikant is a successful entrepreneur and angel investor who has made a name for himself in Silicon Valley. Beyond his impressive accomplishments in the tech world, Ravikant is also known for his philosophical musings on life, happiness, and success. He’s the closest thing to a Public Intellectual that Silicon Valley has ever produced, despite pretensions to the contrary by people like John Doerr and others.
Naval is sort of a hero of mine. Tim Ferriss credits him with teaching him how to invest in angel deals and getting him access to Uber and Shopify at the earliest stages. I’ve read the book distilling his wisdom The Navalmanack (get it free here!), more than a dozen times. For real: download this book, share it with your kids before they join the rat race.
One of Ravikant's most well-known quotes is, "Desire is a contract that you make with yourself to be unhappy until you get what you want." This quote encapsulates his philosophy of finding contentment in the present moment, rather than constantly striving for external validation and success.
In writing his seminal moral biography of Alexander Hamilton, Richard Brookhiser notes that Hamilton was the first American because he not only became successful in the new country but conducted his life and affairs in such a way that other Americans could become successful, too. Because of Hamilton, America wasn’t about building up wealth and then pulling up the drawbridge. It is about expanding opportunity for everyone.
Naval has achieved amazing success in his career, having founded several successful startups and invested in companies such as Twitter, Uber, Shopify, and dozens of others. He is also the co-founder of AngelList, a platform that connects startups with investors in order to expand because he knew how hard it was for startups to raise money, and how hard it was for angels to find good investments.
Instead of keeping his methodology private, he released AngelList to the world where everyone can participate in the process. Over the years, hundreds of people have asked me if they could invest alongside me in the deals that we do (78 last year, 55 the year before). Now they can. In the coming weeks, I’ll be putting the finishing touches on my own AngelList syndicate where I can share deals with others so that everyone can do little angel investing, creating wealth for themselves and others.
Whether you're an entrepreneur, investor, or simply someone looking for inspiration and guidance, Naval Ravikant's teachings offer valuable insights on how to live a happy, fulfilling life. So take a page from Ravikant's book and focus on finding joy in the journey, rather than just the destination.
"Play long-term games with long-term people."
- Naval Ravikant.
Two of my favorites get together for an incredible conversation. Tyler Cohen interviews Kevin Kelly.
Tyler is the economist behind Marginal Revolution and someone who’s work and mind I’ve loved for ages. He embodies the principle “strong ideas, loosely held” and I learned what I know about changing my mind by watching him change his. He is prolific in his publishing, I get an email a day from MR, and I always pause to take a look at it.
Kevin Kelly published Wired magazine and wrote a book called New Rules for the New Economy that was widely derided at publication in 1999, and is so embedded in our truths today that no one reads it. He literally bats .1000 in the book and has continued to do amazing things since. 15 years ago he started a blog called the Quantified Life and measured everything in life he could. Now we wear an Apple Watch to do the same thing. At age 70, he just went to Asia to photograph a part of the world that will no longer exist in 10 years as industrialization and globalization erase tribal heritages. He is just amazing, and while we would differ on politics and economics to some extent, he’s opened doors of thought to me for years.
Each year Kelly publishes or updates a list of life lessons he wished he had learned earlier on his journey. He’s turned it into a book and Tyler discusses the book with him, and some things he left out of the book! A great listen.
Reptition. Reptition. Reptition. Reptition. Reptition. Reptition. Reptition. Reptition. Reptition. Reptition. Reptition. Reptition. Reptition. Reptition. Reptition. Reptition. Reptition. Reptition. Reptition. Reptition. Reptition. Reptition. Reptition. Reptition. Reptition. Reptition. Reptition. Reptition. Reptition. Reptition. Reptition. Reptition.
Reputation.