The Fifth Leverage

Naval Ravikant wrote the playbook on leverage. Here's the one he didn't see coming.

In The Almanack of Naval Ravikant, Naval made a brilliant observation about the 4 fastest paths to building wealth and how each one has shifted over time. Each era in history produces a dominant form of leverage, and the people who recognize the shift early are the ones who have the advantage in the market.

Labor was the oldest form — the Egyptians built the pyramids with it.

Then capital — Warren Buffett proved that money itself could be leverage.

Then code — Mark Zuckerberg built Facebook from a dorm room and created more wealth than most corporations.

Then media — one person with a phone could reach more people than a Super Bowl ad.

Today however, I believe there’s a 5th leverage. One that Naval didn’t talk about because he was too early to see it coming.

And as we head into the second half of the 2020s, while every single one of those levers mentioned above are more powerful and more accessible than ever - none of them are the competitive lever for the era we’re in now.

When everyone has access to the same tools, the same platforms, the same funding mechanisms, those levers stop being what separates you. They become the baseline.

The Fifth Leverage

The people who keep pulling ahead aren't just the ones with the best product, the most capital, or the slickest media strategy. Those with the most competitive edge in the market, are the ones who walk into every room with people already behind them.

Community is the emerging fifth leverage. It's not necessarily the fastest way to build wealth — but I believe it's becoming the most valuable. Communities used to be a nice-to-have. Now they're becoming a requirement for survival.

Here's why.

The Proof Is Already Everywhere

At a recent CPG event, food and beverage brands were pitching brokers — the gatekeepers who decide what gets stocked at Target, Walmart, Costco. The brokers weren't searching for the best product. They were searching for cultural relevance — which brands already had a following, which ones people were already talking about. The question wasn't "What's the best?" It was: How big and loyal is the community you're bringing with you?

This is why Aviation Gin became a $610 million brand. Not because it was the best gin on the market — but because Ryan Reynolds has a cult following that buys whatever he creates, and every retailer wants a percentage of that.

And this is playing out in influencer marketing too. The old model — a brand pays a creator for a sponsored post, maybe a 6-month partnership, hopes for a bump in sales — is dying. What I'm seeing now is influencers negotiating equity stakes, revenue shares, and co-founder roles. They're not selling ad space anymore. They're bringing the buyers to the table and asking for a seat at it. Because they know what they're actually holding: a community of people who trust them enough to open their wallets.

That's leverage that can’t be bought - it can only be earned (over a long period of time).

Why Community Is the Hardest Leverage to Build — And Why That Makes It the Most Valuable

Here's what makes community different from every other form of leverage — you can't shortcut it.

You can access code through AI. You can raise capital through a dozen different channels. You can build a team faster than ever. You can produce media with tools that didn't exist 18 months ago. All of those levers are stronger and more accessible than they've ever been — and that's a good thing. But it also means they've become commodities. When everyone can pull the same levers, those levers stop being what sets you apart.

Community is different. You cannot buy real people. You cannot automate trust. You cannot download an audience overnight.

Communities take time. They take consistency. They take showing up when there's no ROI in sight and doing it anyway because you're playing a longer game than most people have the patience for.

And there's a paradox that makes community even more scarce — everybody wants to have a village, but very few people want to be a villager. Our culture values optionality, flexibility, no commitments. We want the freedom to leave at any time. Building a community — a real one, not a vanity metric — requires the opposite. It requires sacrifice. It requires saying "I'm going to keep showing up here even when it's hard, even when it's boring, even when growth is slow."

Not everybody is willing to pay that price. Which is exactly what makes it valuable.

The Eras of Leverage — And Where We Are Now

When Naval made his observation, each era of leverage represented the dominant way wealth was being built at that moment in time. Each one is still useful — they stack, they compound, they work together. But each era also produced a point where that particular lever became so accessible that it stopped being the thing that set you apart.

Community isn’t just the 5th lever - its the lever for the era in history we’re in right now. It can't be replicated by a tool, bought with a check, or built by an algorithm. It's the one that requires the thing most people aren't willing to give — time, trust, and consistency.

Build the Demand Before the Product Exists

Here's where I predict there will be a change. Historically, most founders spend their time building a product first before they ever think about marketing. They spend months (sometimes years) perfecting the thing, and then they show up to a market where nobody knows they exist, nobody has any buy-in, and nobody is waiting for them to launch.

Meanwhile, their competition has been telling a story. Building trust. Earning attention. Creating anticipation. By the time that competitor launches, people are ready to hand over their credit card on day one — not because the product is better, but because the relationship already exists.

It's not enough to develop something great and then go find an audience. You have to start building community and earning buy-in before the product even exists. The longer your runway of storytelling and trust-building, the bigger your advantage when it's finally time to sell. That's anticipation marketing — and in a world where everyone is fighting for the same few seconds of attention in the same feed, it's the founders who built the relationship first who get the sale.

Community isn't a "Phase 2" thing you get to after you nail your product. It's the infrastructure that everything else runs on.

Naval Ravikant identified the pattern — each era produces a new dominant form of leverage. Labor, capital, code, media. Each one changed who could build wealth and how fast. But the world Naval wrote about is not the world we're building in now. Community isn’t just the differentiator in a competitive market - its the foundation.

And the playing field is wide open — because most people still think community is optional.

To being a villager in the community you love being apart of,

Ashley

P.S. — I’d love to hear from you on this. Do you agree that community is the fifth leverage? Or do you think there’s something else emerging that I’m missing? Let me know — I read every single one.

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