> When you grow up you tend to get told the world is the way it is and you’re life is just to live your life inside the world.
> Try not to bash into the walls too much. Try to have a nice family, have fun, save a little money.
> That’s a very limited life.
> Life can be much broader once you discover one simple fact: Everything around you that you call life was made up by people that were no smarter than you and you can change it, you can influence it, you can build your own things that other people can use.
I wonder what bit of 60s counterculture that attitude was directly lifted from.
While the people that came before weren't any smarter than you; it's important to remember that they had, collectively, more experience in more areas than you could ever dream of having. That doesn't mean they got everything right, but it does mean if you just take the quote to heart you'll probably end up more like a bull in a China shop than some sage-like innovator.
But it is nice idea to remember, so you can mentally knock down people like Jobs, who want to portray themselves as sage-like innovators, a peg.