Fam­i­ly Life took a trans­for­ma­tive turn for Elon Musk in May 2020 with the birth of his son, X, whom he shares with musi­cian and artist Grimes. Unlike his pre­vi­ous expe­ri­ences with father­hood, Musk found an unusu­al sense of calm in his bond with X, fre­quent­ly bring­ing him to work meet­ings and even high-stakes events like SpaceX launch­es. This dynam­ic mir­rored Musk’s own child­hood, where inde­pen­dence was encour­aged, and famil­ial inter­ac­tions were shaped by a respect for per­son­al space rather than tra­di­tion­al parental close­ness. The unique nature of Musk’s rela­tion­ship with X was evi­dent in how seam­less­ly the child was inte­grat­ed into his world of inno­va­tion and high-pres­sure deci­sion-mak­ing. Musk believed that ear­ly expo­sure to sci­ence, engi­neer­ing, and tech­no­log­i­cal advance­ments would shape his son’s curios­i­ty and crit­i­cal think­ing abil­i­ties, just as his own upbring­ing had instilled in him a deep fas­ci­na­tion with space and com­put­ing.

The uncon­ven­tion­al approach extend­ed beyond their dai­ly rou­tines and into X’s very name—X Æ A‑12—representing a fusion of math­e­mat­i­cal sym­bols, arti­fi­cial intel­li­gence ref­er­ences, and a nod to Musk’s favorite air­craft, the Archangel 12. While their choice of name ini­tial­ly caused legal com­pli­ca­tions, lead­ing them to slight­ly mod­i­fy it to “X AE A‑Xii,” the orig­i­nal­i­ty behind it under­scored Musk and Grimes’ shared appre­ci­a­tion for tech­nol­o­gy and inno­va­tion. It reflect­ed their view that chil­dren should not only inher­it cre­ativ­i­ty but also embody the futur­is­tic ideals that shape human progress. Musk, always keen on chal­leng­ing soci­etal norms, found amuse­ment in the con­tro­ver­sy sur­round­ing his son’s name, see­ing it as a small rebel­lion against con­ven­tion­al expec­ta­tions. The name itself became emblem­at­ic of Musk’s broad­er mission—to push bound­aries, chal­lenge norms, and rede­fine what is pos­si­ble, both in his per­son­al life and through his com­pa­nies.

Dur­ing this peri­od, Musk also focused on his old­er chil­dren, all of whom dis­played diverse tal­ents in math­e­mat­ics, engi­neer­ing, and music, reflect­ing their father’s deep-root­ed pas­sion for prob­lem-solv­ing and futur­is­tic think­ing. His approach to par­ent­ing was uncon­ven­tion­al yet deeply involved, as he encour­aged his chil­dren to think crit­i­cal­ly, solve prob­lems cre­ative­ly, and devel­op a sense of inde­pen­dence from an ear­ly age. Musk had pre­vi­ous­ly found­ed Ad Astra, a small exper­i­men­tal school designed to fos­ter advanced learn­ing tech­niques for his chil­dren and a select group of oth­er bright stu­dents. This ini­tia­tive was lat­er expand­ed into Astra Nova, an edu­ca­tion mod­el that pri­or­i­tized hands-on learn­ing, eth­i­cal prob­lem-solv­ing, and real-world appli­ca­tions over tra­di­tion­al rote mem­o­riza­tion. Musk viewed edu­ca­tion as a fun­da­men­tal pil­lar of human progress and took an active role in ensur­ing his chil­dren had access to inno­v­a­tive learn­ing expe­ri­ences that would pre­pare them for a rapid­ly chang­ing future.

How­ev­er, Musk’s fam­i­ly rela­tion­ships were not with­out strain. His trans­gen­der daugh­ter, Jen­na, dis­tanced her­self from him due to ide­o­log­i­cal dif­fer­ences, lead­ing to a pro­found rift that Musk found dif­fi­cult to rec­on­cile. This estrange­ment weighed heav­i­ly on him, influ­enc­ing some of his pub­lic state­ments about gen­der iden­ti­ty, spark­ing con­tro­ver­sy, and fur­ther com­pli­cat­ing his attempts at main­tain­ing famil­ial har­mo­ny. Musk, who had always been a staunch advo­cate for free speech and indi­vid­ual lib­er­ty, strug­gled with the per­son­al impli­ca­tions of ide­o­log­i­cal con­flicts with­in his own house­hold. The sit­u­a­tion forced him to con­front the chal­lenge of sep­a­rat­ing per­son­al beliefs from pub­lic dis­course while grap­pling with the real­iza­tion that even in his own fam­i­ly, dif­fer­ences in per­spec­tive could cre­ate irrepara­ble dis­tance. This emo­tion­al tur­moil was reflect­ed in his lat­er pub­lic com­men­tary about polit­i­cal cor­rect­ness, social activism, and what he saw as an increas­ing cul­tur­al divide.

Around this time, Musk also made a rad­i­cal lifestyle deci­sion that reflect­ed a philo­soph­i­cal shift. Hav­ing pre­vi­ous­ly owned mul­ti­ple lux­u­ri­ous prop­er­ties, he announced his inten­tion to sell near­ly all his real estate, claim­ing that pos­ses­sions were a dis­trac­tion from his greater mis­sion of advanc­ing human­i­ty. Mov­ing to a mod­est, pre­fab­ri­cat­ed home near SpaceX’s Texas facil­i­ty, Musk embraced min­i­mal­ism, opt­ing for a stripped-down lifestyle that pri­or­i­tized effi­cien­cy over extrav­a­gance. His deci­sion was part­ly sym­bol­ic, rein­forc­ing his com­mit­ment to his vision of mak­ing life mul­ti-plan­e­tary. He want­ed to demon­strate that mate­r­i­al wealth was sec­ondary to pur­pose, and by relin­quish­ing his phys­i­cal assets, he believed he was rein­forc­ing his iden­ti­ty as a mis­sion-dri­ven entre­pre­neur rather than a bil­lion­aire indulging in excess. This dras­tic shift puz­zled many, as it stark­ly con­trast­ed with the opu­lent lifestyles of his peers, but to Musk, it was a log­i­cal exten­sion of his broad­er phi­los­o­phy of resource allo­ca­tion and long-term think­ing.

As the year pro­gressed and the world grap­pled with the effects of the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic, Musk found an oppor­tu­ni­ty to mend ties with his broth­er, Kim­bal, after a peri­od of emo­tion­al dis­tance. Kim­bal sug­gest­ed they par­take in an Ayahuas­ca cer­e­mo­ny, a psy­che­del­ic spir­i­tu­al expe­ri­ence, but Musk instead pre­ferred a more prag­mat­ic approach to recon­nect­ing. Their renewed bond sig­ni­fied the endur­ing nature of fam­i­ly, even amidst ide­o­log­i­cal clash­es and shift­ing per­son­al pri­or­i­ties, rein­forc­ing that despite Musk’s larg­er-than-life per­sona, his jour­ney remained deeply per­son­al and com­plex. The con­trast between the two brothers—Kimbal, the restau­ra­teur and envi­ron­men­tal advo­cate, and Elon, the relent­less innovator—highlighted the diverse per­spec­tives with­in the Musk fam­i­ly. Yet, despite their dif­fer­ences, they shared a deep-root­ed under­stand­ing of each oth­er, built on child­hood expe­ri­ences, shared ambi­tions, and the pur­suit of cre­at­ing a last­ing impact on the world.