We often hear that if you really want to achieve your goals and be successful in your life then you need to work as hard as you can, but really? Let's find out what Naval said.

1. Work as hard as you can

If getting wealthy is your goal, you’re going to have to work as hard as you can. But hard work is no replacement for who you work with and what you work on.

According to Naval, the most important thing you need to consider to be successful in your career is you need to work hard on it but working hard isn't an alternative to the people who you're working with and on what you're working on.

In the book "The Almanack of Naval Ravikant by Eric Jorgenson", the author stated Naval's thoughts on getting wealthy and hard work that getting rich is about knowing what to do, who to do it with, and when to do it. It is much more about understanding than purely hard work. Yes, hard work matters, and you can’t skimp on it. But it has to be directed in the right way.

2. What you work on and who you work with are important

You can save a lot of time by picking the right area to work in. Picking the right people to work with is the next most important piece. Then comes how hard you work. Naval has cleared the misconception regarding hard work by relating with three legs of a stool.

According to him, they are like three legs of a stool. If you shortchange any one of them, the whole stool is going to fall. You can’t easily pick one over the other.

If you don’t know yet what you should work on, the most important thing is to figure it out. You should not grind at a lot of hard work until you figure out what you should be working on.

When you’re building a business or a career, first figure out: “What should I be doing? Where is a market emerging? What’s a product I can build that I’m excited to work on, where I have specific knowledge?”

3. Nobody really works 80 hours a week

This is where the mythology gets a little crazy. People who say they work 80-hour weeks, or even 120-hour weeks, often are just status signalling. It’s showing off. Nobody really works 80 to 120 hours a week at high output, with mental clarity. Your brain breaks down. You won’t have good ideas.

People tend to work most effectively, especially in knowledge work, to run as hard as they can while they feel inspired to work and rest. Then they take long breaks.

It’s more like a lion hunting and less like a marathoner running. You sprint and then you rest. You reassess and then you try again. You end up building a marathon of sprints.

That's how you build a marathon of sprints.

4. Inspiration is perishable

Inspiration is perishable. When you have inspiration, act on it right away.

If I’m inspired to write a blog post or send a tweet, I should do it right away. Otherwise, it’s not going to get out there. I won’t come back to it. Inspiration is a beautiful and powerful thing. When you have it, seize it.

5. Impatience with actions, patience with results

People talk about impatience. When do you know to be impatient? When do you know to be patient? Naval's glib tweet on this was:

“Impatience with actions, patience with results.”

Anything you have to do, get it done. Why wait? You’re not getting any younger.

You don’t want to spend your life waiting in line. You don’t want to spend it travelling back and forth. You don’t want to spend it doing things that aren’t part of your mission.

When you do these things, do them as quickly as you can and with your full attention so you do them well. Then be patient with the results because you’re dealing with complex systems and a lot of people.

It takes a long time for markets to adopt products. It takes time for people to get comfortable working with each other. It takes time for great products to emerge as you polish away.

If Naval discover a problem in one of his businesses, he won’t sleep until the resolution is at least in motion. According to him, "If I am on the board of a company, I’ll call the CEO. If I’m running the company, I’ll call my reports. If I’m responsible, I’ll get on it, right then and there, and solve it.

If I don’t solve a problem the moment it happens—or if I don’t move towards solving it—I have no peace. I have no rest. I have no happiness until the problem is solved. So I solve it as quickly as possible. I literally won’t sleep until it’s solved—maybe that’s just a personal characteristic. But it’s worked out well in business."

Final thoughts

You can save yourself a lot of time if you pick the right area to work in.

So trying to outpace everyone by working more number of hours than others isn’t the most efficient strategy. Here, you have to put more weight on your judgement. Before starting to work crazy hard, you must figure out:

What to work on? and Who to work with?