This is a short blog on my views on Elon Musk’s work ethic.
Elon Musk has been my idol since I got to know him (5-6 years ago) and even now, he is among the people I aspire to learn from. I am fond of his first-principles thinking and his work ethic. Also, the amount of impact that he is having in the space, electric vehicle, internet connectivity, and many more industries.
Today, I want to particularly talk about his work ethic and why I think it is not meant for everyone. Elon Musk’s work ethic here means a working style where you “go all in,” in terms of Gen Z lingo. This means if there is something to be achieved, then no matter what, you have to do all that is required to achieve that. Working odd hours, being low on sleep, high productivity, and all the other buzzwords.
I personally believe that if you have such a work ethic, then you should just go and work, and in most cases, it will be absolutely amazing for you. But in my case, as in the case of many others, this is not what really works. Trust me when I say this, I have tried to mimic Elon’s work ethic in my daily life and, in a nutshell, it is chaos. It isn’t productive (maybe pseudo-productive), nor is it very sustainable if you don’t belong to that very small subset of people.
What I have figured out through trial and error that works for me is to block out time for everything that needs to be completed. Also, while I talk about this, it doesn’t matter whether you work late till 4 AM or wake up at 3 AM for a productive morning; what matters is what you produce. For a long time in my life, I believed that being an early bird is surely a way to a successful life, as portrayed by many parents. This, of course, isn’t completely false; I myself still wake up at 5 each morning. But does it mean I sleep early? Nope. I sleep at 12-1 AM. Then how am I alive? I sleep for 2 hours in the afternoon, easy. Does this imply how successful (or a failure) I will be? Absolutely not. It is something that just works for me. Can Elon follow the same routine as mine and still thrive? Probably not.
So, on a closing note, a good practice while you figure out your work ethic is to stay organized, plan in advance, and do what you said you would do.
