Speaker 1: The greatest motivational speech of Elon Musk.
Speaker 2: When you had that third failure in a row, did
you think I need to pack this in ever? Why not?
Speaker 1: I don't ever give up. I mean I'd have to
be dead or completely incapacitated. Work like hell. I mean,
you just have to put in, you know, eighty hour
eighty one hundred hour weeks every week. All those things
improve the odds of success, Okay. I mean if other
people are putting in forty hour work weeks and you're
putting in one hundred hour work weeks, then even if
you're doing the same thing, you know that in one
year you will achieve what they achieve. You will achieve
in four months what it takes them a year to achieve.
You need to work super hot. So what does super
heart mean. Well, when my brother and I were starting
our first company, instead of getting an apartment, we just
rented a small office and we slept on the couch
and we showered the YMCA and we're so hot up.
We had just one computer, so the website was up
during the day and I was coding at night, seven
days a week all the time. So briefly had a
go friend in that period, and in order to be
with me, chef to sleep in the office, so I
work hard, like every waking hour. That's the thing I
would I would say if you, particularly if you're starting
a company, and I mean, if you do simple maths,
say like okay, if somebody else is working fifty hours
and you're working one hundred, you'll get twice as done
as much done in the course of a year as
the other company. I think when I was I don't
know if five or six or something, I thought I
was insane.
Speaker 3: Why do you think you were insane?
Speaker 1: Because it was clear that other people did not. Their
mind wasn't exploding with ideas all the time.
Speaker 3: They were an express it. They weren't talking about it
all that and you realize by the time you're five
or six, like, oh, they're probably not even getting this
thing that I'm getting.
Speaker 1: No, it was just strange. It was like, hmm, I'm strange.
When I was young, I I I didn't really know
what I was going to do. When when I got older,
people kept asking me and and but but then eventually
I thought that the idea of inventing things would be
would be really cool. And the reason I thought that
was because I read a quote from otse Clock which
said that a eufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.
And that's really true. If you think if you go back, say,
three hundred years, the things that we take for granted
today would be you'd be burned at the stake for
you know, being able to fly, that's crazy, being able
to see over long distances, being able to communicate, having
effectively with the internet a group mind of sorts, and
having access to all the world's information instantly from almost
anywhere on the earth. This is stuff that really would
be magic. It would be considered magic in times past.
In fact, I think it actually goes beyond that, because
there are many things that we take for granted today
that weren't even imagined in times past. They weren't even
in the realm of magic, So it actually goes beyond that.
So I thought, well, you know, if I can do
some of those things, basically, if I can advance technology,
then that's like magic, and that would be really cool.
You have to apply a lot of hours to actual working,
actually working, So the way I generally not it is
I'll be working at SpaceX on Monday, and then Monday
night flight to Bay Area, spent Tuesday and Wednesday in
the Barrier, then a Tesla, and then fly back on
Wednesday night. Spent Thursday and Friday at SpaceX in in
the last several months, and I would fly back here
on a Saturday. I either spend Saturday and Sunday at
Tesla or spend Saturday at Tesla and Sunday at SpaceX.
I was living in the in the in the factory
in Fremont and the one in Nevada for three years straight.
It was my primary residence. O kidding literally, I actually
slept slept on a couch at one point on a
in a tent on the roof and then but for
a while there I was just sleeping under my desk,
which is out in the open in the factory, and
for an important reason, and it was damn uncomfortable sleeping
on that floor, and always when I woke up, i'd
smell like metal dust. But actually I stopped using the
couch in the in because it's a little conference room
and a couch there. I stopped using the couch and
I just slept on the floor under my desk so
that the so during shift change, the entire team could
see me if they think that the sort of their
leader is off somewhere having a good time, you know,
drinking my ties on a tropical island, which I could
definitely have been doing, have been doing, and would much
have preferred to do. But the thing is that since
the team could see me sleeping on the floor during
shift change, they knew I was there, and that made
a huge difference, and then they gave it their role.
Like one of the most difficult choices I have ever
faced in life was in two thousand and eight, and
I think I had maybe thirty million dollars left or
thirty dollars left in two thousand and eight. I had
two choices. I could put it all into one company
and then the other company would definitely die, or split
it between the two companies. But if I split it
between the two companies, then both might die. And when
you put your blood, sweat and tears into creating something thing,
it's like a child. And so it's like which one
am I going to let one start to death? I
can bring myself to do it, so I split the
money between two. Fortunately, thank goodness that work came through.
Speaker 4: Well, your little naive, when you thought I'll just like
an easily build build an electric car and a rocket.
Speaker 1: I didn't think it would be easy, Like I said,
I thought they would probably fail. But you know, like
creating a company is almost like having a child. So
it's sort of like how do you say your child
should not have bud.
Speaker 4: So once you have the company, you have to feed
it and nurse it and take care of it, of
it even if it ruins you. Yeah, but wasn't there
wasn't tough times in two thousand and eight end of
two thousand and eight. How did you get through that
period of crisis?
Speaker 1: Yeah? We just break for a second, of course. Well,
I mean Tesla really faced this sphere threat of death
due to the Model three production round. Essentially the company
was bleeding money like crazy, and and just if we
didn't solve these problems in the very short period of time,
we would die. And it was extremely difficult to solve them.
Speaker 3: How close to death did you come? Were there within
single legit weeks? Twenty two hours a day or like
I seventdays a week sleeping in the factory.
Speaker 1: I worked every from the I worked in the oaks,
in the paint shop, general simply body shop.
Speaker 3: Do you ever worry about yourself imploding, like it's just
too much.
Speaker 1: Absolutely, no one should put this many hours into work.
This is not good. People should not work this hard.
They should not do this. This is so it was
very painful, painful, and more tense. It's because my earth's
my brain in my heart.
Speaker 2: You know, there are American heroes who don't like this idea.
The al Armstrong gene cernon have both testified against commercial
spaceflight and the way that you're developing it, and I
wonder what you think of that.
Speaker 1: I was very sad to see that because those guys are, yeah,
you know, those guys heroes of mine. So it's really tough. Now.
I wish they would come and visit and see the
hard way that were during camp, and I think that
would change their mind.
Speaker 2: They inspired you to do this, didn't they Yes, And
to see them casting stones in your direction.
Speaker 1: It's difficult.
Speaker 2: Did you expect them to cheer you on?
Speaker 1: So they're hoping they would well for SpaceX, first three
launches failed and were just barely able to scrape together
enough parts and money to do the fourth launch. That
fourth launch had failed, we would have been dead. So
multiple failures along the way, I tried very hard to
get the right expertise in for post space X. I
tried hard to find a great chief engineer for the rocket,
but the good chief engineers wouldn't join, and the bad ones, well,
there's no point in hiring them. So I ended up
being chief engineer at the rocket. So if I could
have found somebody better, then we would have maybe had
less than three failures.
Speaker 2: How did you get the expertise to be the chief
technology officer of a rocket ship company?
Speaker 1: Well, I do have a physics background that's helpful as
a foundation, and then I read a lot of books
and talked to a lot of smart people yourself taught. Yeah,
thanks for listening. See you in the next episode.