Naval’s identity as a latchkey kid shaped his relationship with knowledge and freedom. “I was a latchkey kid. My mom was working multiple jobs and then she was going to school at night. We were raised by a single mother, my brother and I were, in New York City”.
His mother discovered pure leverage. “I was raised by a single mom in New York, and she used the local library as a daycare center, because it was a very tough neighborhood”. She understood asymmetric risk: a free library card versus the upside of unlimited education. “When you get back from school, go straight to a library and don’t come out until I pick you up late at night”. The incentives aligned perfectly: safety and intellectual wealth.
Being a latchkey kid gave Naval something most children never get: hours of solitary contemplation that resembled meditation. While other kids were supervised and directed, he was free to follow pure curiosity. “So I used to basically live in the library, and I read everything; I read every magazine, I read every pictograph, I read every book, I read every map”.
This voracious consumption was constant iteration. Every book compounded his understanding. He absorbed physics and mathematics alongside fiction and history. The abundance mindset formed early: knowledge wasn’t scarce, only attention was. The library taught him game theory - how to optimize within constraints.
Naval didn’t care about reputation as the weird library kid. This indifference to social status became specific knowledge - a unique combination of reading breadth that others couldn’t replicate. His latchkey childhood built accountability: no one else would take care of his education.
The experience connected to his immigrant story. “We were immigrants so we came to this country when I was 9 and my brother was 11. We had very little”. Being both an outsider and self-taught created the foundation for later entrepreneurship - the comfort with being alone, thinking differently, and building from nothing.