Naval views sacrifice as the highest leverage for building self-esteem. “If I look back on my life and what are the moments that I’m actually proud of, they’re very far and few between. It’s not the material success, it’s not having learned this thing or that. It’s when I made a sacrifice for somebody or something that I loved.”
He distinguishes real sacrifice from status signaling. True sacrifice isn’t what you give up for career advancement; it’s taking actual costs for love without external validation.
This connects to his parenting algorithm: providing unconditional love requires sacrificing the parent’s desire to control outcomes. The paradox is that giving up control creates more freedom for everyone.