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Speaker 1: The greatest motivational speech of Elon Musk.

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Speaker 2: When you had that third failure in a row, did

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you think I need to pack this in ever? Why not?

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Speaker 1: I don't ever give up. I mean I'd have to

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be dead or completely incapacitated. Work like hell. I mean,

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you just have to put in, you know, eighty hour

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eighty one hundred hour weeks every week. All those things

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improve the odds of success, Okay. I mean if other

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people are putting in forty hour work weeks and you're

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putting in one hundred hour work weeks, then even if

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you're doing the same thing, you know that in one

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year you will achieve what they achieve. You will achieve

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in four months what it takes them a year to achieve.

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You need to work super hot. So what does super

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heart mean. Well, when my brother and I were starting

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our first company, instead of getting an apartment, we just

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rented a small office and we slept on the couch

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and we showered the YMCA and we're so hot up.

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We had just one computer, so the website was up

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during the day and I was coding at night, seven

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days a week all the time. So briefly had a

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go friend in that period, and in order to be

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with me, chef to sleep in the office, so I

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work hard, like every waking hour. That's the thing I

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would I would say if you, particularly if you're starting

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a company, and I mean, if you do simple maths,

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say like okay, if somebody else is working fifty hours

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and you're working one hundred, you'll get twice as done

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as much done in the course of a year as

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the other company. I think when I was I don't

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know if five or six or something, I thought I

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was insane.

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Speaker 3: Why do you think you were insane?

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Speaker 1: Because it was clear that other people did not. Their

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mind wasn't exploding with ideas all the time.

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Speaker 3: They were an express it. They weren't talking about it

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all that and you realize by the time you're five

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or six, like, oh, they're probably not even getting this

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thing that I'm getting.

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Speaker 1: No, it was just strange. It was like, hmm, I'm strange.

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When I was young, I I I didn't really know

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what I was going to do. When when I got older,

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people kept asking me and and but but then eventually

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I thought that the idea of inventing things would be

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would be really cool. And the reason I thought that

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was because I read a quote from otse Clock which

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said that a eufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.

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And that's really true. If you think if you go back, say,

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three hundred years, the things that we take for granted

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today would be you'd be burned at the stake for

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you know, being able to fly, that's crazy, being able

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to see over long distances, being able to communicate, having

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effectively with the internet a group mind of sorts, and

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having access to all the world's information instantly from almost

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anywhere on the earth. This is stuff that really would

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be magic. It would be considered magic in times past.

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In fact, I think it actually goes beyond that, because

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there are many things that we take for granted today

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that weren't even imagined in times past. They weren't even

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in the realm of magic, So it actually goes beyond that.

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So I thought, well, you know, if I can do

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some of those things, basically, if I can advance technology,

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then that's like magic, and that would be really cool.

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You have to apply a lot of hours to actual working,

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actually working, So the way I generally not it is

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I'll be working at SpaceX on Monday, and then Monday

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night flight to Bay Area, spent Tuesday and Wednesday in

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the Barrier, then a Tesla, and then fly back on

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Wednesday night. Spent Thursday and Friday at SpaceX in in

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the last several months, and I would fly back here

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on a Saturday. I either spend Saturday and Sunday at

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Tesla or spend Saturday at Tesla and Sunday at SpaceX.

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I was living in the in the in the factory

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in Fremont and the one in Nevada for three years straight.

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It was my primary residence. O kidding literally, I actually

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slept slept on a couch at one point on a

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in a tent on the roof and then but for

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a while there I was just sleeping under my desk,

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which is out in the open in the factory, and

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for an important reason, and it was damn uncomfortable sleeping

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on that floor, and always when I woke up, i'd

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smell like metal dust. But actually I stopped using the

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couch in the in because it's a little conference room

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and a couch there. I stopped using the couch and

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I just slept on the floor under my desk so

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that the so during shift change, the entire team could

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see me if they think that the sort of their

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leader is off somewhere having a good time, you know,

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drinking my ties on a tropical island, which I could

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definitely have been doing, have been doing, and would much

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have preferred to do. But the thing is that since

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the team could see me sleeping on the floor during

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shift change, they knew I was there, and that made

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a huge difference, and then they gave it their role.

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Like one of the most difficult choices I have ever

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faced in life was in two thousand and eight, and

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I think I had maybe thirty million dollars left or

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thirty dollars left in two thousand and eight. I had

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two choices. I could put it all into one company

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and then the other company would definitely die, or split

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it between the two companies. But if I split it

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between the two companies, then both might die. And when

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you put your blood, sweat and tears into creating something thing,

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it's like a child. And so it's like which one

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am I going to let one start to death? I

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can bring myself to do it, so I split the

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money between two. Fortunately, thank goodness that work came through.

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Speaker 4: Well, your little naive, when you thought I'll just like

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an easily build build an electric car and a rocket.

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Speaker 1: I didn't think it would be easy, Like I said,

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I thought they would probably fail. But you know, like

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creating a company is almost like having a child. So

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it's sort of like how do you say your child

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should not have bud.

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Speaker 4: So once you have the company, you have to feed

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it and nurse it and take care of it, of

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it even if it ruins you. Yeah, but wasn't there

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wasn't tough times in two thousand and eight end of

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two thousand and eight. How did you get through that

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period of crisis?

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Speaker 1: Yeah? We just break for a second, of course. Well,

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I mean Tesla really faced this sphere threat of death

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due to the Model three production round. Essentially the company

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was bleeding money like crazy, and and just if we

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didn't solve these problems in the very short period of time,

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we would die. And it was extremely difficult to solve them.

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Speaker 3: How close to death did you come? Were there within

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single legit weeks? Twenty two hours a day or like

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I seventdays a week sleeping in the factory.

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Speaker 1: I worked every from the I worked in the oaks,

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in the paint shop, general simply body shop.

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Speaker 3: Do you ever worry about yourself imploding, like it's just

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too much.

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Speaker 1: Absolutely, no one should put this many hours into work.

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This is not good. People should not work this hard.

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They should not do this. This is so it was

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very painful, painful, and more tense. It's because my earth's

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my brain in my heart.

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Speaker 2: You know, there are American heroes who don't like this idea.

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The al Armstrong gene cernon have both testified against commercial

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spaceflight and the way that you're developing it, and I

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wonder what you think of that.

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Speaker 1: I was very sad to see that because those guys are, yeah,

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you know, those guys heroes of mine. So it's really tough. Now.

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I wish they would come and visit and see the

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hard way that were during camp, and I think that

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would change their mind.

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Speaker 2: They inspired you to do this, didn't they Yes, And

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to see them casting stones in your direction.

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Speaker 1: It's difficult.

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Speaker 2: Did you expect them to cheer you on?

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Speaker 1: So they're hoping they would well for SpaceX, first three

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launches failed and were just barely able to scrape together

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enough parts and money to do the fourth launch. That

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fourth launch had failed, we would have been dead. So

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multiple failures along the way, I tried very hard to

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get the right expertise in for post space X. I

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tried hard to find a great chief engineer for the rocket,

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but the good chief engineers wouldn't join, and the bad ones, well,

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there's no point in hiring them. So I ended up

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being chief engineer at the rocket. So if I could

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have found somebody better, then we would have maybe had

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less than three failures.

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Speaker 2: How did you get the expertise to be the chief

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technology officer of a rocket ship company?

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Speaker 1: Well, I do have a physics background that's helpful as

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a foundation, and then I read a lot of books

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and talked to a lot of smart people yourself taught. Yeah,

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thanks for listening. See you in the next episode.