Naval Ravikant’s Happiness Formula: 12 Lessons + Powerful Quotes
Peace is happiness at rest. Photo by Patrick Schneider on Unsplash.
Reading time: 5 minutes
Who Is Naval Ravikant and What Is His Philosophy of life?
Naval Ravikant is an entrepreneur, investor, and thinker best known for distilling complex ideas about wealth, happiness, and decision-making into simple mental models. While he rose to prominence through startups and investing, his most enduring ideas are about how to live well.
In Eric Jorgenson’s bestselling book The Almanack of Naval Ravikant, Naval argues that happiness is not something you chase—it’s something you remove obstacles to. He describes happiness as a learnable skill and offers a simple but radical idea: when desire and expectation fall away, peace returns naturally.
This article focuses on the happiness half of Naval’s philosophy (he also examines wealth in the first part of his book): his happiness formula, 12 core principles, and the quotes that explain why inner peace—not success or status—is the real foundation of a good life.
Quick answer — What is Naval Ravikant’s happiness formula?
Naval Ravikant defines happiness as a state of inner peace, not excitement or pleasure. His happiness formula is often summarized as peace minus desire: when you remove unnecessary wants, expectations, and mental noise, happiness returns naturally. He believes happiness can be learned through habits like meditation, acceptance, and focusing only on what you can control.
Naval’s ideas draw heavily from Buddhism, Stoicism, and modern psychology—especially research on hedonic adaptation and attention.
Naval Ravikant’s 12 Happiness Principles (With Quotes)
1. Happiness is peace
Happiness is an overloaded term, and its definition often differs from person to person. For many, happiness is often defined by joy, positivity, and emotional well-beings; for others it represents being in a state of flow. In contrast, Naval Ravikant believes true happiness is rooted in cultivating a deep sense of inner peace. A genuinely happy person is someone who can effortlessly interpret events in a way that doesn’t disturb their inherent tranquility. This reframes happiness away from chasing highs and toward protecting peace.
Quote: “Peace is happiness at rest, and happiness is peace in motion”
2. Happiness Is a Learnable Skill
Naval is very clear on this. In the same way that you can choose to acquire the right tools and build wealth, you can also choose to be a happy person. It is something that can be learned, and starts by believing you can do it. True happiness comes from within and becomes a sustainable state of being by developing self-awareness, practicing mindfulness, and fostering a positive outlook. At the end of the day it is about habits—about making a commitment to be happier and gradually replace bad habits for good ones.
Quote: “You choose to be happy, and then you work on it”.
3. The Happiness Equation: Peace Minus Desire
One of Naval Ravikant’s most quoted principles is that happiness is our natural state when we remove desires. When nothing is missing, your mind shuts down and stops bouncing back and forth from regretting something in the past to being anxious about something in the future. The fewer desires we can form for external things and the more we accept the current state of things, the more present we are, and the happier we will be. As we can see, there is a lot of influence of Buddhism in Naval’s philosophy of life.
This idea is often summarized as Naval Ravikant’s happiness equation: happiness is what remains when the sense of something missing disappears.
Quote: “Happiness is what’s there when you remove the sense of something missing in your life”.
Photo by Elle Hughes on Pexels.
* Further Reading – Article continues below *
4. Get rid of expectations
Embrace the belief in the complete insignificance of the self. If you think you are the most important thing in the universe, then of course you will be upset when reality doesn’t bend and conform to each of your desires. Remember your insignificance in the broader universe to maintain peace and avoid as much as possible your expectations of how life “should” unfold. Everything is perfect just the way it is. Happiness comes as a side-effect of peace, and peace comes mostly from acceptance, not from trying to change your external environment.
Quote: “Expectations are a form of self-imposed slavery”.
5. Focus on What You Can Control
Again, here we are reminded of Buddhist and Stoic wisdom. Many of our anxieties and frustrations arise from trying to control external circumstances, many of which are unpredictable and often beyond our reach. By practicing detachment and accepting that certain aspects of life are outside our control, we can achieve a greater sense of peace and clarity. Adopting this mindset helps focus energy on personal actions and mindful decision-making, fostering personal growth and resilience.
Quote: “Focus on what you can control, and ignore the rest”.
6. The mind is just as malleable as the body
Naval Ravikant believes the mind is highly malleable and can be shaped—this is one of his foundational beliefs about happiness and self-improvement. People frequently aim to change external aspects like society, others, or physical looks—but they tend to overlook the potential for transforming their own minds. By recognizing that our mental state and thought patterns can be consciously altered, we can choose to cultivate happiness and develop it as a skill.
Quote: “Memory and identity are burdens from the past preventing us from living freely in the present”.
Photo by Joshua Sortino on Unsplash.
7. Rid yourself of anxiety
Many of us feel like our head is running from one thought to the next. Perhaps you experience “nexting”, where you are incapable of being present—always thinking of what comes next. Whatever the source, Naval recommends not to fight it, but to try to understand it and to ask ourselves: would I rather be having this thought right now or would I rather have my peace? Because as long as I have these thoughts I can’t have my peace.
Quote: “Anxiety is experiencing failure in advance”.
8. Desires are chosen unhappiness
The idea that by changing something in the outside world will bring you everlasting peace, joy, and happiness is a fundamental delusion most of us suffer from. Over and over, we keep saying to ourselves that we will be happy when we get that thing or when this happens. Desiring something creates a self-imposed dissatisfaction until that desire is fulfilled. By constantly wanting more, we trap ourselves in a cycle of perpetual unhappiness. Reducing our wants and desires leads to contentment and inner peace, since happiness is found by appreciating what we already have.
Quote: “Desire is a contract that you make with yourself to be unhappy until you get what you want”.
9. Why Success Doesn’t Guarantee Happiness
Confucius said we have two lives, and the second one begins when you realize you only have one. Naval Ravikant often shares that in his younger years he chased material and social success—but later realized that true happiness came from simplicity and internal peace.
Firstly, he experienced hedonic adaptation, the process by which individuals return to a baseline level of happiness after experiencing positive or negative events, reducing the long-term impact of these events on overall happiness. But more importantly, he saw that “successful” people around him were always wanting more and didn’t seem to be very happy.
Quote: “Happiness comes from being satisfied with what you have, while success comes from dissatisfaction. Choose”.
Photo by Mitch Walker on Unsplash.
10. Practice acceptance
You always have three ways to respond to any given event: you can change it, you can accept it, or you can leave it. What doesn’t make sense is to sit around wishing you could change it but doing nothing about it, or wishing you could leave it but not being able to let go. According to Naval, this struggle is responsible for a lot of our suffering. Often, you can shift your perspective to find positive angles in any situation—always ask yourself what is the positive angle of any given situation.
Quote: “True freedom lies in accepting the present moment as it is, without attachment to the past or anxiety about the future”.
11. Embrace death
Here we are reminded of Seneca. Naval believes that death is the most important thing that will ever happen to you. Looking at death in the eye and refusing to hide from its reality will bring meaning to your life. We are here for such a short time and all that matters is how you experience reality as you go through life—why not interpret it in the best possible way?
Quote: “To live fully is to embrace death. When you accept the inevitability of your own mortality, you free yourself to truly live”.
12. Meditation Is the Key to Inner Peace
Naval repeatedly returns to meditation as the most reliable way to quiet the mind and experience peace directly. He recommends that we spend time undistracted alone, in self-examination to better understand the nature of our thoughts and emotions. It’s not about making decisions or about judging, but about accepting the mind as it is.
He refers to our mind as a giant inbox of unanswered emails that goes back to our childhood. These thoughts will come up during meditation, one by one, and you will be forced to observe them. The good news is you can deal with many of them now as an adult, with more objectivity and with some time and distance from any given past event. According to Naval, eventually, you can reach a place where your inbox is at zero, experiencing blissful peace.
Quote: “Meditation is intermittent fasting for the mind”.
If you're wondering whether “The Almanack of Naval Ravikant” is worth reading, especially for those seeking Naval Ravikant's rules, quotes, and principles—it absolutely is. Especially if you're interested in both personal growth and pursuing Financial Fndependence. The book distills complex ideas into simple, actionable insights, making it a valuable guide to living well in the modern world.
Enjoyed this post? Don’t miss Naval Ravikant’s 10 wealth-building lessons or our post on the 10 shared principles from Buddhism and Stoicism to achieve inner peace. Didn’t find what you were looking for? Check out our most recent articles below, or the full list of blog posts here.
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Written by David, a former academic scientist with a PhD and over a decade of experience in data analysis, modeling, and market-based financial systems, including work related to carbon markets. I apply a research-driven, evidence-based approach to personal finance and FIRE, focusing on long-term investing, retirement planning, and financial decision-making under uncertainty.
This site documents my own journey toward financial independence, with related topics like work, health, and philosophy explored through a financial independence lens, as they influence saving, investing, and retirement planning decisions.
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Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
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Naval Ravikant’s happiness formula is often summarized as peace minus desire. He argues that happiness is our natural state when we stop wanting reality to be different and remove unnecessary expectations.
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Naval defines happiness as a state of inner peace, not external excitement. It comes from removing desires and being present.
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Success comes from dissatisfaction; happiness comes from being content. Naval argues the two don’t always align.
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Yes. He believes happiness is a learnable skill, built through habits, self-awareness, and inner work.
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He suggests questioning whether thoughts are worth trading your peace for—and advocates meditation to quiet the mind.
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Focus on what you can control, practice acceptance, let go of desire, and embrace meditation and mortality.
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