John O’Leary

When John O’Leary (Cook ’99) was 9 years old, he decided to experiment with fire and gasoline in his family’s garage. His innocent undertaking caused an instant explosion. O’Leary was burned over 100 percent of his body; 87 percent was third-degree. His doctors and nurses did not think he would make it through the night; he was given a less than 1 percent chance of surviving. John O’Leary (Cook ’99) and Beth (Hittler) O’Leary (Doisy ’01) in front of St. Francis Xavier College Church. But survive he did. After a grueling but miraculous recovery — his doctor told him he had never seen anything like it in his entire career — O’Leary worked to put the fire behind him. He enrolled at Saint Louis University, where he met his wife, Beth (Hittler) O’Leary (Doisy ’01), who is now a SLU adjunct instructor in occupational therapy. After college, he started a real estate development business with a fellow SLU alumnus. He later pursued a chaplaincy program through SLU and worked as a hospital chaplain for three years. He and Beth began having children — they now have four. But he never talked much about the fire; even Beth and his college roommates knew few details about how he had gotten his scars.

That changed in 2005, when his parents, Susan and Denny (Law ’68), published a book, Overwhelming Odds, about that fateful day in 1987 and the journey for their family that followed. “It was an unauthorized biography of my life,” O’Leary joked. “It changed my life.” His parents’ telling of it helped him realize that the fire and its aftermath had brought out the best in everyone around him, from his sister Susan, who risked her life running into their burning house to retrieve cups of water to pour onto his face; to his hospital-room janitor, who kept it spotless and free of infection; to broadcaster Jack Buck, who sent him more than 60 autographed baseballs from St. Louis Cardinals baseball players to encourage him to learn to write again, despite having had his fingers amputated. “Our neighbors opened up their homes to my siblings as we waited for the house to be repaired; the community raised money, donated blood, offered prayers, brought food,” he wrote. “I had never before fully considered all the people who came together to make the miracle a reality. … As if cataracts had been cut away, I understood, ‘Oh my gosh … it was all a gift.’”

Three months after his parents’ book was published, O’Leary was asked to give a speech about his experiences. Despite being terrified of public speaking — he said he barely scraped by in his required public speaking course at SLU — he agreed. Then he was asked to speak again and again. I think it’s a reflective story that inspires others to be the best version of themselves, helping them realize they can do so much more in their lives than what they had been doing, and that everything they do going forward from this moment will make a difference.” Now, over a decade later, O’Leary has given more than 1,500 talks around the country and the world, describing the small acts of kindness from strangers and friends alike that contributed to his recovery and growth, and the lessons he learned that he believes can be applied to the difficult situations in everyone’s lives. He encourages his audiences, from health care workers to prison inmates, to live their lives “radically inspired.”

And in March of this year, O’Leary’s own book, On Fire: The 7 Choices to Ignite a Radically Inspired Life, was published by Simon & Schuster. The book became a No. 1 national best-seller and is already being printed in 12 languages. “It was very, very raw and personal to write about the experiences of being burned as a kid,” he said. “It’s been very therapeutic, very healing and transformative as we’ve gone farther and farther down the path to realize it’s not an autobiography. I think it’s a reflective story that inspires others to be the best version of themselves, helping them realize they can do so much more in their lives than what they had been doing, and that everything they do going forward from this moment will make a difference.”