Read What You Love Until You Love to Read
Naval Ravikant · 2016
"The way to become a lifelong reader — Naval's primary form of self-education — is to read only what genuinely interests you until reading itself becomes a pleasure, rather than forcing a prescribed curriculum."
Naval's claim is that most people fail to become readers because they were forced through books they didn't care about — school curricula, 'should-read' lists — and concluded reading itself was a chore, when the actual chore was the specific book, not the medium. His fix: start entirely from genuine interest, no matter how 'unserious' the topic seems, and let the habit of reading itself compound from there.
Once someone has built the identity and habit of 'a person who reads for pleasure,' Naval argues they can gradually pull toward harder, more valuable material, because the underlying skill — sustained attention, comfort with density, exposure to plural perspectives — transfers, whereas someone who never builds the base habit at all typically never reaches the harder material either. The ordering (love first, difficulty later) matters more than which specific books you start with.
How much time does Naval credit himself with spending reading daily, as central to his self-education?
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The explanation above is written with AI assistance. These are the originals — go to them to check it.
- Naval Ravikant's reading tips — read what you loveNaval Ravikant / Farnam Street
- Read What You Love Until You Love To ReadYouTube
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