Persistence is how you overcome resistance. An interviewer asked Elon what he thought about the challenges with launching an orbital rocket in the early days of SpaceX.
Interviewer: After that third rocket failure did you think about giving up?
Elon:Never. I don’t ever give up. I mean (if I was going to give up) I’d have to be dead or completely incapacitated.
Try, try harder, and try again.
And believe in yourself. You can only achieve great success when you keep trying and truly believe you can.
“We should all be concerned about the future because we will have to spend the rest of our lives there.” ~Charles F. Kettering
When Elon became the world’s wealthiest man he had already been the world’s most powerful man for some time…
This is because Elon is optimizing for his missions and not simply trying to rack up his net worth as much as possible. If maximum net worth was the goal SpaceX would likely be a publicly traded company, rather than privately owned.
Elon owns the majority of SpaceX (54% with 78% voting control) and since he does not have to answer to investors he has more time and energy available to roll out new innovations faster.
Interestingly this is what Ashlee Vance (Author of the bestselling biography of Elon) said when Elon became the world’s richest man officially:
“When I set out to write a bio on @elonmusk, he was worth a paltry few billion. Did not really think I’d end up writing about the richest person in the world because his companies were so risky.
How many people in a similar position would take a personal fortune of $200 million and bet it all on solar, electric cars and rockets in 2001?”
Tesla and SpaceX surviving the 2008 financial crash by the skin of their teeth and rising to dominate two of the most competitive industries in the world is undoubtedly one of the best business stories of all time.
Elon has attributed his engineering mind due to the genetics and upbringing he obtained from his father. Elon’s father is an Engineer also and Elon has explained how he grew up around an engineering environment.
Elon’s success does not surprise me, because Elon is a brilliant human being.
What others perceive as ultra risky do not understand the depths of Elon’s intelligence, his fierce work ethic, and his ability to get the job done better than anyone.
Elon is looking towards the future and planning with Tesla and Optimus humanoid robots and energy products to usher in amazing abundance for all.
Master Plan IV video explains in 1 minute 23 seconds.
As Elon plans a Starlink IPO his wealth is tracking towards a trillion USD and beyond.
You Are the Company You Keep: Elon Musk’s Path to Billion-Dollar Success
Certainly after multiple decades thriving in silicon valley Elon has amassed a number of powerful friends.
Elon’s friends include Richard Branson, Peter Thiel (the first investor in Facebook), Chad Hurley (YouTube co-founder), Reid Hoffman (LinkedIn Founder), Chamath (Facebook & Social Capital) and the list goes on.
You are the company you keep is an idiom that has stood the test of time, and it certainly seems to hold true for Elon as well.
The great friends Elon has have helped him achieve great business success. When Tesla was on the verge of bankruptcy Elon was able to convince Larry Page to get Google to agree to buy Tesla…
Unfortunately for Larry the deal never went through…
On the last hour of the last day Elon had to secure financing, on Christmas Eve 2008, Elon was able to get the financing needed to keep Tesla alive. So the Google acquisition of Tesla did not go through.
Surrounding yourself with powerful people is a great way to brainstorm brilliant ideas and help each other realize powerful results.
For better or worse the people you surround yourself with will influence you. So to maximize the positive effects from your friendships, surround yourself with the best people possible and be ruthless about cutting out and unfriending anyone who proves to be negative.
Better to have fewer friends than to have negative friends.
If Tesla focused on quantity of investors over quality they might not be in business today.
The concept of quality is so important to the success of a business, especially in the early phases…
And quality over quantity extends to every element of the business, including the venture capitalists and investors it works with.
In a PandoMonthly interview Elon elaborates:
“If you have a choice of a lower valuation with someone you really like or a higher valuation with someone you have a question mark about, take the lower valuation.
It’s better to have a higher quality venture capitalist who you think would be great to work with than to get a higher valuation with someone where there’s even a question mark, really.”
Quality matters.
Strive for quality people as investors and in all aspects of your life and your odds of living a quality life increase.
You want to learn as much powerful information as you can.
Elon elaborates: “It’s great to read books and talk to interesting people, and learn as much as possible…”
“Maybe it was Plato or Socrates who said: To know everything is to know nothing…” So keep an open mind.
The moment you think you know everything is the moment you fail to learn anything…
So keep learning.
If you think you know everything it will be difficult to learn anything.
At Italian TechWeek Elon elaborated:
“I think you should maximize your feedback loop and your ability to learn. As soon as you think you know too much and people can’t teach you things that’s when you start getting very dumb…”
Stay curious. Keep asking questions. Be a lifelong learner.
Audio Books are a Great Way to Learn More
Elon Musk listens to audio books as he goes to sleep usually.
Elon is a lover of history and audio books.
Particularly favoring historical, biographical, and epic works—many with themes of war, civilization, and leadership.
He often emphasizes listening to classics like ancient epics in audio format, noting that they were originally meant to be spoken.
Here are some of his most frequently or enthusiastically recommended audiobooks:
The Iliad (Penguin Edition, narrated for audiobook): Musk has repeatedly praised this highly, saying “Can’t recommend The Iliad enough!” and recommending the Penguin audiobook at 1.25x speed. He stresses it’s best experienced as a spoken story.
The Story of Civilization by Will and Ariel Durant: Tops his list of audiobook recommendations, described as “very much worthwhile” despite its length (multi-volume series on world history).
The Road to Serfdom by Friedrich Hayek: Included in his curated audiobook list, focusing on economics and freedom.
American Caesar by William Manchester: A biography of Douglas MacArthur, part of his history-focused recommendations.
Masters of Doom by David Kushner: About the creators of Doom video games—appeals to Musk’s gaming interests.
The Wages of Destruction by Adam Tooze: Economic history of Nazi Germany.
Storm of Steel by Ernst Jünger: A WWI memoir.
The Guns of August by Barbara Tuchman: On the outbreak of WWI.
The Gallic Wars by Julius Caesar: Caesar’s own account of his campaigns.
Twelve Against the Gods by William Bolitho: Profiles of historical adventurers.
Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World by Jack Weatherford: Musk has shown interest in Genghis Khan’s history separately.
Additionally, he highly recommended the audio version of Destined for War by Graham Allison, saying “could not recommend this book more. Audio version is great.”
Elon is much more interested in exceptional ability than he is a college education.
“I think colleges are for fun and to prove you can do your chores but they are not for learning.”
“I make sure Tesla recruiting does not have anything that requires University because that’s absurd…but there is a requirement of evidence of exceptional ability.
If you try to do something exceptional you must have evidence of exceptional ability.
I don’t consider going to College evidence of exceptional ability. In fact ideally you dropped out and did something.
Gates is a pretty smart guy, he dropped out. Jobs, pretty smart guy, he dropped out. Larry Ellison, smart guy, he dropped out. Like: Obviously not needed.” [source 7:10]
Clearly great success does not require a piece of paper on the wall.
Of course that’s not to say a College or University degree does not help. They certainly can. However with the great proliferation of quality information from excellent schools and individuals online there are plenty of great alternatives to the traditional model.
Traditionally the schools had a monopoly on information. They had the books. But these days it’s different.
There are plenty of full length lectures from Stanford, Harvard, and a number of other reputable schools.
edX.org is a truly powerful online resource that contains over 3,000 courses from 160 Colleges, many of them among the worlds best, and it’s totally free.
Harvard, Stanford, The University of British Columbia, and the National University of Australia are just a few of these institutions you can learn from for free.
At the time of writing there are 343,710 people learning on edX at this moment.
I’ve taken an edX course from Harvard and found the quality to be exceptional. They use the actual lectures and material from the on campus program.
Learning solutions like Astra Nova, Synthesis and edX are three shining examples of the future of education you can use to learn whatever you want.
If your chores stack up too high your stress will mount and your success will dwindle…
So don’t let that be you.
Make sure you do what you need to do to ensure healthy operation of the enterprise you are operating.
“I’d love to just do innovation and just do engineering but alot of life in general and any job you have to do your chores…
I think to be successful at almost anything you have to do the tough stuff as well as the enjoyable stuff. You have to do the boring stuff as well as the non-boring stuff. And if you don’t do your chores then bad things will happen…
Like it’s more fun to cook the meal than to clean the dishes, but you need to clean the dishes. You need to do both.”
Do what is absolutely necessary and in doing so you will afford yourself the ability to enjoy the arbitrary.
Elon Musk on Profit: It’s Proof You’re Adding Real Value
In his Kahn academy interview with Sal Kahn Elon said:
“There’s nothing fundamentally wrong with profit, in fact profit just means that people are paying you more for whatever you are doing than you are spending to create it…
And that’s a good thing. If that’s not the case then you would be out of business and rightfully so because you’re not adding enough value.”
So add more value. Stack on bonuses. Strengthen your offer by finding ways to improve your product.
Elon explains by investing in his own companies it becomes easier to ask others to do the same.
In a Milken Institute Interview Elon was asked: “You put a lot of your eggs in one basket. Would you advise entrepreneurs to roll the bones quite the way you did?”
Elon: “Yeah absolutely! I think it’s worth investing your own capital in what you do. I don’t believe in the sort of other people’s money thing…
I think if you’re not willing to put your own assets at stake then you shouldn’t ask other people to do that.”
Elon is all in with having skin in the game.
By investing more of his own money into growing his businesses Elon has more invested, and more reasons to stay focused on fully optimizing the businesses he is invested in.
When you are willing to invest everything into your businesses you have every reason to make it work.
Find a noble reason beyond profit to make your business work – and this will likely boost your profitability.
SpaceX is currently the most profitable rocket company but at one point they had never sent a rocket to orbit and were running deep in the red.
But they pulled through and made it to orbit with the fourth launch!
So why take the risk? Elon explains his bigger than money motive:
“Now is the first time in the history of Earth the windows has opened where it is possible for us to extend life to another planet…the wise move is to make life multiplanetary while we can.” (AGU)
It’s not about the odds of success as much as it is about the importance of the mission: “If something is important enough, then you should do it anyway.”
Having a super human mission is the superhuman effort realized to help achieve it.
Elon has developed a reputation for delivering on his promises, no matter how bold they might be.
His promises might not always be delivered on time…but Elon gets the job done and gets it done well.
Hard work and doing what you saywill earn you the trust of others.
Honesty is one of the most important life skills and directly influences how much trust you will receive.
Elon’s Body Language Speaks Volumes
Elon communicates very honestly and his body language adds another layer of meaning to what he says. Your communication has to do with your body language too.
If you are watching a video of Elon try emulating his motions as he speaks to gain greater awareness of how he communicates.
Elon – though he may glorify a story for maximizing its effectiveness – seems to do so from a place of honesty and genuine good intent.
Elon is a shining example of how honest communication – both in words and body language – leads to trust, power, and success.
