About Mark
My passion for helping others rebuild their lives, find seeds of meaning in their pain, and grow from trauma and adversity comes from personal experience. My expertise comes from studying what helps people flourish when life gets hard and sharing it with others.
I’m an author, consultant, educator, and coach working at the intersection of community wellbeing and individual thriving.
Over the last fifteen years, I’ve found great meaning and deep satisfaction in working with people who fight for healing and justice, who uphold the dignity of all people, who approach their work in a spirit of caring, generosity, and optimism, and who see beauty and resilience where others might see brokenness and despair.
In 2008, I caused the death of my girlfriend Laura while driving drunk after a birthday party she threw for me. Determined to make meaning out of tragedy and committed to serving others as a way to honor her memory, I’ve since had the privilege of working with top organizations and inspiring people to make communities safer and healthier and been a part of national efforts to make public health, criminal justice, and other systems work better.
The people I've met have changed my life.
Many of the most passionate and profoundly effective change-makers I worked with arrived at their callings through personal experiences with loss, trauma, or life-changing adversity.
Seeing the potential of adversity and hardship to catalyze altruism and positive change, I returned to school to study positive psychology, focusing my research on posttraumatic growth and resilience. The results of what I've learned formed the foundation of Growth & Goodness and the programs we've launched.
In my research on how and why people grow after painful experiences, one of the biggest lessons was the importance of connections.
When we face adversity, we rely on our relationships and learn to value the care we receive. And we also learn to see and respond to the pain of others.
Not long after Laura’s death, I met my now wife, Maria, who had recently lost her father to cancer. We bonded over our mutual grief, but things were initially, um, complicated. She hung in there while I got myself together, and we got married in 2012. We now live in Lutherville, Maryland with three joyful children and a goofy pup named Otis.Â
Crashing: I Love You. Forgive Me.
"In this powerful, unforgettable memoir, Mark L. O’Brien examines the profound consequences of the moment that forever changed his life and cut short the life of the woman he loved. The morning after a birthday party she threw for him, Mark woke up in the hospital to learn that his girlfriend was dead, and he might be going to prison for causing the car crash that killed her.
'Mark L. O'Brien has lived through a tragedy and made something beautiful of it. He has gathered the pieces of his shattered life, and from them built this unforgettable book. Not only will this story of transformation move you; it will challenge your most basic assumptions about guilt, grief, mercy, and justice. Not to be missed.' -- Darin Strauss, National Book Critics Circle Award recipient and author of Half a Life.
With piercing insight and stark prose, Mark L. O’Brien leads us on a deeply personal, intimate, and emotional journey—grappling with loss, regret, and his fragmented memories of the night of the crash, questioning a new relationship fraught with immense shame and colored by his continued attachment to his lost love, and wondering whether questions about his guilt and the forgiveness of his girlfriend’s family would keep him out of prison. Along the way, he delivers an unflinching exploration of grief, mercy, and the fractured path from loss to meaning. The result is as insightful as it is inspiring.
As seen in The Washington Post and on Jada Pinkett Smith’s Emmy award-winning Red Table Talk, Mark L. O’Brien’s story will inspire readers with its powerful message of hope and its heart-wrenching illustration of the human spirit’s capacity to discover seeds of meaning in even the most painful experiences."
Media
Mark on the Drive On Podcast
Hear the whole conversation between Mark and Scott DeLuzio on the Drive On Podcast at https://driveonpodcast.com/podcast/turning-pain-into-purpose/.
Publications
The Atlantic
My criminal record somehow vanished.
Washington Post
How do you tell your child about the worst thing you've done?
How I Found Meaning in Tragedy.
FREE GIFT
Forgiveness has been an important part of my life.
It's one of the greatest gifts we can give or receive, and it's also one of the most difficult things we try to practice.
30 Days of Forgiveness
A 30-day email series exploring the meaning of forgiveness and how we can practice it in response to ordinary frustrations, deeper wounds, and situations involving the moral complexities of life.
This free series offers stories, research, reflections, and simple daily actions to help you think more deeply about forgiveness and its role in your own life.
Over 30 days, we'll explore:
- Everday annoyances and small acts of forgiveness
- Apologies, mercy, and second chances
- Family wounds, grief, and self-forgiveness
We'll start out small and simple, to get warmed up, before turning to a deeper exploration of the painful things you might be carrying. It's not all stuffy though. We'll laugh along the way too, because sometimes life truly is absurd.