“Play iterated games. All the returns in life, whether in wealth, relationships, or knowledge, come from compound interest.”
Naval Ravikant
I have an absolute nerd crush on the guy. I love the lucidity and the depth at which he thinks. Of all the precepts he seems to constantly spew, this is the one I have been contemplating much.
Playing Iterated games and Compounding
By nature, we are very highly fickle minded, and constantly interest-hop from one to another. In true spirit of being retrospective, I kept track and then analysed my month’s worth of actions against these. [I use Kanbanflow ].
- Knowledge: This is probably my biggest take-away of it all. For the longest time, I maintained an ‘ideas journal’ and often wrote down ideas that excite me. Looking back I realize that a lot of things did. I was interested in creating goal setting journals that I used for myself, learning about Amazon FBA’s, scoping out Blockchain opportunities in our country, obsession in learning more about future of AI and Superintelligence, making perfumed soaps and having story telling sessions with kids, being underwhelmed by our education system and wanting to revolutionize the STEM and K2 education, creating a podcast for working moms, write e-books on road-trips, exploring the travel industry with the husband, et all. While I don’t necessarily regret learning, I think going deep is what compounds knowledge. I still love learning and books help. My mom oft complained that I would pretty much devour any sheet with ink on it. But whilst I continue to learn about things that excite me, I think I will focus on sprinting down a path that compounds over time.
- Wealth – Compounding is the greatest known secret to wealth. Money is the greatest leverage to, well, making more money.
- Wealth Creation isn’t evil : Overcome the negative connotation associated with money. Money in itself isn’t evil. What one could do with it, could be. Creating wealth (vs. making money) can be a goal for by doing that one is creating something of value.
- Profit First (based on Mike Michalowicz’ awesome book): Creating a mindset change of how we look at expenses and doing it over and over.
- Relationships: This was interesting. I have never considered compounding in the context of relationships. But in reality, most of our closest relationships are the one’s that have compounded over time – like a marriage.
- Build relationships over time with people who truly matter. And be consistent over time.
- Exit relationships that suck early on because compounding makes it harder to step out given the time invested
- Health : If anyone needs any reasons to stick to compounding, it is probably best reflected in how much one could change oneself over time if one wants to. I included this to the list since well I went from a 90 kg+ bloated post pregnant mom with severe pre-eclampsia to 65 kgs and 25% body fat – over time. One day at a time. Every day.
And finally, in action through iterations. ‘Doing’ beats everything else. To improve against any of the above requires action. And progress. And to fail. And to try again. So the single best thing I learnt was to have an action bias.
The universe doesn’t give you what you ask for with your thoughts – it gives you what you demand with your actions.
