[excerpted from a lecture by Richard Yokota]

Gene O’Connell used to be on welfare. She was the middle daughter. She felt ignored. She lost hope. In her teens, she wanted to commit suicide.

In 1972, she moved from Boston to San Francisco with her husband and three children. At that point, her husband left. She found herself with her three children in terrible and utter poverty. She was miserable.

She often brought her children to San Francisco General Hospital and would spend hours in the waiting room. She was there one day in 1974, and witnessed another mother hitting her children. Another patient sitting next to Gene remarked that that is no way to treat children. This helped break the ice and they got into a conversation. The woman said that she was an SGI member and invited Gene to a meeting. The woman had only been practicing for six months.

Usually, Gene didn’t trust anyone. But something felt very warm about this woman, so Gene trusted her when she asked for her phone number to invite her to an SGI meeting. Gene told the woman that she never answered the phone because it was usually only bill collectors, but she gave her number anyway.

Gene kept the phone hidden away in a closet so she wouldn’t even hear it. About a month later, she was walking by the closet and she heard the phone ringing. She answered it and it turned out to be that SGI member! She had been calling and calling and calling over and over again, never giving up on Gene. This alone touched Gene tremendously — that someone would keep trying for her and never give up. She accepted the invitation to an SGI discussion meeting.

When she arrived at the meeting, she was overcome by the warmth of the people. It was the first time in her entire life she ever felt such a wonderful feeling from other people. This gave Gene the motivation to try to make something of her life. She started to practice Buddhism and she decided to go to school to become a nurse — which was a vague dream she had had in the back of her mind for many years.

Half her time was spent in school and the other half was spent at the hospital caring for patients. Gene was scared that she might mess up with the patients and she often wanted to quit. But her Buddhist practice helped keep her going. Giving experiences and presentations at the meetings gave her the confidence she lacked. She eventually got so good with the patients that she was assigned the toughest patients.

She learned the spirit of Florence Nightingale: 1) Never give up; and 2) Stand up to authority figures who would hurt the patients.

In 1975, Gene went to the SGI Hawaii Convention, where she did not attend the meeting itself but did First Aid. As soon as it was over, she wanted to meet President Ikeda, having heard so many people talking about him. She found out where he was staying and snuck away to the place. When she got there, she was able to see him from a short distance. She got out her camera. As soon as she was about to snap the picture, President Ikeda, noticing her, turned to her and threw up his hands with an ebullient and joyful expression. At that moment, she felt as though a huge burst of sunlight entered her life. She felt this person was the source of the warmth she had experienced from all the other people, and she decided to follow his example in life and live as he did.

After that, she took on anything she was asked, no mater how difficult it might seem.

After her graduation, she worked as a nurse for the University of California, San Francisco.

Ten years after she encountered Buddhism, Gene got a job at San Francisco General Hospital. Her feeling was: “I really want to pay my immense debt of gratitude by showing tremendous actual proof in my life.”

The two things she adhered to were: 1) Warm care, and 2) Never say no.

In 1988, she became the Chief Nurse of the Emergency Department at the hospital. How? She always listened to people, never judged them, no matter how critical they were, even of herself. Because of this, people naturally turned to her and let her know what was on their mind.

When she was appointed Chief Nurse, someone asked “Why?” The nurse who appointed her said it was because she knew more about the Emergency Department than anyone else. Why? Because she did more listening than anyone else did.

Ten years after she came to SF General and 20 years after encountering Buddhism, Gene became the first Executive Administrator (a position like that of a CEO) of SF General, being not only the first woman Executive Administrator of the hospital but also the first nurse to become an Executive Administrator.

The 2 keys she always followed were: 1) Never stop listening; and 2) Never say no. These are the hallmarks of a Bodhisattva, the way of Buddhism.

Gene never lost her humility. She never forgot her roots. In all her speeches, she always mentions how she used to be on welfare and how it was at SF General that she would come for help. She never used her position. She used only her humanism.