Naval views creation as the fundamental act of building wealth. “We create things together”. Creation transforms raw materials into value through applied intelligence. It separates positive-sum games from zero-sum status battles by expanding what exists rather than fighting over fixed resources.
All creation starts with personal wanting. “It starts as an act of creativity. First you create it just because you want it”. Naval built AngelList because he needed it himself. Every founder solves their own problem first. This genuineness becomes the foundation for unique expertise that cannot be taught in school.
Creation demands personal agency. “Children are high-agency. They go get what they want”. Society trains people to consume rather than create. Naval insists you must “preserve your agency”. Creators maintain their independence by building things rather than waiting for permission.
“If I do my job right, if I create value for society, society says, ‘Oh, thank you’“. Society rewards creators through economic signals. This creates perfect incentive alignment between personal fulfillment and economic reward. The mathematical beauty lies in how individual authentic desires serve collective needs.
Naval sees infinite abundance in creation opportunities. Unlike competing for existing resources, creation expands possibilities through compound effects. “Something brand new will be created”. Each creative act increases total societal wealth rather than redistributing it. This follows the physical laws of energy transformation.
The force multiplication in creation comes from productization. Create once, distribute infinitely. Programming and digital distribution allow infinite scaling without proportional effort. “Businesses that have high creativity and high leverage tends to be ones where you could do an hour of work, and it can have a huge effect”. This asymmetric relationship between input and output defines modern wealth creation.
Creation connects to Naval’s philosophy of meaningful pursuits. “I love the ideation and initial creation phase around startups”. When work becomes creation, it stops feeling like work. This explains why Naval can work intensely without personal sacrifice. The natural selection of ideas through trial and error generates both personal satisfaction and economic value.
Creation requires ownership mindsets. Naval understands that creators must own their output to capture value. This connects to his emphasis on personal accountability and reputation building. “Artists are, by definition, authentic”. No one can compete with you on being you.
Future work will be purely creative. “If anyone is still working at that point, they’re working as a form of expressing their creativity”. When automation handles routine tasks, humans will create “because it’s in them to contribute, and to build and design things”. Creation becomes humanity’s last economic competitive advantage in an automated world. This game-theoretic insight explains why Naval invests in creative founders rather than efficient operators.