Elon Musk’s Ex-Wife: He ‘Thrives in Chaos’

Elon Musk’s ex-wife, Justine Musk, said the billionaire “thrives in chaos” and has become accustomed to living with a constant sense of extreme urgency, turning virtually any problem into a matter of life and death.

Justine Musk shared her observations in a teaser for an interview with journalist Kara Swisher. Filmmaker Alex Gibney, whose documentary MUSK is set to be released, also took part in the conversation.

“I once described him as someone who could, for example, jump off the edge of a cliff and then, on the way down, figure out how to make himself a parachute,” Justine Musk said of her former husband. “I think he really does thrive in chaos.”

According to Justine Musk, that characteristic is also reflected within her former husband’s companies.

Current and former employees previously told Business Insider that Musk’s increasing involvement in the company’s operations led to abrupt shifts in priorities, large-scale emergency meetings and the creation of a group chat that included more than 300 engineers. Researchers could be pulled away from their ongoing work to address issues that had caught Musk’s attention.

“Because the company is so small, everything becomes an emergency,” one former employee told Business Insider.

Musk’s willingness to make sweeping decisions and then quickly reconsider some of them emerged long before he launched his artificial intelligence startup. After acquiring Twitter in 2022 and sharply cutting the company’s workforce, Musk later acknowledged that some of the layoffs had gone too far.

Justine Musk believes her former husband’s intensity can draw people in before they even realize what they have become involved in.

“He brings that chaos with him, and he knows how to pull other people into it. At first, it can look a lot like excitement,” she said. “I always assume there’s some method to his madness, you know. Sometimes it’s a kind of sleight of hand.”