Advice for Students & College Grads - HOW TO SUCCEED IN LIFE (ELON MUSK's)

   Advice for Students & College Grads - HOW TO SUCCEED IN LIF....

what advice do I have for college

graduates certainly I don't want you to

apply for a job at solar city or Tesla

or SpaceX and if not then if that

doesn't work for whatever reason then

apply to jobs at other companies in that

arena or try starting a company

if you study engineering and you figure

out how to design new things then it's

relatively easy to start a company you

just need to get a few like-minded

people with you although I have to say

that the space business is quite it's

quite hard to start a company in space

business because it's such a capital

intensive business so it may be better

to do something in solar power or if

you're gonna do it in cars do it and as

kind of a component supplier of cars or

something like that musk has college

degrees in business and physics but

SpaceX is his first venture in aerospace

how did you get the expertise to be the

chief technology officer of a rocket

ship company well I do have a physics

background that's helpful as the

foundation and then I read a lot of

books and talked to a lot of a lot of

smart people don't just follow the trend

you may have heard me say that it's good

to think in terms of the physics

approach of first principles which is

rather than reasoning by analogy you

boil things down to the most fundamental

truths you can imagine and you reason up

from there and this is a good way to

figure out if if something really makes

sense or if it's just what everybody

else is doing and it's hard to think

that way you can't think think that way

about everything takes a lot of effort

but if you're trying to do something new

it's the best way to think and that

framework was developed but by

physicists to figure out

counterintuitive things like quantum

mechanics so it's really a powerful

powerful method

and I want to know what is the one thing

that is surprised to you about your life

well I simply I'm surprised about the

whole thing honestly

I certainly didn't expect to be to be 20

of these things to happen honestly yeah

I just do I know I wanted to be involved

in technology and in fact the only

reason I started a company back to 95

Internet company was because I couldn't

get it there were only a few internet

companies they're not gonna get a job at

any of them now I try to get a job at at

Netscape and tomorrow's me and I tried

hanging out in the lobby but I was too

shy to talk to anyone and it was like

okay well I guess I'll have to start a

company cuz I can't get a job anywhere

I wouldn't say I'm fearless

in fact I I think I fear I feel fear

quite strongly but I am if the if what

we're doing isn't you know what I'm

doing is I think it's important enough

then I just override the fear so but

it's not as that I don't feel I feel

like more stronger than I would like I

think also people tend to overweight

risk on a personal level it's one thing

if you've got you know a mortgage to pay

and kids to support and that if you were

to deviate from your job that well how

you're going to feed your family and pay

the ransom

okay that's understandable but let's say

you're young and we just coming out of

college or coming out of high school or

whatever the what are you what are you

risk.

you know you're not gonna stop I mean

nice it's really certainly not in any

kind of modern economy it's so easy to

earn enough money just to live somewhere

and eat food the other or what are the

field afraid of there it was mostly

afraid of failure I think

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people should be less risk-averse when

there's not much at risk

what is education like you're basically

downloading data and algorithms into

your brain and it's it's actually

amazingly bad in conventional education

it's like it shouldn't be like this huge

chore like the more you can gamify the

process of learning the better

I always had sort of a slight

existential crisis because I was trying

to figure out what does it'll mean like

what's the purpose of things and I came

to the conclusion that if we can advance

the the knowledge of the world if we can

do things that expand the scope and and

scale of consciousness then we're better

able to ask the right questions and

become more enlightened and and that's

really the only way forward what drives

you what what is it that when you wake

up in the morning do you see a problem

and you want to solve it the thing that

drives me is that I want to be able to

think about the future and you feel good

about that

so that you know we're doing what we can

to have the future be be as good as

possible to be inspired by what is

likely to happen and to look forward to

the next day so

that's that's what really really drives

me is trying to figure out how do we how

to make sure that things are great I'm

gonna be so and that's the unlined

principle behind Tesla and SpaceX is

that I think it's pretty important that

we accelerate the transition to

sustainable generation and consumption

of energy it's inevitable but it's it

matters that we had if it happened

soon....

and then SpaceX is about helping make

life multiplanetary and doing what we

can to continue the dream of Apollo and

ultimately make contribution to life

becoming a multiplanetary let's talk a

little more about that I think everyone

very interested that when you say making

life multiplanetary that's exciting it

is exciting so what's your vision there

you know I think you know particularly

for Americans you know like you think

about America is a nation of explorers

people came here from other parts of the

world that you know chose to give up the

known in favor of the unknown so I think

exploration like the United States is a

distillation of the human spirit of

exploration

so that's why it appeals to Americans so

much you know you can see this when say

there was a shuttle tragedy and seven

people died it and that's that's

terrible but a lot of people die all the

time but why do we care so much because

it was the dream of exploration that was

dying along with those people that's why

I mean I thought both Tesla and SpaceX

would fail at the beginning yeah really

of course nevertheless you put all your

money in them I expected to lose it

well technically what I thought was well

I'll take half the money from PayPal and

if L lose half of it that's okay but

then of course the companies encounter

difficulties and then have a choice of

that you like let the company die or put

you know all the money into the

companies and so really doing what the

companies to die so I put all the money

in the companies and then I had to

borrow money for friends to pay living

expenses you know just looking just for

evidence of exceptional ability and if

there's a track record of exceptional

achievement then it's likely that that

will continue into the future

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well it really depends on the stakes if

the stakes are high if it's really

important then what should then I know

we'll overcome the fear and just do it

anyway I essentially I mean it's drive

over rights fear but I feel the fear

it's kind of annoying

I wish isn't oh Sh I felt it less