John O’Neil has made these the watchwords of his life, reinventing himself time and again to pursue numerous career paths: as a US Air Force training instructor, an AT&T executive, a venture capitalist, vice president of Mills College, president of the California School of Professional Psychology, consultant, seminar leader, and author of four books on leadership and gratitude. John O’Neil ultimately became one of the most respected teachers of our day, recruited by Nelson Mandela at the Davos World Economic Forum to run a leadership development program intended to spread a culture of innovation and learning across the new government of South Africa. John credits his success to the long list of wisdom carriers he has encountered throughout his life, both through his passion for reading, as well as those he has known in person, ranging from the cook and caretaker on the ranch where he grew up, his high school English teacher, his professors at the University of California at Berkeley, and a New York City limo driver, to his numerous well-known acquaintances, mentors and friends including Eleanor Roosevelt, Jonas Salk and Abraham Maslow, among others.