Eric-Jorgenson The-Almanack-of-Naval-Ravikant indd

Part of making effective decisions boils down to dealing with 
reality. How do you make sure you’re dealing with reality 
when you’re making decisions?
By not having a strong sense of self or judgments or mind 
presence. The “monkey mind” will always respond with this 
regurgitated emotional response to what it thinks the world 
should be. Those desires will cloud your reality. This happens 
a lot of times when people are mixing politics and business.
The number one thing clouding us from being able to see real-
ity is we have preconceived notions of the way it should be.
One definition of a moment of suffering is “the moment when 
you see things exactly the way they are.” This whole time, you’ve 
been convinced your business is doing great, and really, you’ve 
ignored the signs it’s not doing well. Then, your business fails, 

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B U I L D I N G J U D G M E N T · 97
and you suffer because you’ve been putting off reality. You’ve 
been hiding it from yourself.
The good news is, the moment of suffering—when you’re in 
pain—is a moment of truth. It is a moment where you’re forced 
to embrace reality the way it actually is. Then, you can make 
meaningful change and progress. You can only make progress 
when you’re starting with the truth.
The hard thing is seeing the truth. To see the truth, you have 
to get your ego out of the way because your ego doesn’t want 
to face the truth. The smaller you can make your ego, the less 
conditioned you can make your reactions, the less desires you 
can have about the outcome you want, the easier it will be to 
see the reality.
What we wish to be true clouds our perception of what is true. 
Suffering is the moment when we can no longer deny reality.
Imagine we’re going through something difficult like a breakup, 
a job loss, a business failure, or a health problem, and our 
friends are advising us. When we’re advising them, the answer 
is obvious. It comes to us in a minute, and we tell them exactly, 
“Oh that girl, get over her, she wasn’t good for you anyway. You’ll 
be happier. Trust me. You’ll find someone.”
You know the correct answer, but your friend can’t see it, 
because they’re in the moment of suffering and pain. They’re 
still wishing reality was different. The problem isn’t reality. 
The problem is their desire is colliding with reality and pre-

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98 · T H E A L M A N A C K O F N A V A L R A V I K A N T
venting them from seeing the truth, no matter how much you 
say it. The same thing happens when I make decisions.
The more desire I have for something to work out a certain way, 
the less likely I am to see the truth. Especially in business, if 
something isn’t going well, I try to acknowledge it publicly and 
I try to acknowledge it publicly in front of my co-founders and 
friends and co-workers. Then, I’m not hiding it from anybody 
else. If I’m not hiding it from anybody, I’m not going to delude 
myself from what’s actually going on. [4]
What you feel tells you nothing about the facts—it merely tells 
you something about your estimate of the facts.
It’s actually really important to have empty space. If you don’t 
have a day or two every week in your calendar where you’re 
not always in meetings, and you’re not always busy, then you’re 
not going to be able to think.
You’re not going to be able to have good ideas for your busi-
ness. You’re not going to be able to make good judgments. I 
also encourage taking at least one day a week (preferably two, 
because if you budget two, you’ll end up with one) where you 
just have time to think.
It’s only after you’re bored you have the great ideas. It’s never 
going to be when you’re stressed, or busy, running around or 
rushed. Make the time. [7]

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B U I L D I N G J U D G M E N T · 99
Very smart people tend to be weird since they insist on 
thinking everything through for themselves.

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100 · T H E A L M A N A C K O F N A V A L R A V I K A N T
A contrarian isn’t one who always objects—that’s a 
conformist of a different sort. A contrarian reasons 
independently from the ground up and resists pressure to 
conform.
Cynicism is easy. Mimicry is easy. 
Optimistic contrarians are the rarest breed.