Elon Musk by Walter Isaacson
Elon Musk is certainly one of the most controversial men of our time. Those who speak of him seem to be polarized by his personality, his style, his words, his actions, and even by the money that he has made. I've heard him criticized for being a billionaire. I wonder if those criticizing realize the poverty he came from or the fierce focus and devotion that has lead to those billions. He has very specific goals. Those goals are meant to help humanity. His medium is technology and engineering. His giftings, including objectivity and intensity combined with his skills in engineering and shaving every penny of waste in his companies have lead him to do things that many thought impossible. I've found this book about this fascinating man to be just that—fascinating.
My Thoughts:
Even the introduction was intense. In fact, it seems that every part of Elon Musk's life was and is intense. I chose to listen to this book on audio. It is one of the best written biographies that I have ever listened to or read. Walter Isaacson has written this book in the voice of an insider not just someone who has read about Musk or researched him. It is, however, very obvious that Isaacson has done his homework both with Musk and with those who have known him. Musk's life reads like a novel. Sometimes it is sad, sometimes volatile, sometimes joyous, sometimes against impossible odds. But Musk is always focused and fearless.
Isaacson takes us through Musk's life in depth, looking at it from various perspectives, and going through the many stages of the numerous projects that he's been involved in including PayPal, a map app, SpaceX, and Tesla, to name a few. There are three things that stood out to me.
First, Elon Musk is not your average man. He is brilliant. He thinks differently than we do. He sees things differently. He does things differently. Status quo isn't in his vocabulary. He questions everything.
Second, he really is focused on the long range good of mankind and of our country.
Third, he is neurodivergent. He doesn't seem to go through things as emotionally as most of us do. He's able to detach from the emotion. That makes him uniquely able to make some of the decisions he makes.
Whether you like him or not, he has and will continue to make a major impact on our country and on our world.
I highly recommend this book. I also highly recommend praying for him. He needs Jesus and our prayers to help him through it all.
About The Book
The #1 New York Times and global bestseller from Walter Isaacson—the acclaimed author of Steve Jobs, Einstein: His Life and World, Benjamin Franklin, and Leonardo da Vinci—is the astonishingly intimate story of the most fascinating, controversial innovator of modern times. For two years, Isaacson shadowed Elon Musk as he executed his vision for electric vehicles at Tesla, space exploration with SpaceX, the AI revolution, and the takeover of Twitter and its conversion to X. The result is the definitive portrait of the mercurial pioneer that offers clues to his political instincts, future ambitions, and overall worldview.
When Elon Musk was a kid in South Africa, he was regularly beaten by bullies. One day a group pushed him down some concrete steps and kicked him until his face was a swollen ball of flesh. He was in the hospital for a week. But the physical scars were minor compared to the emotional ones inflicted by his father, an engineer, rogue, and charismatic fantasist.
His father’s impact on his psyche would linger. He developed into a tough yet vulnerable man-child, prone to abrupt Jekyll-and-Hyde mood swings, with an exceedingly high tolerance for risk, a craving for drama, an epic sense of mission, and a maniacal intensity that was callous and at times destructive.
At the beginning of 2022—after a year marked by SpaceX launching thirty-one rockets into orbit, Tesla selling a million cars, and him becoming the richest man on earth—Musk spoke ruefully about his compulsion to stir up dramas. “I need to shift my mindset away from being in crisis mode, which it has been for about fourteen years now, or arguably most of my life,” he said.
It was a wistful comment, not a New Year’s resolution. Even as he said it, he was secretly buying up shares of Twitter, the world’s ultimate playground. Over the years, whenever he was in a dark place, his mind went back to being bullied on the playground. Now he had the chance to own the playground.
For two years, Isaacson shadowed Musk, attended his meetings, walked his factories with him, and spent hours interviewing him, his family, friends, coworkers, and adversaries. The result is the revealing inside story, filled with amazing tales of triumphs and turmoil, that addresses the question: are the demons that drive Musk also what it takes to drive innovation and progress?
When Elon Musk was a kid in South Africa, he was regularly beaten by bullies. One day a group pushed him down some concrete steps and kicked him until his face was a swollen ball of flesh. He was in the hospital for a week. But the physical scars were minor compared to the emotional ones inflicted by his father, an engineer, rogue, and charismatic fantasist.
His father’s impact on his psyche would linger. He developed into a tough yet vulnerable man-child, prone to abrupt Jekyll-and-Hyde mood swings, with an exceedingly high tolerance for risk, a craving for drama, an epic sense of mission, and a maniacal intensity that was callous and at times destructive.
At the beginning of 2022—after a year marked by SpaceX launching thirty-one rockets into orbit, Tesla selling a million cars, and him becoming the richest man on earth—Musk spoke ruefully about his compulsion to stir up dramas. “I need to shift my mindset away from being in crisis mode, which it has been for about fourteen years now, or arguably most of my life,” he said.
It was a wistful comment, not a New Year’s resolution. Even as he said it, he was secretly buying up shares of Twitter, the world’s ultimate playground. Over the years, whenever he was in a dark place, his mind went back to being bullied on the playground. Now he had the chance to own the playground.
For two years, Isaacson shadowed Musk, attended his meetings, walked his factories with him, and spent hours interviewing him, his family, friends, coworkers, and adversaries. The result is the revealing inside story, filled with amazing tales of triumphs and turmoil, that addresses the question: are the demons that drive Musk also what it takes to drive innovation and progress?
Famed biographer Walter Isaacson -- who’s studied and written about Steve Jobs, Albert Einstein, Ben Franklin, and Leonardo da Vinci – spent 2 years shadowing Elon Musk and it clearly shows in this fascinating book. You really get to know Musk as an inventor and as a person, and you feel like a fly on the wall watching things like Tesla development and SpaceX launches. You also learn about Musk’s tough childhood in South Africa and how that shaped him.
Purchase Link: https://bit.ly/PartnerEM Get an exclusive 40% discount off the hardcover by using code MUSK40 at ElonMuskTheBook.com from March 10 to April 15.
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