The Mishna on top of amud aleph quotes a story about Rabban Gamliel’s slave, Tavi.  Tavi was a remarkable person who achieved notoriety and is mentioned many times throughout Mishna and Aggada.  Here are some highlights about his life:

• Rabban Gamliel referred to him as a Talmid Chacham (Mishna Succah 2:1).
• Tavi wore Tefillin (Mekhilta DeRabbi Yishmael 13:9:6)
• When Tavi died, Rabban Gamliel sat shiva for him, against convention (Mishna Berachos 2:7)

Every once in a while there are individuals who seem to completely transcend their circumstances and their status. Vishen Lakhiani, is his book, The Code of the Extraordinary Mind, describes a trait of people who are not constrained by conventional thoughts and beliefs:

“Extraordinary minds are good at seeing the culturescape and are able to selectively choose the rules and conditions to follow versus those to question or ignore. Therefore, they tend to take the path less traveled and innovate on the idea of what it means to truly live.”

Another extraordinary individual, Steve Jobs, has the following advice, which is along the same lines:

“When you grow up, you tend to get told that the world is the way it is and your 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 life, have fun, save money. That’s a very limited life. Life can be much broader once you discover one simple fact. This is – everything around you that you call life was made up by people no smarter than you. And you can change it. You can influence it… Once you learn that, you’ll never be the same again.”

However, let us keep in mind there is a fine line between being an out-of-the-box thinker and an arrogant jerk.  In point of fact, Steve Jobs died of a cancer that he could have been treated for, had he followed conventional wisdom and advice of his doctors.  So what made him great, also foolishly killed him.