The Compounding Courage of Charlie Kirk

By David Verlander

Serious investors understand the power of compounding. I often illustrate it with a parable: take a sheet of paper and fold it in half. Then fold it again, and again. “How tall,” I ask, “will it be after 51 folds?” People guess six inches, maybe a foot; the more ambitious, the ceiling. Then comes the reveal: “by fold 51 the paper reaches the moon; by 52, it returns to Earth.” The listener is stunned. Human beings simply aren’t wired to process the power of compounding.

I felt that same way a few days ago. At first, I was shocked that anyone would take Charlie’s life. That shock deepened into grief. But as I began to see the vast arc of his reach — the crowds, the vigils, the silence of stadiums — grief gave way to awe. And finally, to hope.

Charlie began as an oddity — a teenager with earnest convictions, speaking before small, hostile crowds where jeers, thrown objects, and chants of “bigot” and worse tried to drown him out. Over time the oddity became a novelty, and soon after, a target. He was spat on, derided, shouted down.

Looking back, those were his early folds. Small, painful, barely visible. Each scornful dismissal was another layer on a stack no one else could see, perhaps not even Charlie himself. Yet he persisted. Fold after fold, courage upon courage.

Eventually the tower emerged. Ideas once ridiculed were now embraced by crowds of thousands. His organization’s chapters stretched across the country. The paper stack was no longer flat; it was rising.

And then came the shot in Utah. It was meant to end him — and with him, his ideas. Instead, it revealed just how high his courage had already carried.

Vigils flared from London to Phoenix. Professors and staff who mocked his death were exposed; institutions scrambled to respond. Moments of silence fell across stadiums. And then Erika’s voice cut through the grief: “The evildoers responsible have no idea what they have done.” She was right. The latest fold had reached the moon. The next would bring it back — and from there, the stack will only climb higher.

Because courage compounds beyond a single life. It roots itself in every heart willing to be inspired. It sparks in every student, every parent, every citizen who realizes that standing alone is not madness, but the first fold of something larger.

I am convinced that if God had offered Charlie the choice — more years with his beloved Erika, his daughter and son, or a shorter life that would propel his message further than he could ever imagine — he would have chosen this. He loved his family dearly, but sacrifice for something greater was consistent with the courage he lived every day. And I am in awe of that kind of courage.

This is not an elegy. It is a reckoning. Charlie’s answer to “why do you do this?” was always the same: “Because when we stop talking, bad things happen.” He knew the difference between keyboard skirmishes and true communication. That’s why he showed up in person, on stages, face to face. Connecting. Explaining. Talking.

As a boy, my mother gave me a Reader’s Digest quote: “Why explain? Your friends don’t need it, and your enemies won’t believe it anyway.” For years I thought it brilliant. But life taught me otherwise. Sometimes you must explain. Sometimes misunderstanding demands you keep talking. Twenty-nine years of marriage has shown me that silence may feel easier in the moment, but words — honest, face-to-face — are the only way to heal.

Charlie knew that instinctively. He preached by talking, explaining, relating. That was his courage. That was why his folds compounded.

Now the question is whether we will continue them. His movement can grow, his influence multiply, if we carry the work forward.

We stand at the threshold of something capable of reaching the moon — and back, many times over.

David L. Verlander is a Managing Partner at DLV Capital, bringing expertise in investment management and strategic leadership.