Scan time: 2-3 minutes / Read time: 3-5 minutes
Hey rebel ideapreneurs 🦸♂️🦸♀️
Maya runs three content businesses for people building a side hustle while employed.
She started them while still in her own 9-to-5, juggling all three at night.
To her, a real business can start on the side — no resignation letter required.
Her readers live it too — big dreams, four spare hours a week.
⛳️ Problem:
Maya runs three content businesses and none of them are moving.
She works every night, splitting time across newsletter, templates shop, podcast.
The newsletter is on issue three. The templates shop has one file. The podcast has zero recordings shipped.
Four months in, she's exhausted and three projects sit unfinished.
Her frustration: how to focus on the one business worth her time.
🔥 The recipe
➡️ The absurd hourly rate
Naval Ravikant is the angel investor behind early Twitter and Uber.
His free book The Almanack is one of the most-read guides on solo wealth.
He argues most side hustlers price their time too low.
Trouble is...we say yes to the freelance gig.
We say yes to the cousin's favor.
We say yes to the recruiter's "quick call."
And every yes is a no to the one project that compounds.
Naval's argument: pick an absurd hourly rate.
Then say no to everything below it.
Naval valued his time at $5,000 an hour — long before anyone paid it.
So he refused cheap time-sinks: haggling a bill, returning a faulty gadget.
At that rate, an hour spent saving $50 wasn't worth it.
He kept those hours for his one big bet.
🚗 The steps
💰 Step 1 — Pick your absurd hourly rate.
Pick the rate your future self would charge today.
$500, $1,000, $5,000 — go absurd.
The number feels uncomfortable because that's the point.
Maya picks $500 an hour.
That's $4,000 for a full 8-hour day of her time.
The number gives her a single test for every yes.
🎯 Step 2 — Audit last week's hours.
Open your calendar.
Tag every hour: above the rate, at the rate, or below.
Maya audits her last 14 evenings.
12 hours on freelance editing at $40 an hour: below.
6 hours on a friend's favor, free: below.
3 hours on her own newsletter: above (her one project).
1 hour on the podcast: below (not her one bet).
Most of her week was below the rate.
✋ Step 3 — Cut everything below the rate this week.
Send the short no.
Refund the half-done gig.
Hand back the favor.
Maya replies to the recruiter: "I don't take freelance right now."
She tells her cousin: "I can't take side projects this season."
She pours every freed evening into the one project that compounds.
The newsletter ships its first ten issues that quarter.
One rate, one filter, one focus — and the calendar finally empties.
The prompt below will run the Absurd Hourly Rate on everything on your plate.
You just tell it what's there.
🧸 One absurd rate + one ruthless no = a calendar that finally moves the needle.
🏄♀️ The prompt
Save this prompt as a Skill or add to Project in your favorite AI tool — build once, use often.
Update your input values in the prompt or just run as is, your AI sidekick will use the example values and will give output.
CONTEXT:
- (use what's available, fall back to the inline values)
- If my Voice Profile exists, write in that voice. Otherwise, write in a clear, warm, no-jargon voice — short sentences, plain words, zero hype.
- If my ICP / Audience doc exists, target that reader. Otherwise, use the audience below.
Inputs:
Everything on my plate right now (list every side project, freelance gig, favor, and "I really should" task):
{e.g.
- weekly newsletter on building a side hustle (issue 3)
- paid templates shop (one file half-built)
- a podcast in pre-production (2 unedited recordings)
- freelance landing-page gigs when a recruiter pings me
- helping a friend with their side project
}
For Audience: {e.g. employed people building a side business at night}
For Outcome: {e.g. a one-page filter I can pin above my desk so the next ping gets a clean no in 30 seconds}
Outputs:
PART 1 — The absurd hourly rate: pick a rate between $500 and $5,000 per hour that matches the future version of me. Write it as a one-line rule.
PART 2 — The audit: for each item on my plate, tag it above the rate, at the rate, or below. Be ruthless. The freelance gig is below. The favor is below. The one project that compounds is above.
PART 3 — The cuts: for each below-rate item, write a 1-2 sentence no I can copy-paste. Short. Friendly. No apology. No "let me get back to you in a month."
Then in two sentences, tell me the smallest possible move I can make this week on my one above-rate project — even if I have only 90 minutes of focused time before Sunday night.
One number worth living by.
One week of hours laid bare.
One project that finally ships.
That's it, my fellow mavericks!
Yours 'helping you turn your obsession into income 10x faster with your AI sidekick' Vijay Peduru 🦸♂️