How To Shift From Victim to Victor w/ John O'Leary

“John, do you want to die? It’s your choice, not mine.”I thought for a moment and answered, “Mom, I don’t want to die. I WANT TO LIVE!”That was the first conversation JOHN O’LEARY had with his mother after a horrific fire burned him across 100% of his body at 9 years old. That's right. He was literally burned alive. But what is truly remarkable is what he did next. In this episode, John is going to tell you how he OVERCAME IMPOSSIBLE ODDS and how you can use the things he’s learned to LIVE YOUR BEST LIFE, even in the midst of TRAGEDY. John O’Leary is a sought-after inspirational speaker, and podcaster and has published two bestsellers. His mission and his messages are simple. He wants to TEACH YOU how to find ways to awaken you to your life’s POTENTIAL and ENERGIZE you to live more THOUGHTFULLY, BOLDLY and INSPIRED. John also gets into how important PERSPECTIVE is in our lives. Instead of focusing on the things he no longer had, John learned a valuable lesson about being called to use the GIFTS and TALENTS he was given and still had despite his physical limitations. If you want to know what it takes to go from VICTIM TO VICTOR, listen closely to John’s story. It will change the way you think. And hopefully, change the way you live. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Ed Mylett?

  I hear so many small business owners say the exact same thing. They just never have enough time in the day. Well, I measure time differently. I've compressed, condensed, heck, I've bent time. My first day is 6:00 a.m. to noon. My second day starts at noon and goes till 6:00 P.M. And my third day, 6:00 P.M. to midnight. I now get 21 days a week. Stack that up over a month, over a year, over five years, and my life's completely different than it would have been otherwise. And if you want to win as an entrepreneur, you have to compress your time, too. And you definitely can't afford to waste it. Waiting weeks on a big bank for capital? Your best bet's to work with my friends at Cardiff. They know how to compress time for entrepreneurs. They get your business approved in minutes and funded the very same day. They're America's favorite small business lender, and for good reason.

• 0:45Ed Mylett?

  Over 20 years in business, over $12 billion deployed to small business across America. Stop letting bank delays slow down your momentum. Head to cardiff.co/ed. That's cardiff.co/ed. Cardiff.co. Real growth, fast funding. Cardiff. Borrow better.

• 1:01Speaker 01

  Mr. President, my company, for me, of the explosion on our rig.

• 1:05Speaker 02

  On October 2nd.

• 1:06Speaker 01

  Causing massive water displacement and triggering a tsunami. They all heap the blame on me.

• 1:11Speaker 02

  Tom Cruise is. Digger got us into this mess. And Digger's gonna dig us up. From the director of Birdman and The Revenant.

• 1:18Speaker 01

  What would happen if I stopped drilling? You stop, you freeze to death, that's what.

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  With great power comes great deniability.

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  I'm not the first nanny.

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  Digger. See the trailer online. Only in theaters October 2nd. Rated R. Under 17. Not a middle without parent.

• 1:36Speaker 02

  This is The Ed Mileage Show.

• 1:40Ed Mylett?

  All right, welcome back to the show, everybody. Today's special. And I mean that. We were just having a conversation, you know, offline, off camera. We're both already getting emotional about what we know we're going to discuss today. I really admire this man. And when we're done with this hour today, your life will be better. It'll be different. It'll be improved because that's what he does. Because he's done it in his own life. Nine years old. This man was nine years old, a little boy, nine years old, and was burned over 100% of his body. I want you to just think about that for a second. And what comes with that, with all of the recovery, all the shame, all of the scars. The difficulties that that could present in one's life.

• 2:22Ed Mylett?

  But also the keys to becoming successful that you can learn from coming from that type of pain, that type of struggle. So I have a very highly qualified person today to talk about moving from victim to victor. The mindset required, the strategies, the tactics, and just overall, you're going to be inspired by this man's spirit. He's an author, couple of different books, On Fire, The Seven Choices to Ignite a Radically Inspired Life. He's got another book called In All that we'll talk about as well. John O'Leary, really grateful you're here today, brother.

• 2:51John O'Leary?

  Ed, man, I've, I've already cried twice before we hit record, so I'm not even looking forward to where this thing is going to go next. Because I think it's going to be emotional and real. And ultimately practical for your audience. So man, I'm thrilled to be on your show.

• 3:05Ed Mylett?

  Oh, brother, the feelings are mutual and I'm so grateful you're here. Let's go all the way back. Let's at least set the tone for a second. So you're nine years old. Kids in the neighborhood are playing with matches and fire and you go, it's probably a good idea. And so take us through what happened. It was obviously a turning point very early in your life, to put it mildly.

• 3:23John O'Leary?

  Right. And you know, every one of us have these inflection points and mine, one of them took place at nine. You mentioned the kids. They got away with it. I figured I would too, Ed, and I was wrong. My dad was at work. My mother was out. The house was mine. On January 17th, 1987, at about 7:30 in the morning, walked into the garage, bent over a can of gasoline. Monkey see, monkey do. Try to pour a little bit of gasoline on top of this piece of paper that I had lit. And before the, the, the liquid even came out, the fumes pulled my little flame into this can. It's a five gallon can. Stick of dynamite basically went off, split the can in two, picked me up. And then launched me 20 feet against the far side of the garage.

• 4:08Ed Mylett?

  Oh, my gosh.

• 4:09John O'Leary?

  So that's the starting point of this story. And you know, when we were little, you know, you growing up in California was where you were from. I'm from Missouri. We all learned the same thing, man. Stop, drop and roll when you're on fire. Stop, drop and roll. And I remember that on the far side of the garage. But dude, everywhere I looked was on fire.

• 4:29Ed Mylett?

  Oh, my gosh.

• 4:30John O'Leary?

  You know, like the garage immediately was engulfed. And then I looked down and like, me too. So I, I, I ran, you know, did the exact opposite of what you should do, but I self preservation. I just ran, I ran on fire. Through the flames into the house. And then I just kept on going. I ran through the kitchen and the family room. I came into to the front hall. Story I very seldom share, but it's part of the journey, man. So I enter into the front hall. I'm on top of this rug, just begging and praying for a savior. I know I can't do this by myself. I'll take anybody, anybody. And I see my brother Jim, who was seventeen. So he looks at me, I look at him, and I'm screaming and I'm praying. And as Jim is coming toward me, I remember thanking God, anybody else, not, not him.

• 5:14John O'Leary?

  Cause he's my older brother. He's not always that nice to me. And yet this is his day, man. He picks up a rug. He swings down into the flames. The flames are leaping three feet off of my body in all directions.

• 5:27Ed Mylett?

  Oh, my gosh.

• 5:28John O'Leary?

  He's beating me with this rug. After swinging down like three or four times, he drops his little rug. Because he caught. And you know, I know you're a big why guy, big purpose driven guy. Like when you touch something hot, what you naturally do, if your life is about you, is you drop it and you retreat. You don't do one more to use your length. You don't do one more. You save yourself, man.

• 5:50Ed Mylett?

  Yeah.

• 5:51John O'Leary?

  But that's what we do if it's only about us. Wh- what do we do if it's not about us? If it's about something bigger than us? And that's what Jim is about to prove out here. He picks the rug back up. He comes back into the fight. He swings down a fourth and a fifth and a sixth, and ultimately two and a half minutes later, beats down the fire enough to carry me outside. Jump on top of me, roll me around on the grass, runs back into the house, calls nine one one. And that's the beginning of our story toward recovery. But it began with an unlikely hero stepping up and making a difference in my life.

• 6:22Ed Mylett?

  Unbelievable. You, you, um, I, so I, I don't know why I know the story, why it makes me so emotional. I just picture this. This little boy, I don't know, I just, uh, I'm getting emotional now and I was, I've, I've, I know this story. I've heard it more like even last night preparing again, I, my wife's like, are you okay? I'm like, I'm all right. Uh, cause your brother kind of wasn't that good to you all the time, like any big brother is, and he catches fire himself, burns himself to save you. And it's just amazing you have this, you talk a little bit and we'll keep going with the story, but I heard you say something about everyday people becoming someone else's miracle. Is that the way that you said it? Something along those lines. And that's sort of what Jim did for you.

• 7:04John O'Leary?

  And it's, so I wrote a book years ago called On Fire. And if you look at On Fire, when they first published it, there was a picture of O'Leary wearing a suit, looking at the reader like arms crossed, like, look at me, people. And I wrote him back and I'm like, hey, guys, before you come up with the cover art, read the book. Cause that book is not about me. It's about ordinary people, man, doing extraordinary things. Well. Brothers and sisters and parents and neighbors and EMTs and doctors and nurses and custodial staff and radio announcers, ordinary folks doing work well. And so when they, they came back with the cover art in round two, it's, there's no picture of John, and I don't mind pictures of me, but there's no picture of John.

• 7:44John O'Leary?

  It's a picture of the words on fire in like gold and red and orange flame, mirror like material. So when people see the book, they don't see my picture. They see theirs, literally. You can see yourself in the, in the cover. And it's my hope when people check that out or check out our work. They don't recognize how good I am or how much I went through. They recognize how good they are, how called they are, and how much potential they have in their lives to be part of someone else's miracle.

• 8:10Ed Mylett?

  Unbelievable.

• 8:11John O'Leary?

  Yeah, man, that, that's the call to recognize the gifts that you have and then use them.

• 8:16Ed Mylett?

  A seventeen year old boy does this though. That's just what blows my mind about it. So let's keep going here because your parents are central figures too. And so are you, you know, one thing I didn't consider. Um, with being burned like that is the recovery, which we'll get to, which is really the rest of your life to some extent, which I think people forget, like the incident itself is horrific. And this precious little boy burning to death. But before, before we get there, now you're in the hospital, you're given everybody, I want you to understand this, a one percent chance to live. Just to live, never mind ever stand up or walk, just standing up was like off the table for the most part. Living is 99% not gonna happen. And you're in the hospital and I'm sure you're in excruciating pain.

• 9:00Ed Mylett?

  Take us through what that part of it was like, and then this moment where your dad arrives. And by the way, the way you describe it, I'm pick my dad, I could just hear my dad's footsteps stomping down the hall like you burned the house down, you know. So what, what took place in those moments?

• 9:16John O'Leary?

  So I love your dad. I love your love of your dad. I love the mistakes your dad made and I love the choices he made afterwards to do better. So like, I love, I honestly love your dad. He brings me to tears.

• 9:27Ed Mylett?

  Thank you.

• 9:28John O'Leary?

  And my dad lived a different path than yours, but I think we both look up to our fathers in the same degree.

• 9:34Ed Mylett?

  Very much.

• 9:35John O'Leary?

  Like I'm in awe of your dad and mine. My dad was a veteran. He's a business owner. He's type A. He's kind of, he's kind of one of those guys, man, but he was fair. He was fair. He was good. But I blew up his house. So like I'm nine, I know what I did. I know it was wrong. So the pain you mentioned in the question isn't actually the pain I was thinking about. The pain I was thinking about wasn't amputations or burn care. It was my father's wrath. And then I hear the voice of the line down the hall. He's roaring at some poor nurse. You know, where is my boy, John? And this girl does me no favors. She, she brings him back into the room, pulls back the curtain. He marches then, my dad, my dad did not walk. He marched.

• 10:19John O'Leary?

  He, he marches into this room, points down at me and then he lit me up. And that word for word, what he said to me, and I remember today, like it happens this morning. He said, John, look at me when I'm talking to you.

• 10:34John O'Leary?

  So I uncrossed my arms and looked up at him and then he added. I have never, I've never been so.

• 10:44John O'Leary?

  Proud of anybody in my entire life and my little buddy, you look at me when I'm talking to you.

• 10:52John O'Leary?

  I'm just proud to be your dad. And then he goes, this is just love language, man. He goes, I love you. I love you. I love you. And there's nothing you can do about that.

• 11:04Ed Mylett?

  Oh, dear.

• 11:05John O'Leary?

  And after hearing this, man, I, I crossed my arms and shut my eyes and I, this is true. I remember thinking, oh my gosh, nobody told my dad what happened. The, the old man doesn't know I burned out.

• 11:19John O'Leary?

  But dude, I, I didn't get grace and unconditional love and the way a parent feels for a child like that. That's what I didn't get. And, and that day my dad showed it to me and it, you know, it's not going to make life easy, love. But I think it's going to make it possible. And so my, my dad is just exhibit A of, of courageous unconditional love in my life.

• 11:39Ed Mylett?

  Yeah. And what that can do, I mean, and what you've turned out to become in your life, I think that was that your life right there, the, the, it's not the events of our life that define us. I think, I think it's the meaning that we take from it. And you could have instantly been told that what this means is you're a terrible young man. You're a bad boy. And this is why you write about this so beautifully, but the word that comes to mind is grace. And the first lesson of this interview for me, you'd think it'd be resiliency and toughness because obviously you exhibited a ton of that. But for me, the first lesson of this is grace, which is connected to our faith.

• 12:17Ed Mylett?

  But it's grace. Your dad gave you grace and gave you love when he could have gone the other direction. And so often in life, the easy path is to be critical, to be harsh, to hurt others. Because it may even feel justified when we do it, but great people exhibit grace in moments that define their lives and the lives of other people. Don't you agree?

• 12:35John O'Leary?

  Yes. And it's, it's not seen that often in our society. Many of the leaders that we look up to are the ones that offer the least amount of grace out there. They're very quick to judge on Twitter or whatever other instrument they're using right now, that bullhorn at bringing other people down. Grace isn't about that. Grace, grace doesn't hide from the brokenness of the world. It just has the power to redeem it. Not just judge it, but work to redeem it. And there's a profound gap between the two.

• 13:01Ed Mylett?

  Wow. That is really well said, man. Like let's go back and rewind 40 seconds there, everybody. That is really. Really well said. So we got Jim steps up, your brother. Turns out you come from a pretty special family, but Jim steps up.

• 13:13John O'Leary?

  I'm gonna stop you like that. What the cool thing about us is we're not. It's actually why I'm attracted to your story. And it's why I think others are attracted to mine. We're a middle class, midwestern, ordinary family. Not exceptional in the least. Jim wasn't exceptional. There's stories of what my sister did the morning I was burned. They weren't exceptional before they did it. They became exceptional in doing it.

• 13:36Ed Mylett?

  Yes.

• 13:36John O'Leary?

  It was the moment that made them exceptional, not the preparation so much for it.

• 13:44Ed Mylett?

  Yep. By the way, obviously you know that that's what I mean when I say that. I think what makes this exceptional, what makes your family special? Is the things that make family special and that in life, I think we've been programmed to think, well, the special families are the beautiful people or the super smart people or the really gifted people or the rich people. But the truth is to me, special is average, ordinary people doing extraordinary things in big moments. And Jim did that. Your dad did it and your mother taught me a lesson.

• 14:19Ed Mylett?

  With what she did when you came home and you're having dinner. And I want to talk about this for a second because this is a lesson for everyone with their children, but also yourself. Also yourself, this, there's a, there's a deep lesson in what your mother did here. And I'm going to give, I know what you mean by the fact that you come from an average, ordinary family. We both acknowledge we both do, but your mother.

• 14:40John O'Leary?

  Yeah.

• 14:41Ed Mylett?

  Somehow in her discernment as a loving mother. Uh, did something very special that I think in that moment, and, and, and I know it is because you're right about it. So it's gotta be, it's kind of shifted what this was going to be for you.

• 14:55John O'Leary?

  Right.

• 14:56Ed Mylett?

  In this moment, and he's going to describe it. I want to just set the frame. You could have easily been the victim now. Our poor boy, he's been burned. Let's just care for him, right? Or in, in life, my son's getting bullied at school or he's struggling at his grades or he didn't, or she didn't make the, the softball team. And there's these moments or even in our own lives where we could take the easier path. Your mom, this is extraordinary to me. So take us through that dinner when you come home from the hospital, if you don't mind.

• 15:24John O'Leary?

  Yeah, she's just so awesome. I, I had lunch with mom yesterday and mom is a warrior. Mom is married to a man who we talked about already, who's had Parkinson's for 36 years. A man who's got his own profound challenges and this warrior just keeps leading him forward in order that he becomes the best version of himself. She demands it of her husband. She demanded of her six kids growing up. She demands it of herself. And we don't see that a lot in society. This expectation of excellence. Wow. Perfection. Cause that's impossible this side of eternity, but excellence, getting a little bit better day after day. And so the story I'm about to share is one of a litany that I could bring to bear on my mom.

• 16:05John O'Leary?

  So I'm not getting emotional sharing it because again, I don't always tell this story, man, but here we go. So I'm, I'm, I'm nine and I, I got burned bad and I spent five and a half months in hospital and it was a street fight. It was hard, impossibly hard to describe, but you go through amputations and skin grafts and surgery. And the miracle takes you come home, something most people did not expect we live into. And then they've rebuilt my house. So this house fire that destroyed everything, it's now rebuilt. That's amazing. The six kids are around, around the table. That's awesome. The dogs are there. My mom and dad are there. The dinner's on the plate. Awesome. It's all good. The problem is I can't eat. You use the word that I love because it, it drives me crazy. The word victim, man, I'm a victim.

• 16:50John O'Leary?

  I'm in a wheelchair. I don't have fingers. My, my life has been cut short. So although I survived, what kind of life will I live? Not much of one, just ask me. I'm a victim. And my sister, Amy, who is another one of the heroes in this story, many times over, she grabs a fork. She scoops up a little bit of potatoes and she starts bringing it toward John O'Leary's mouth. So this little victim boy is about to eat finally. And right before the fork with the, the potato goodness enters into my mouth, my warrior mother says to Amy,

• 17:23John O'Leary?

  Amy, drop the fork. If John's hungry, he's going to feed himself. I did like, you know, you, you, you have, you have a heart, man. So you can imagine what's really going on here.

• 17:36Ed Mylett?

  Yeah.

• 17:37John O'Leary?

  I, I look at my mom and I said, Mom, I, I can't eat. You know, I, I'm hungry. My mom doesn't look at me. She looks at Amy and says, Amy, if John is hungry, he will feed himself. And then with that, she just looks back down at her plate and starts eating again, which sounds incredibly cold hearted. And that's how I felt for sure. And after begging her to feed me and all this other stuff, long story, I had made very, very, very short. Two and a half hours into that celebration formally, the plate had been flipped twice. The, the dogs had been well fed. The kitchen's cleaned. Everyone else is gone. My mom is at the head of the table with me. I think that's important to say.

• 18:19John O'Leary?

  She's there with me. I didn't know that at the time, but she's there with me. And two and a half hours in, this little fellow figures out a way to wedge a fork between his two fingerless broken hands. Pick up some cold potatoes, start moving them toward his mouth.

• 18:35John O'Leary?

  And, and eating. And in the entire time, I remember chewing on those potatoes. I remember thinking.

• 18:42John O'Leary?

  I hate my mom. I hate my evil mom. But the key piece there, brother and listeners, if I've not yet rocked you to sleep.

• 18:53John O'Leary?

  I'm eating.

• 18:54Ed Mylett?

  Yeah.

• 18:55John O'Leary?

  Like I'm, I'm doing this thing.

• 18:56Ed Mylett?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 18:57John O'Leary?

  And it's really, cause even as I walked you through that, I hold up this little pen in front of you modeling this. I can write, man. I can dress today. I travel on my own. I'm married, have four kids, have a great business, have a great life. I eat my own meals today, mom.

• 19:12Ed Mylett?

  Yeah.

• 19:12John O'Leary?

  And listeners, why? Is it because I'm that great? Uh-uh. The surgeons weren't that great. The therapists weren't that great. An incredibly bold warrior, loving mother sat at the end, end of the table for two and a half hours as her heart broke.

• 19:25Ed Mylett?

  Yeah.

• 19:26John O'Leary?

  Knowing that this little boy would have to figure it out one day. And he might as well figure it out on this day. And I, I think that decision for her to sit with me that night for two and a half hours changed my life.

• 19:35Ed Mylett?

  It's one of the most incredible things I've ever heard. Because of what you said, you think, well, gosh, this person must have some PhD in psychology or, you know, no, this is, this is a loving mother. Who loved you enough to let you go through the difficulty of learning to feed yourself. And I really believe that was, there's another defining moment where she asks you, do you want to die? Right? She actually asked you, it was your choice. Am I right about that? I mean, this is an extraordinary woman and the lessons for my audience from your mom and your dad are pretty extraordinary. But do I have that right? Didn't she say that to you?

• 20:11John O'Leary?

  Yeah, I'm glad you brought it up because I think it's almost the perfect first page of the story you just asked about. So the day I came into the hospital, right after my dad walked out, my mom walks in. So dad was there first, then mom. And I'm dying. For those of you have children, like if you've ever been in the emergency room with them, you know that you would do anything to take away that pain and take them home right then and there. I'm dying and mom knows this and I'm grasping on for hope right now. And I look at her and I say, Mama, am I gonna die? And when a child asks a question like that, the answer they're hoping for in response is the word, no.

• 20:48Ed Mylett?

  Right, right.

• 20:49John O'Leary?

  You're not gonna freaking die, dude. What the heck's wrong with you? Who told you that? So I expect her to give me hope, which is a lovely thing to have. But sometimes what we need is truth. You've talked, you've written about your dad and how someone loved him enough to lay truth in front of him, make a different, different decision. So she lays in front of me, truth, and she says, baby, do you want to die? Your choice, not mine. Like this, the decision point of life right here, man. It's in the emergency room. It happens right now. We're not waiting for tomorrow because tomorrow is not promised. Do you want to die? Your choice, not mine. And I look at her as a scared nine year old boy. And I said, Mom, I don't, I don't want to die. I want to live. So she says, good, baby. Look at me. You take the

• 21:34John O'Leary?

  hand of God. You walk the journey with him and you fight like you never fought before. Your father and I will be with you. We are not leaving you, but do your part. You fight too.

• 21:47John O'Leary?

  And that like day one, man, I'd never heard of skin grass or banan chin. I had no idea what the journey would entail. All I knew was the first right step. Take the hand of God, know that mom and dad are with me, but do my part. Fight.

• 22:01Ed Mylett?

  I'm so grateful I'm getting to experience this with you. I just want you to know that sometimes in an interview, I don't know what's wrong with me. I'm like really emotional. Some, see, when we before the interview, you were giving me some praise and I said, yeah, I said, look, man, I say nice things. I said, you are an embodiment of moving from victim to victor. You embody it. And the word embody, I mean, you literally embody this because you went through torture. When you made that decision, you know, I have not gone through it, but I do have, I've had Israel Del Toro on my show who was burned pretty severely in Iraq. And so I have had some insights into the absolute hell and torture

• 22:42Ed Mylett?

  that being burned like what you you had to your body, a hundred percent of your body means. And so the story of your mother and your father and your brother are just remarkable stories to me. I want to shift and go forward because I think there's a massive lesson. Here with you, which is that once you got through, well, you're never totally through it. John still suffers from the who gets some sores and different things right now in his life. Am I right about that? You still, there's still, you still reminded all the time of the difference with you compared to what it may or may not have been. True?

• 23:18John O'Leary?

  It is true. And ironically, and it's through the actions of one of my sisters that we probably won't speak about today, but my face is not burned. So when you look at me at glance across a coffee bar, you see a very ordinary looking guy. But right below that face starts the neck and from the neck to my toes, there's third degree burns. So although I look at first glance, well, you know, dark haired dude, you know, normal looking fella. Yeah, right below that though, it falls apart. So I've burns and scars and sores, like you mentioned, from my neck to my toes. It's a constant daily reminder of what I've been through.

• 23:58Ed Mylett?

  What about though, this is what I want to ask you. This is where I think people, this is a massive, oh my gosh moment for my audience and it was for me. You sort of hid the story most of your life. In other words, which is ironic because we're talking about it now, but you spent most of your life trying to say, no, no, no, I'm normal, I'm normal, I'm normal, I'm normal. And I think you have somehow discovered in the process that the real beauty in life is being vulnerable, authentic enough, courageous enough to reveal the scars in our life metaphorically and literally. So we all have scars like I have found when I've been willing to finally talk about my childhood with my dad, that the impact I've made is much greater.

• 24:41Ed Mylett?

  I think most people think, oh, my divorce disqualifies me from being successful or happy or this, my sin has or you know, my financial failures or some part of me that's inadequate, my scars, my weaknesses disqualify me. And you spent a pretty decent part of your life sort of trying to hide your scars. So talk, speak to that for everybody because I think everyone needs to, this is maybe one of the great life lessons you'll ever hear everybody. And it may be, maybe going into 2023, which is coming soon. For those of you listening at this time, maybe it'll be a different year for you after you hear John speak to this. So go ahead, John.

• 25:17John O'Leary?

  There's a lot of pressure on me, so hopefully we'll live into it together, Ed. Let's change years, man, for individuals. The cool thing is our conversation reminds them that they can do this in their lives. So like, it's not my job, but it is our job collectively to do this work and it is possible.

• 25:33Ed Mylett?

  You gotta eat your own potatoes.

• 25:35John O'Leary?

  Yeah, that's right, brother. When you're burned as badly as I was, the dream in life is not ultimately to end up on your show, Ed, or to become a speaker myself.

• 25:44Ed Mylett?

  Right.

• 25:45John O'Leary?

  My dream was to be ordinary. Like all I wanted out of life was to disappear. And I did that for a long time, for 20 years. Like I, I started my own business, but I started my own business to not interview with people because I was so

• 26:00John O'Leary?

  shy, man, I don't like being judged. So rather than being judged, just do my own thing. So I did that. I never told anybody how I was burned. I went to college and all this stuff, but never told fraternity brothers or roommates. What had happened to their roommate or fraternity brother? It was my story, my scars, my past, we're not going there. And then two things happened over the course of three days that changed my life. And this is the way the universe or God works, I think, if you're paying attention. I'm 28 years old and in a church service on a Sunday, a pastor is talking about talents. And as a Midwesterner, I'd always known what I had, one talent. Intellectually, you and I share that. You talk about being the least intelligent in your family, me too, and I'm not exaggerating.

• 26:41John O'Leary?

  I'm not that intelligent. I'm not that good looking. I'm not that athletic. I'm not that driven. All these things I'm not. So I'm not, I'm not talented. So he says, if you got five, double, three, multiply one. Now he's looking at me. And he talks about how you're called to do something with that talent. And he gave us a pathway forward to multiply that talent to do, to do something mighty with the gifts we have, even if it's only one gift. Do something, man. Do something. And if, for those of you in the audience, if you've ever been in a big room, but it seems like someone's looking at you when they're talking. Like this pastor is looking at me. Two days later, I'm working, I, I, I'm doing construction at that time. I ran my own development business.

• 27:19Ed Mylett?

  Which is hilarious to me, by the way. You're burned, you've had amputations, you don't have your fingers. You decide to be in carpentry or like, uh, construction, which I think is just another part of the story. That's great, but go ahead.

• 27:29John O'Leary?

  Well, it's ridiculous. It, it, it was the way without knowing it, because I'm not that self-aware of proving to the world I'm worthy.

• 27:34Ed Mylett?

  Yeah.

• 27:35John O'Leary?

  But I can't prove it yet to myself. When I don't recognize I'm already worthy. I'm always trying to prove it to everybody else, man. So just look at what I'm doing now. I'm building, I'm on a ladder, I'm earning all these things. I'm proving you how normal I am. But I, I wasn't and I'm, I'm not, I'm not confident, that's for sure. And on that Tuesday morning, my phone rings and it's a little girl and she says, Mr. O'Leary, would you speak at my school? And Ed, I've, I've never spoken anywhere. But I said, yes, on the heels of that conversation from Sunday, where if you have one talent, multiply it. Okay. So I said, yes, to this little girl, I practiced a talk for 40 hours, walked in front of this room, had my notes in front of me, never looked up at the little monsters.

• 28:17John O'Leary?

  And that's my first gig, man. Three Girl Scouts in St. Louis County wasn't even paid with a box of Samoas. So there's no income, man, coming out of this thing.

• 28:26Ed Mylett?

  My gosh.

• 28:28John O'Leary?

  And on the walk out, these little girls were hugging me, which was sweet. And then one of the dad says, dude, that was, that was killer. Would you speak at my Kuanis meeting? Never heard of Kuanis, but yeah, one of those guys was a Rotarian. One of those guys was Chamber of Commerce. And we just kept saying, yes, no goal in mind. And I know you're a big goals guy. Me too. But the goal back then was to be open to, open to, yes.

• 28:50Ed Mylett?

  Yes.

• 28:52John O'Leary?

  And it led over time. And if you want to rewind and ask more about it, we can, but it led to 2,500 events, couple million people live, tens of millions virtually, by being willing to vulnerably say yes to that first group of three Girl Scouts.

• 29:08Ed Mylett?

  Well, and also say yes to, hey, here's my scars. Here's my pain. I think that, you know, it's been said on my show multiple times that we're most qualified to help the person we used to be. And, and there's a great saying also about, listen, if you really want to impress people, try to show them how perfect you are or normal you are to your language. But if you really want to impact people, reveal to them your imperfections. And I don't think enough times in life, we, I, I, I want my audience to understand this, your imperfections.

• 29:39John O'Leary?

  Right.

• 29:40Ed Mylett?

  Are your pathway to you creating change in your own life and other people's lives. If you'll just accept that. And by the way, it doesn't mean we don't work on our weaknesses. What I'm saying to you is that that's which, that's your special.

• 29:53John O'Leary?

  That's right.

• 29:53Ed Mylett?

  When we were talking earlier about, you know, well, my family's average and ordinary, you know what I meant, and I know what you meant. And I'm saying that the average, ordinary people like myself, like you, that have had something special happen in their life. The irony is the pathway is their mistake, is their scar, is their setback? And so, look at that area of your life and decide what can you do with it? And I'm gonna tell you, not all the people that win in life are six foot four and hit, you know, run a four, four, forty and can dunk a basketball or are supermodels. That's a really small group of the happy and successful people in life. Ninety nine point nine percent of the happy and successful people in life are average and ordinary people

• 30:36Ed Mylett?

  who have done extraordinary things in very simple ways. I'm curious though, didn't your parents write a book about this, which is sort of what sort of, again, your parents get, kind of had to nudge you out there one way or the other. This story was gonna get out there, or do I have the sequence incorrect?

• 30:51John O'Leary?

  No, you're right. And that's how the little girl heard about it. So, uh, my mom and dad always wondered how their child's story would end. And for the, the parents in the room, you, you understand what I'm talking about. They're like, how does this, this thing go down? And they weren't sure, even as I'm progressing through grade school, middle school, high school into college. And on the day you and I are recording this, it's November 22nd as we record. It's the anniversary of the day my wife, Elizabeth Grace and I married. So this is our, to the anniversary, but mom and dad.

• 31:19Ed Mylett?

  Wow.

• 31:20John O'Leary?

  Dude, I'm honored. So, um, they're in church the night that their son is on the altar, wearing this goofy looking tuxedo that doesn't fit right.

• 31:30John O'Leary?

  And then they look behind them and they see this girl in white with brown hair and brown eyes. And she's stunning. She gorgeous walking toward the altar.

• 31:40John O'Leary?

  And then they see us take hands and my hands are broken and hers are perfect. But we say I do, and we kiss and we turn around and we walk down this aisle. And that's the first time they recognized how the story ends. It's actually just how it begins. But the painful story of their, of their nine year old son being burned in it beautifully, with a beautiful lady and an incredible life in front of them. So they start writing about this. My dad got Parkinson's. He lost his business. He lost his job. He lost income. He retreats home, writes a little story of his life called overwhelming odds.

• 32:11John O'Leary?

  And they they write about the miracle they got when they turned this thing, this hopeless story over to God and they got their son back in more ways than one. So they print a hundred copies, only a hundred copies, man. It's the unauthorized biography of John O'Leary's life. They they wrote it. Hundred people buy it, then another hundred, then another hundred. They go on to sell, I think, eighty five thousand copies.

• 32:32Ed Mylett?

  Come on. Amazing.

• 32:35John O'Leary?

  No marketing plan, no goals, no savvy, out of their garage, from my father's wheelchair, people come in. It was just a beautiful, grace-filled story. One of the copies was sold to a Girl Scout, and she's the one that says, after reading it, which you shared your story. So if you take this thing all the way back, like, how does the universe or how does God work? My dad wrote that book because he lost his gig because he had Parkinson's disease. And you're you're big into using your challenges for something bigger than the day.

• 33:06Ed Mylett?

  Yes.

• 33:07John O'Leary?

  Leading you somewhere, man. That addiction is leading you somewhere. That divorce is leading you somewhere. That first bankruptcy is leading you somewhere. That burn at age nine is leading you somewhere. Quit looking at yourself as a victim to it. Ask yourself what you can do to redeem it. So dad gets this diagnosis, writes a book, has no idea that it's going to be lead ultimately to you and me being on this podcast today.

• 33:25Ed Mylett?

  My gosh.

• 33:26John O'Leary?

  But he says yes. And that's the that's the key in life. Say yes.

• 33:30Ed Mylett?

  My gosh. You guys, his father gets Parkinson's, writes the book, forces him to go speak to this little girl's group, and here we are. And by the way, all of it, go all the way back, it's seven thirty in the morning, where he messes with his gas can, and Jim saves his life. It's unreal. Yet, guys, your story becomes special if you win. If you win. If he didn't win, if he didn't marry this beautiful woman, if he didn't turn his life into something, then it's a totally different story. So you all get to determine, you are the author, you and God are the author of your own life. You determine the next chapters. You determine

• 34:14Ed Mylett?

  what it means. And ultimately, what you do with it, do you eat your potatoes?

• 34:19Ed Mylett?

  Right? Determined. Do you want to live? Because I'm gonna say the other thing, what made me emotional. This question, I want to go back, man, and you'll use this when you speak. When your mother says, do you want to die? I think a lot of you need to ask yourself that question right now. Are you living? I'm not talking about your heart beating. You know exactly what I mean. There's that great saying that says, most people die at 22 or 23 years old. We just don't get around to burying them until they're 65 or 70. So those of you listening to this, are you living? Do you want to die? You know what I mean by that? I mean, do you want to live? Cause what John's response was, no, mom, I want to live. I don't want to die. Maybe it's time you ask yourself this question. What does living mean to you? What is your calling? What is your purpose? What are the scars you need to reveal?

• 35:05Ed Mylett?

  What is the redemptive story you have? And here's a pathway for it. And I've never heard someone say this before. I'm reading and I'm like, man, I actually said to our mutual friend who introduced us, John. I said, man, what an optimistic guy. And then I'm reading your work. You're like, I don't just believe in optimism. You talk about pragmatic positivity. What the heck is that?

• 35:25John O'Leary?

  So the guy you mentioned is John Ruhlen, who is just such a good man. So I love.

• 35:30Ed Mylett?

  Wonderful, wonderful human.

• 35:31John O'Leary?

  And I'm grateful he made the introduction. I get in trouble a bunch by being the optimistic guy by squeezing enough lemons, adding a tiny bit of sugar, mixing that up with a little bit of water and having myself a delicious lemonade. And people remind me how hard life is. And I always say, yeah, and I don't run from that. I don't hide from the difficulties of life. But rather than just talking about how bad it is, I like when people are moving toward the struggles and making it better.

• 35:56Ed Mylett?

  Yes.

• 35:58John O'Leary?

  So yeah, am I optimistic? Yeah. Pragmatically so. Because what I do is rather than just looking at how bad the world is, which any fool can do, and they do. And if you don't believe me, watch your evening news tonight.

• 36:09Ed Mylett?

  Yep.

• 36:09John O'Leary?

  They will tell you how bad everything is. What they miss is the arc of history. The reality is this, in our individual lives and certainly in our collective ones, things are better today by a lot than they were 10 years ago. Shockingly better than they were 20, 50, 100, 1,000, 10,000. Give me any measurement and we are far better off today as a society than we've ever been in the history of the world. So yeah, we can talk about how bad the environment is and how bad things are racially and in environment. Like, yes, these things need to be redeemed. We need to discuss and work to make it better. And then take a deep breath and say, and it is getting better. And we are working to make it better, not only for ourselves, but for those around us. So pragmatic optimism is moving forward with.

• 36:54John O'Leary?

  A heavy dose of hope, but also bowied by the fact that we are doing far better today than we were yesterday. And it's our job to make it better for those who come behind us.

• 37:02Ed Mylett?

  See, I love that. See, one thing when you start saying, hey, uh, don't be a victim. Someone will say back to you, well, no, you don't understand my situation. Um, you know, my dad was a drug addict or alcoholic. I was burned. I come from a marginalized racial community where I am behind the eight ball. I don't have the opportunities you have. I, I grew up poor. I didn't get to go to good schools that you went to. Or, um, you know, I don't look like everybody looks like. And whatever that situation is, what I'm saying to you is, I may not understand those things and I'm going to assume you're right about them.

• 37:36John O'Leary?

  Yeah.

• 37:37Ed Mylett?

  I'm assuming you're right about them. In fact, many of you, I know you're right about them. The question is, is that going to define the rest of your life? That's the question. Is that the definition of you? And so accepting truth is my father was an alcoholic and a drug addict. I did have a rough little time there, right? You were burned on a hundred percent of your body below the neck, right? Like, okay, that's true. You are, you were born into a group of people that have been, um, taken advantage of, abused, whatever it might be. Those, these things are true. These are not, someone's not, when someone says you're not a victim, they're not saying your circumstances aren't true. They are true. You are right. The question is now what are we going to do about it?

• 38:20Ed Mylett?

  Is it going to be a redemptive story? And what if more and more people that were children of alcoholics shared it? And prevailed. What if more and more people from a marginalized racial or economic or religious community? Shared it and won anyway. Isn't that sort of how it would change?

• 38:35John O'Leary?

  Yes.

• 38:36Ed Mylett?

  Isn't that sort of how it changes? Otherwise, it's a permanent definition of your life. So am I, am I, would you, would you second that, the way that I said it?

• 38:45John O'Leary?

  It's right on. The way we change the world, we think it's going to be in DC or Jefferson City or Sacramento. And that is part of it, no doubt. But the real way we make the changes, you make your bed, you look in the mirror, you fix the hair, if you have any hair left over, and then you attack the day. So you start in your own backyard, you start at home and then you work outward from there. So that's where the beachhead begins and then we move onward and we do so together.

• 39:09Ed Mylett?

  Yeah.

• 39:13Ed Mylett?

  You say in your book, the in awe book, um rediscover your childlike wonder unleash inspiration, meaning and joy. This has always been hard for me because my childhood was not, by the way, my mom listens to this mom. I had a great childhood, but always bugs my mom. She's like, you know, was it that bad? No, there were just elements that weren't good. I come from a very loving family and my mom, like your mom, is a world-class human being. Thank God for my mom. Um, and my dad was a wonderful man, but we all know the story there. So I have a hard time approaching things and I want to more. So I want you to help me with this with what I, what you call like childlike enthusiasm. I know exactly what you mean, but because my childhood didn't

• 39:55Ed Mylett?

  have a lot of enthusiasm when I was young, but I see other people that I think are happy.

• 40:01John O'Leary?

  Yeah.

• 40:01Ed Mylett?

  They approach things with a, not a naivete, but a curiosity almost of a child. Like they'll try new things.

• 40:10John O'Leary?

  Yes.

• 40:10Ed Mylett?

  And they're okay if they're not good at it at first because they're curious about what it is or what it could be. What do you mean when you say that?

• 40:18John O'Leary?

  Well, man, there's so much, so much depth to that question. So I'm not even exactly sure where to begin, but what, what I will say is one thing, you use the word happy. I don't like to trade in happy. I think happy is very fleeting. I'm a joy guy. I think joy is so enduring and uh, we can be happy, but if it starts raining, the, the, the joy, the happiness quickly turns into a frown. Like it has just ruined our picnic. Joy empowers us to dance in the middle of it. And so like I, I pursue joy and I think children naturally show up with joy. You and I both speak on some pretty big stages and when we choose some pretty small ones.

• 40:54Ed Mylett?

  Yes.

• 40:54John O'Leary?

  I love speaking with kids. Those look, that's my heart right there, man. I love the big insurance brokers and everything else. But you bring me into a second grade group of kids and like my heart is on fire, man. And so is theirs. When I ask an older group a question, usually people sit with their arms crossed staring back at me. When I ask a group of kids a question, every hand rises. Usually their hands rise before I even ask the question. Like that's how engaged they are with the presentation. That's how engaged they are with life. They're not worried yet about ego or being right or being wrong. They just show up fully as they are. So what I noticed as a speaker and then what I noticed as a father is that my kids were a lot more of who I wanted to become.

• 41:36John O'Leary?

  The the way they showed up in life, the way their eyes smiled, the way they raised their hands, the way they got into and out of a car, like everything about them was just lit for life. And I wondered what it was about them that they have that I have lost that a whole lot of other older folks have lost that we can ultimately return to. And so this idea of joy was a big part of it. And you mentioned it, and even in the way you framed the question, Ed. The desire to not worry at all about failing forward. I think so many times, the reason why we don't ask a question, raise our hand, participate in life, try something new, is because we've been either taught or we've learned that we don't want to fail again. We don't want to fail again. Kids haven't learned that lesson yet.

• 42:19Ed Mylett?

  Yeah.

• 42:19John O'Leary?

  So they are tripping their way forward. But the cool thing is after they trip, they get back up and they do it again.

• 42:24Ed Mylett?

  Yeah.

• 42:24John O'Leary?

  And that's ultimately how we learn. It's how we grow.

• 42:27Ed Mylett?

  Yeah. I say in my book, I talk a lot about that, you know, 1% of the population operates out of imagination and vision. And over time, as adults, we learn a way to just operate out of history and memory. And children, I think children are happier or more joyful, to use your term, than adults, because, one, they were more recently with God, and and two, they operate out of imagination because they don't have a history and a memory. But at some point, history and memory starts to dominate our life, and that becomes the filter, the prism that we see our life through. And what happens is we just continue to repeat the same emotions, the same history, the same memory. If we can return to what you call joy or curiosity, I call imagination.

• 43:08John O'Leary?

  Yes.

• 43:08Ed Mylett?

  Just to begin to imagine what your life would be, imagine what the day could be, imagine what the relationship could be. I I'm curious, though, with you, because I think some people go, I that sounds good, but you know, I'm constantly reminded of what my life could have been. Or, you know, I'm I'm 30 or 40 years old now, and it didn't turn out like I thought. And for you, you're you live this, like, you're constantly, is there a strategy you use? Because you are, I got up this morning and took a shower and, you know, I'm like, I gotta lose three pounds here, I gotta do this or whatever, right? And but I thought about you this morning, ironically, not in a weird way.

• 43:45John O'Leary?

  Should we end the interview early? I think we should stop.

• 43:49Ed Mylett?

  But I thought about you this morning. I'm like, when he does that, he looks down and is reminded of this event.

• 43:55John O'Leary?

  Yes.

• 43:55Ed Mylett?

  It's physically there. And so many people in life, the reminder or the comparison to other people's lives, or what their life once was, or could have been, or they hoped it would be, is a source of consternation for them, if not frustration, depression, anxiety, and holds them back. How do you deal with that reminder of the event of your life, or what it could have been, or what you could have looked like?

• 44:24John O'Leary?

  Awesome. So two things. And, you know, listen, you were going to be a major league ballplayer. And that, that changed for you too. So we all have these experiences in life that take us on a path we were not expecting. So let me give you two quick stories around choosing the path going forward. The, the first was when I'm 10 and a half, getting ready to go back to school. I'm still in a wheelchair. So today, Edwin, you and I see each other live. I'm going to hug you. I'm going to run over to you. My legs both work, but they did not for a couple of years. So I'm in a wheelchair. I don't have fingers. I'm struggling, man. And I know the people back at school are going to make fun of me. I know my life has been victimized. I know I'm shattered and I know I'm damaged goods. And my favorite question as a child was, why me? Why me, Dad? Why me?

• 45:07John O'Leary?

  So I'm having this conversation with my father, who is my hero. Today, he is unable to speak due to Parkinson's, and he has more wisdom and joy in his heart than probably all over know this side of eternity. When my dad's still with the ability to speak, though, I'm asking him, why me? He's explaining all these things that have happened. And I say, Dad, seriously, but why me? And eventually father stands, he walks to the bedroom door, he shuts it. But he's on the inside of the bedroom, which is unfortunate. He walks over to me. He kneels in front of me, he puts his hands on my thighs, looks me square in the eyes and says, John, damn it. Why not you? This terrible thing has happened in your life. What you do with it next is going to inform the life that you live going forward.

• 45:51John O'Leary?

  And if you want to be a victim for the rest of your years, have at it. Nobody's going to judge you for that one. And then he paused and said, or. You can be a victor. You can choose this path going forward. And then when we roll you into that classroom tomorrow, and eventually when you walk into that classroom, every single classroom of life that you go into, people will look up at you and all that you've overcome. And then Eddie says, John, victim or victor? Honey, it's your choice. And he leans forward, he kisses me on the forehead, stands, walks out of the bedroom, pulls the door shut, and I'm in a wheelchair with bandages, getting ready to go back to school with that percolating on my mind, victim or victor? Honey, your choice.

• 46:36John O'Leary?

  So you, you asked me, John, how do you do this in the morning? Because this morning I took a shower, and although you need to lose three pounds, and I don't think I thought that about you, because you're about as fit a guy as I know. I'm looking at a broken body, man. And when I look in the mirror, I see a different story. I don't see the need to lose three pounds. I see a miracle. Like, I'm, I'm shocked. Every time I look at my broken scarred body that I'm in this game still. I should not be here. Like, I'm a miracle. The deal is, though, I know it. But we should know it. The fact that any one of us is alive at all is nothing short of a shocking, stunning cosmic gift. And our job is to act like it.

• 47:18John O'Leary?

  So my, my dad taught me that choice early in my life, and then just a couple of years ago, and then I'll wrap with this. My son reminded me of it. I'm in the mirror, I'm shaving, my shirt is off. My, my chest is so badly burned, like, deep, thick scars everywhere, Ed. And my little boy, he's three at the time, his name is Jack, he's fake shaving next to me. Okay, so he's got the little razor with the thing on. And then he puts the razor down, and he starts tracking with his index finger, this big thick scarf that goes from my neck all the way down. And then he says to me, Daddy, your tummy is red, it is bumpy, and it is ridgy. So I'm like, getting ready to explain, yeah, I'm sorry, son, I was burned, and you know,

• 48:03John O'Leary?

  it's gonna be okay. I can still be your old man, like, explaining all this away. And before I can explain it away, this brilliant three-year-old says, and Daddy, I love it. I love your red, bumpy, ridgy tummy.

• 48:21John O'Leary?

  I think children, you mentioned it earlier in the way you framed a question, children are close to God.

• 48:26Ed Mylett?

  Yeah.

• 48:27John O'Leary?

  And then we get closer to technology and we get closer to headlines and we get closer to ego and we get closer to all this crap that draws us away from who we really are and whose we really are. And sometimes we need a loving father, pre diagnosis to remind us victim or victor, your choice. Sometimes we need a three year old, beautiful little boy to say, hey, the brokenness is good. I love it. I love it. So yeah, I see brokenness every time I take a shower, every time I look in the mirror and every time I stand up. But today, rather than being a victim to the circumstances that I just choose to rise up and give thanks for it.

• 49:01Ed Mylett?

  Can there ever be a better conversation than this in the history of the planet?

• 49:06Ed Mylett?

  I'm just, I'm like, come on, guys, this is unbelievable. We talked about, I'm just blown away. I'm just blown away. Very rarely on the show do I get like this. I'm so grateful we're doing this, man. I'm just really grateful for your remarkable being and I know you don't accept that, but you are.

• 49:27Ed Mylett?

  But I don't think it was all you and I don't think it was all your parents. And I have to ask you how faith has played into your life and throughout this, I keep. When you've been talking the whole time, I'm thinking about what a blessing your parents were to be chosen to be your parents. And what a blessing is that God chose you to have this circumstance because he knew that we'd be talking about this today and he knew that millions of people were going to hear this story. And I have to ask you about faith in your life. You've said universe and God, but I have a pretty good idea that it's not just the universe to you, but. What is your, do you mind telling us what your, what faith, what the role of faith has played?

• 50:08Ed Mylett?

  In your journey, if there was any when you were nine and if it's greater now and, and what that role's been in your world.

• 50:14John O'Leary?

  Yeah. So I think you and I grew up with a similar faith background. I grew up in the Catholic church. I think you went to St. Dennis. I might be wrong on that.

• 50:21Ed Mylett?

  You're unbelievable. Yes.

• 50:22John O'Leary?

  I went to St. Clement, man. So we're brothers from 3,000 miles apart. Okay. But we were doing the thing, you know, just kind of doing the thing, dotting, dotting I's and crossing T's and church, church on Sundays. Prayer before dinner, ambulance goes by, you say, and our Father, like that kind of stuff. But homework used to be for me like coloring Jesus. And I remember right before I got burned, I colored a picture of, I think Peter coming out of the boat, walking. And I remember, this is like, I've never shared this, but I remember that night coloring that, that little picture of Peter walking on the choppy waters, thinking, if ever called out of the boat, I can walk on water too. I can do this. I got, I'm that confident in God's goodness and his grace and in his power that if he called me, I'm good.

• 51:07John O'Leary?

  So that's the lead in to me being burned to my mother saying, hey, if you want to die, and I'm, and he said, no, I don't want to die. Good. Okay, good. Then take the hand of God. When she said that, Ed, it didn't really matter what the doctor said on odds of survival or not. I already knew what was happening here. I'm out of the boat and I'm walking. It's gonna, it's gonna be a while. It's gonna be painful, but we're walking. We got this. So with the hand of Jesus kind of pulling me forward, five and a half months in hospital, I walked years of recovery afterwards, I walked. But as most of us go in our faith walks, we go up and down, close, and then push away from God, from whatever faith we grew up in. And there were a lot of things that I prayed for in my life that never came to pass.

• 51:49John O'Leary?

  I prayed for a girlfriend. That never happened. I prayed for fingers to grow back. They still haven't. I prayed for scars to fade. They haven't. I prayed for a job where I would be paid well for my work early in my career. That did not happen. I paid to be, like, all, all the stuff I'm praying for. My, my friend Mark Haberburger, drinking and drive-in accident, he survives. We pray for survival. And then we get the call that it's not to be.

• 52:15John O'Leary?

  And if you don't wonder sometime, well, where, where's God in this? Where's God in this?

• 52:20John O'Leary?

  We get to wrestle with our faith and then eventually the faith goes away from a coloring book or our parents' version of faith into ultimately our faith in God, our my faith in Jesus Christ. And so today, my faith is so enduring, it is so endearing, it is so powerful, I could flop this podcast interview with you and I just don't care because I'm not trying to prove myself to you and I love you, man. I love your fall. I love the work you're doing, but I'm not here for you. I'm just not. And I'm not here. I'm not even here for my wife, who I'm wild about, man. I'm wild about her or my babies. I'm here ultimately to reflect the loving grace of Jesus Christ, sometimes by using that term, but ultimately and always by

• 53:03John O'Leary?

  acting out upon it. I want to be the kind of guy who meets people at the well, loves them as they are, no judgment here. And then eventually they can say, damn it, John, what is it about you, man? Why are you so freaking joyful? And that's when I can have an honest conversation around why I'm so joyful in life, because it's not about, well, did I tell you what I earned last year? Did I tell you about this one speech I gave? It was killer. I have an enduring faith in God, a God who loves me enough to recognize in the brokenness, I'm still perfect. And a God who in spite of all of my mistakes, and there have been many, I'm still promised the kingdom of God at the end of my days. So like I, I'm joyful when I look at the scars because I know how the story ends.

• 53:45Ed Mylett?

  Oh, my gosh. That's as beautifully said as I've ever heard it said. And I feel the same way, but I don't know that I have the ability to articulate it the way that you just did. I just think you're remarkable. I just, I really believe you're, I'm so excited because I can feel sometimes when I do, by the way, every show's precious to me because I only do one a week. So there's only 52 of them a year. I take the seat you're in very seriously and because I love humans and I love our community here. And there's some times though, that when I'm doing this and I'm just, I'm overwhelmed with gratitude with what I know it's going to do for someone and

• 54:25Ed Mylett?

  many someones. And you're doing that right now. I want to ask you one more question. On the behalf of someone listening to this, and someone's listening to this and they're crying and they're emotional or they're running on the treadmill and now they're doing level 10 when they're at level two. And

• 54:43Ed Mylett?

  Or they have someone they want to share this with and they that person is at that point of their life metaphorically. They've been burned one way or the other. They've been burned. And they're laying there and the recovery may not even be over. There may be some more pain coming their way. You know, they may not be at the end of that burn metaphorically. And and they say, but I do want to live. I want to make my dreams happen. I do want to make something great happen with my life. And the truth is, I just don't know where to start. And if they ran into you at a Starbucks and said, can I have three minutes? And they asked you that question. What do I do? I know that's a

• 55:25Ed Mylett?

  hard question, John, but you've stood you've risen up to everyone I've asked you today. So I'm going to come with the the biggest one last. What do I do? I want to live. What would you say to them?

• 55:36John O'Leary?

  Well, I would end by giving them my number. And honestly, tell them to stay in touch with me. And I know this is maybe reckless. So you can cut me off if that's bad. But I would give you my office number and I would tell you to call me and that I love you and I'm here for you and I'm serious. At the end of my days, and you hear the emotion because it's real. I don't

• 55:54Ed Mylett?

  Are you offering your phone number up right now?

• 55:56John O'Leary?

  Totally, man. Like, I don't want to be remembered as a speaker that bor- honestly borrows me. I'm not a motivational speaker or an author podcast host. They're talking about doing a movie on our life. We've coached you like all this stuff. That's stuff. A person who who videoed the last year of Mother Teresa's life referred to her. I asked, what do you remember most about her? And he said, her ugly feet. I'm like, why did? Why is that it? And he said, they were the feet of a saint. At the end of my days, man, I want ugly feet. And the way you get ugly feet is to move them in service to others. So I want to have like, I wish you could buy out of your you're at the wake and you're like, hug Beth. I hope it's an open casket, both the top and the bottom. And I'm

• 56:38John O'Leary?

  shoeless. And you're like, damn, that guy's got some ugly freaking feet. My god, put some socks on that boy.

• 56:44Ed Mylett?

  So beautiful.

• 56:45John O'Leary?

  But I'm serious. We want to have ugly feet around here. So I'm going to give you my website and our number and and seriously say, if you're there and you're struggling and you need somebody, we're in. So my website is john o'leary inspires.com john o'leary inspires.com. The number that is like our text line is three one four two zero two five three seven three. That comes to me. And if you're struggling and you're like, dude, I need a, I need an advocate. I need someone to pray for me. I need someone to love me. There it is. So three, one, four, two, zero, two, five, three, seven, three. And then the advice.

• 57:24John O'Leary?

  One is. Ed and I've been there. And anyone who's ever done anything mighty in their lives have been there too. We've been there with the drapes drawn and the sheets up and a bottle nearby, wondering if we can even take the next right step forward. So if that's you right now, just recognize you are in good company, including the three of us on the show right now. We've been there. The second thing is that. This thing that you have been through doesn't have to define what you go through next. Ed has brought us back to this decision point again and again and again, but it is true. You get to decide what that next step is for you on the journey. When, when I get lost in an airport, which is almost every time I'm in an airport, I eventually walk over to a map. I humble myself as a man, find the map.

• 58:08John O'Leary?

  And there's always a little star somewhere on it, on it that says, you are. Here. And then you get to find, okay, B fifty four. That's where you want to go. So as you recognize where you are and some of those decisions that have led you to this point, your wrong turns or somebody else's. You ultimately get to then sit up in bed and say, hmm. And where do I want to go? How do I want my life to influence those around me? How successful can I become? Not for myself, that bore me. In order to be of service for others, that's significance. That's the calling. That's the opportunity of our lives. So I would encourage those, those of us in a hospital bed or at a boardroom table or at a bedroom next to a spouse to sit up.

• 58:52John O'Leary?

  Look at the wall, determine again where they are, how they got here, and ultimately the grand calling on your life. I think it's a divine calling on who you want to become and what the next right step is. And if you need help, truly you need help. John O'Leary inspires dot com. That's the website. The number is three, one, four, two, zero, two, five, three, seven, three, and we are all in.

• 59:11Ed Mylett?

  Oh, gosh. Well, I am called even more than I ever have been to have some ugly feet at the end of my life. And that is, that is something I'm not going to forget. And I won't forget this conversation. It flew by. I feel like we've been talking for about 17 minutes, but it's actually, it's actually been an hour. And I just want, I want to tell you that I love you and I'm grateful for you. And you are special. You're special because you are average and ordinary, and you've done something extraordinary with your life. And to me, that makes you special, and it makes your family special. John, thank you so much for today. Thank you so much.

• 59:45John O'Leary?

  And I, I look forward to every podcast. I cannot tell you how excited I am to be on one that I actually tune into regularly. So brother, thank you for your work, for your life, for your impact, and for your reminder.

• 59:57Ed Mylett?

  Yeah, you guys, I know you're sharing this one. I don't even need to ask you. So I just want to tell you all that I love you and I'm honored that you all listen or watch. Because I get a chance to give you an experience like we just had together. So continue to max out your life, everybody. God bless you. Till next week. This is the Ed Mileage Show.