Wisdom can come from anybody: the checkout clerk who talks to you, how the newspapers are arranged in a pile at the hotel desk, a taxi driver who can’t stop talking, or great leaders. I didn’t know that until I was in my mid–30s when I told a dear friend of mine that I’d heard an amazing thing from someone on an airplane. He replied, «John, that probably happens all the time, but you aren’t listening.»John Maeda.