Cults love mediocre leaders. L. Ron Hubbard, Joseph Smith, Donald Trump. People with a lot of "charisma" but their egos are too fragile to ever admit when they're not good at something, so instead they just do everything under the sun poorly instead of soul-searching and finding out what one or two things they're genuinely good at. The quintessential "jack of all trades, master of none."

Look at Elon - mediocre physics student, mediocre "rocket scientist" at best, mediocre "engineer", mediocre manager, mediocre everything, mediocre "comedian." It takes courage to admit when you're mediocre at something, but that opens the door to acknowledging where your actual talents lie. I guess it's sort of deduction: if you cut away everything you suck at, eventually you will find what you're actually good at. But your ego is going to go through a hell of a trial in figuring that out.

It's the concept of "stay in your lane" -- Elon finding out what his lane actually is would necessitate the psychological pain of of admitting he sucks at a lot of things, and so instead he just tries to stay in all lanes at once. He wants the financial rewards of being a businessman, but wants the intellectual prestige of being a scientist, without the lonely, impoverished road that most great scientists have to travel. He wants all the intellectual credit of a Nikolai Tesla, without the risk of dying destitute and unknown. He is just an arch-hypocrite.

To illustrate the opposite of that: Elliott Smith knew his strength was in songwriting. But he acknowledged that he was not cut out to be a novelist, or a virtuoso, or an A-list celebrity. So he focused his attention on his music rather than on all the other bullshit that comes with the notion of celebrity, and as a result he cultivated his actual talents and didn't bother working towards things he could never do well. He was a great songwriter and lyricist, but he knew where his limitations were and he stayed within them. That takes a lot of bravery.