Elon Musk: The Journey of a Modern-Day Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
Introduction
Hello, dear readers. In the last post, we talked about Elon Musk's childhood and his beginnings, and how this childhood shaped every milestone in his life, turning him into his father. In this post we will continue the story of Musk and the analysis of his personality.
The Dual Nature of Elon Musk
Over time, Elon Musk discovers that he is like his father, having two faces: the face of a genius trying to save humanity and an evil face—a carefully concealed villain behind the mask of a genius. Let me tell you that 2008 would be the most brutal year and a tough test for the two natures inside Elon Musk. The struggle between these two personalities would drive him to the bottom.
Ancestral Adventures and Early Influences
Musk descends from a lineage of adventurers. His maternal grandfather, Joshua Haldeman, would take the family every year to the Kalahari Desert—a scary place. Why? He was searching for a lost archaeological city where a charlatan promised there were many treasures: "Go, my friend, and try to explore, and all the treasures will be yours!" Meanwhile, his father Errol, in his airplane adventure, would land in Zambia and make deals with locals to extract emerald treasures from the mines. These deals failed miserably, and he lost everything, saying: "It was a black day when I went to Zambia!" In the 1980s, the Russians began producing synthetic emeralds, so while he'd be struggling with real ones, the Russians were doing it effortlessly.
Despite what seems like failed adventures and appearing crazy, Elon Musk narrates that his grandfather and father were very proud of these adventures and never described themselves as failures, even though these adventures wasted all their money. The most important scene that would dominate Elon Musk's journey is when he walks out of the airport—the trip from South Africa to Canada for university at 18 years old—a young man dreaming of an adventure to change the world, like his father and grandfather, but through science, not myths.
At this time, his father scolded him harshly, saying: "Look, Elon, when you return in a few months and you haven't succeeded, no! You won't succeed!" This phrase, Elon Musk would remember with terror in 2008.
The Trials of 2008
After creating Zip2 and X.com, which merged with PayPal, and amassing a fortune estimated at $250 million, in 2008, Musk remembered his father telling him he would be a failure. In August 2008, SpaceX failed in its third launch; the rockets didn't want to take off. The problem was that Musk had placed two NASA satellites on those rockets, and also a satellite for the Air Force—a big deal! All these crashed during the launch.
"Well, a crazy investment is gone; let's return to investments that make money." Unfortunately, the loss in SpaceX affected Tesla, which faced bankruptcy. Musk was spending liquidity from money paid for cars that hadn't even been made yet. And remember, we're talking about the year of the global financial crisis—banks were already on the brink, so they refused to cash Elon Musk's checks.
During this period, Elon Musk's wife, Talulah, would wake him up scared and having panic attacks. According to her, he would sit and cry, not talking about the company's difficulties or bankruptcy, but about his father. She described his feelings as inferior—not those of someone afraid to fail, but of a small, terrified child, scared to return to Pretoria and have his father tell him: "I told you, you would fail!"
Musk learned from his father the difficulty of asking for help, seeing it as an implicit admission of failure. He thought he had to bear the responsibility alone. But help would come from an unexpected place.
Support from Unlikely Allies
Remember the PayPal mafia that turned against Musk years ago and ousted him from the company? In 2008, they looked at Musk, who did strange things in his companies—things they were afraid to do in PayPal. They knew Elon Musk was a genius, and his ideas, even if crazy, deserved to live. His problem was that this genius was trapped in a mind close to madness. They decided to save him by investing $20 million in SpaceX, helping fund a fourth attempt to launch Falcon 1, the rocket that refused to take off.
The problem was that if Elon Musk failed, SpaceX and Tesla would be lost. Who would invest with him again? "Clearly, he is a truly crazy man, doing smart and wonderful genius things that seem like they will change the world but don't succeed in the end!" Another surprising factor that saved Elon Musk was his team. Although Musk dealt harshly with his employees, his strictness filtered out the weak, leaving behind engineers who proved their skill and could endure tough working conditions.
When the global financial crisis hit and the companies were about to collapse, the team stepped up. They loaded the components of the fourth rocket, and when the transport plane landed to refuel in Hawaii, pressure started affecting the rocket, crushing its tank like a can. Suddenly, twenty engineers sprang into action, fixing everything wrong with the rocket, even using pocket knives if necessary. Their improvisational, daring effort saved the last rocket and, at the last moment, saved Elon Musk's future. In September 2008, the fourth launch of this rocket succeeded.
Turning Failure into Triumph
Boeing, with 50,000 employees, couldn't do what Musk did. Elon Musk succeeded with only 500 employees and an office assistant! Employees trained and worked hard in all forms and ways, so their creativity shone during the crisis. SpaceX turned from a company on the brink of bankruptcy to one with a $1.6 billion contract with NASA for 12 space trips. This recovery encouraged the German company Daimler to invest $50 million to save Tesla.
Elon Musk's survival makes us think: Did he survive because of his intimidating traits, like arrogance and refusal to admit failure, making him stubborn in rocket launches, and his intense pressure on his team, which made them a dream team? Or did he survive because the PayPal team helped him, proving their point that without them, he would have failed? It's hard to determine, but everything happens for many interconnected reasons.
Elon Musk acted like a runner who won a race not because he was escaping from predatory dogs but because he thought if they caught him, they'd devour him, so he ran as fast as someone afraid of death—not necessarily the fastest, but the most afraid. His whole life, Musk has been running from his demons, and maybe we see him as a genius because in his running, he gains many benefits, increases his wealth, and creates genius things that perhaps no one else could make at that time.
The Rise of SpaceX and Tesla
But what happened in 2008 didn't make him wiser; on the contrary, it doubled his arrogance, especially when he turned in the eyes of the U.S. government into a new superhero. NASA's collaboration with Elon Musk led to the creation of Falcon 9, a rocket ten times stronger, carrying nine engines from Falcon 1.
NASA were surprised by Musk's and his team's unconventional methods. For example, a latch costing NASA $1,500 was redesigned by a SpaceX engineer using the mechanism of a bathroom latch, reducing the cost to $30. Another example is the cooling system for the payload chamber in Falcon 9. NASA estimated it at $3 million, but Musk's team bought air conditioners for $6,000 and adjusted them to fit the rocket. It felt like a strict mother preparing, not a billion-dollar company making rockets!
Obama's campaign advisor convinced him to stop using the space shuttle system and rely on the private sector, including SpaceX, for transporting astronauts and satellites. Many politicians objected because their states had facilities in Boeing and profited from NASA contracts. People like Neil Armstrong saw this as the end of NASA, but Obama bet on the private sector and Elon Musk.
Suddenly, Falcon 9's success became crucial for Obama's campaign, and Musk became the one carrying the space torch. Before launching Falcon 9, heavy rains caused failures in rocket antennas. SpaceX engineers came up with a simple solution—a hairdryer—to dry the wet areas.
Innovation Amid Adversity
In December 2010, Falcon 9's launch succeeded when Elon Musk launched an uncrewed capsule into orbit, which returned safely to Earth—a mission only America, Russia, and China had done. SpaceX repeatedly proved more efficient than NASA because the team embraced Musk's culture of risk-taking and not fearing failure, creating simple solutions under pressure.
Perhaps the hardest moment was in March 2013 when a valve closed in the rocket's capsule while in space. SpaceX software engineers wrote code to increase pressure in front of the valve, then suddenly release it—a maneuver like gambling—but it successfully opened the valve. Elon Musk told the Washington Post it was like the Heimlich maneuver.
NASA began to rely completely on SpaceX to transport humans to space, and Elon Musk became America's space hope. The SpaceX team was driven not just by Musk's pressure but by his vision. They were discussing the design of Mars cities—what the streets would look like, how the traffic signals would be—even before they had rockets to reach orbit.
Living the Dream of Mars
Since founding SpaceX in 2002, Musk held regular meetings called "Mars colonizers," where engineers lived the idea that they were going to Mars. This made any task seem minor in comparison. While securing contracts worth billions with NASA, Musk was also using his company to send Starlink satellites, using Falcon 9 to create internet in outer space. He realized the internet market has revenues of almost a trillion dollars; capturing just 3% would surpass NASA's budget and fund his dream for Mars.
While SpaceX was securing Musk's dream to send humanity to Mars, and Tesla was securing his dream to save the planet with sustainable energy, it's hard to imagine Elon Musk as anything but a person carrying a large part of humanity's future in his hands.
Concerns About Artificial Intelligence
One day, Elon Musk was sitting with his former friend Larry Page, one of Google's founders. Musk felt that Page wasn't very interested in humanity's fate if a strong AI was invented. He cut ties with Page and started establishing a company focused on ethical AI, creating what is now known as OpenAI. He believed that empowering the largest number of humans to use AI was the best way to save us from its dangers. OpenAI, which now includes ChatGPT and DALL·E, is one of the most important companies in artificial intelligence. Musk was one of its founders and initial funders, though he later parted ways with the company.
Controversies and Tragedies
Musk's dreams and arrogance would create casualties—not just pressured employees, we are talking about real casualties now!. He began utilizing AI to turn Tesla into self-driving cars, relying on cameras instead of sensors. He exaggerated the capabilities of the autonomous driving system, leading many Tesla drivers to believe their cars didn't need their intervention, treating them like an Uber and going to sleep.
This led to terrifying accidents. When a driver died in Florida in 2016, it was discovered he was watching a "Harry Potter" movie, reassured by Tesla advertising. Musk didn't feel guilty, seeing that Tesla would reduce the annual car accident death rate significantly, which he considered a success. This highlights one of Musk's key traits: he is very interested in saving humanity, but individual humans don't matter to him. He fears AI, global warming, and extinction—all concerning humanity—but treating people humanely doesn't seem to be his priority.
Personal Life and Relationships
Now, let's look at some human relationships in Elon Musk's personal life. Does he manage to create healthy emotional bonds with his former girlfriends? To answer this, we must go back to his childhood, specifically his relationship with his father.
According to his brother Kimbal, Musk's choices in life partners are people filled with melodrama and drama—Drama Queens. From his first wife Justine to Amber Heard, known for her toxic behavior, Musk seemed drawn to complex relationships. One of the SpaceX employees described Amber as being like the Joker in Batman, a toxic character that made Musk stay up all night arguing and returning to work irritable.
Amber Heard was a carbon copy of Elon Musk's father, practicing the same psychological tricks. Back when Musk was 10 and despite his father's destructive influence, Musk chose to live with him after his parents separated. His father's manipulation made him feel guilty for leaving, drawing him back into a whirlpool of emotional turmoil. Remember, The 10 years old Elon understands the feeling of loneliness and isolation, and he felt that his father is just like him.
Perhaps Musk thought that if he could make tough people like his father love him, he could make his father love him. He chose distorted partners, seeking to succeed in a love relationship similar to his relationship with his father. But relationships often ended with Musk running away as he did with his father or emotionally closing off, as with his first wife Justine after the loss of their first child with infant death syndrome.
A Complex Personality
After the death of his child, Elon will go through an emotional closure, he wasn't able to express the feelings of the sad father to anyone. This emotional closure explains why Musk can't interact humanely with individual suffering; he sees life through the lens of numbers and collective meaning, willing to sacrifice many to save humanity. After his tragic relationship with Amber Heard, Musk entered crisis mode. Instead of facing his separation maturely, he set a crazy goal: Tesla would produce 5,000 Model 3 cars weekly—a completely unrealistic goal.
He encouraged short selling of Tesla shares, leading people to bet on his failure. Speculators spied on factories with drones to prove he was lying. One of those betting against him was Bill Gates, who invested millions on Musk's failure.
Defying the Odds
Musk doubled down by making a bold deal with Tesla's board: if the stock dropped, he wouldn't get paid, but if the company achieved the impossible goal, he'd receive tens of billions, reaching $100 billion. As usual, he created a problem and worked intensely to solve it. The New York Times wrote about the terrible work pressures on Tesla workers, who worked at least 10 hours a day. When production lines stopped due to safety sensors, Musk disabled them: "We'll produce 5,000 cars, meaning we'll produce 5,000 cars!" Many Tesla managers resigned due to the risks.
On July 1, 2018, Musk achieved his targets. After overcoming the crisis he created, he sought new challenges, dealing with Twitter crises and other issues.
Social Media and Public Perception
Understanding Musk's creative mind, we see how easily he can be provoked, recalling memories of bullying and threats from his youth. Around the problem of his tweets, the matter didn't stop. His PR advisor suggested he appear on a podcast to explain his genius. He chose to go on Joe Rogan's show, the most famous podcaster.
Controversial Appearances
During the podcast, Musk smoked marijuana on air. Investors were furious: "He's the genius who will take us to Mars! What's he doing?!" Tesla's stock fell to its lowest levels that year, and NASA opened an investigation. As usual, Musk responded with genius ideas, making people overlook his eccentricities.
In late 2018, while playing with a Tesla model car, Musk noticed the lower part was a single piece. Inspired, he requested the largest casting machine in the world. This innovation reduced the assembly process from welding over 100 parts to casting in 80 seconds at a lower cost.
Innovations and Achievements
By 2020, Musk was NASA's hope after the space shuttle program stopped in 2011. Falcon 9 succeeded in transporting astronauts to the International Space Station, becoming the most reliable rocket in space travel. SpaceX's reusable rockets revolutionized space exploration, reducing costs and increasing efficiency.
Musk also turned space into a commercial venture with the Inspiration 4 mission in September 2021, the first tourist space mission for civilians. By October 2021, Tesla's value exceeded one trillion dollars, higher than several major car manufacturers combined. Tesla survived the COVID-19 crisis due to its internal manufacturing.
The Pinnacle of Success
By early 2022, SpaceX had launched more missions than other companies and nations combined. Starlink provided internet to over 500,000 subscribers in 40 countries with 2,100 satellites. Neuralink, founded by Musk, implanted chips in the human brain, allowing interaction with computers without physical movement. In 2023, a paraplegic patient used Neuralink to turn pages on a tablet through his mind.
Despite these achievements, Musk felt a tense, hostage-like feeling, compelled to move more as if in a struggle for survival. Walter Isaacson discusses Musk's depression and moments of catatonia. Even with success stories, Musk wasn't necessarily happy.
He decided to buy Twitter, offering $44 billion. Ad revenues decreased, forcing him to sell Tesla shares to save Twitter. Isaacson suggests that Twitter became the virtual equivalent of the schoolyard where Musk was once bullied—a place he could control.
A Complex Relationship with Social Media
Musk implemented significant changes at Twitter, including mass layoffs and controversial policies. Advertisers withdrew, and the platform faced chaos with the introduction of purchasable verification badges, leading to misinformation and fraud.
Conclusion
At 17, Musk's father took him to a casino to convince him that nothing is random in the universe. Perhaps there's nothing random in Elon Musk's life. He was almost named "Nice," but his father chose "Elon" after a character in Wernher von Braun's book Project Mars, about a colony managed by someone named Elon.
This is the story of a teenager who believed a fictional narrative and made it his life's goal, living with a siege mentality that kept him running from his past and inventing cosmic solutions to personal complexes. Isaacson wonders if removing Musk's negative traits would also remove his genius.
Steve Wozniak said that while he couldn't be as harsh as Steve Jobs, his kindness wouldn't have allowed the Mac to appear. Justine, Musk's first wife, said that despite his harshness, if the world faced zombies, she'd want to be on Musk's team because he's the only one with enough madness to save the planet.
Musk often saw himself as a superhero but forgot he could also be like Thanus—willing to sacrifice some to save humanity. Until now, it's hard to determine Musk's path. Will he save the world or contribute to its end? We're subject to the moods of a man haunted by ghosts, capable of being both a hero and a villain at the same time.
Last but not least, stay tuned for the new posts in this series. Share the post with your friends and leave your comment on the post (positive or negative).They say once Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg, and Elon Musk were on a plane. The plane broke down, and they realized they only had two parachutes. Elon Musk, with his bravado and recklessness, said: "Guys, I'm the smartest man on Earth and the richest man on Earth; I'll have to jump right now." Bill Gates looked at Zuckerberg and said: "What are we going to do? Only one parachute left!" Mark said: "Don't worry, we have two parachutes. The smartest man in the world jumped with the laptop bag!"
