About Jon

Helping people awaken to who they are, helping them reclaim their inherent beauty and power and wholeness, has been a lifelong journey and endeavor for me.

I experienced my own version of this awakening in my twenties. In the mid-70s, I was a graduate student at Sonoma State in northern California, where I had the good fortune to take part in a ground-breaking program in psycho-ecology. Robert Greenway, maverick professor and creator of the program, led two-week wilderness trips during which he helped us discover our larger spiritual identities. My experiences were profound, and my life’s work was set in motion.

Robert often said that living a spiritual life in northern California was like remaining in the womb. The real challenge would be to relocate to an unexpected location, such as a small farm town in Iowa, and find a way to be a leader and do inspired work.

I responded literally to his challenge, and found myself in a small conservative town in northeastern Illinois, where I raised two sons and taught English and Humanities in the public high school for 27 years. My classes evolved into rites of passage, where hundreds of students discovered and expressed the power of their selves — their hearts, their authentic voices, their vision.

As a leading-edge teacher in a conservative system and community, I persevered through my own doubts and fears as well as those of others. Staying committed to my voice and vision, I gained the respect of students, parents, and administration. I spoke at national conferences and received acknowledgement through prestigious teaching awards.

Throughout the journey, I learned more and more about the power of spirit, vision, commitment, and trust.

In 2001, my understanding of my work shifted. Many of the women I knew — my wife, our women friends, the mothers of my students, women I met at conferences and elsewhere — were struggling with being disconnected from themselves. They were desperately confused and deeply unhappy even in the midst of what appeared to be professional and personal success.

I realized there was a tremendous opportunity for me to bring the skills I had learned with the gifted kids in my classroom to help these “adult gifted girls” rediscover themselves, heal their inner gifted girl, and step into the power and brilliance that is everyone’s birthright. With this new challenge, my work took on a deeper meaning and great authenticity.

My personal commitment to myself is to be free more than anything else, and it’s my great joy and delight to have the gift of helping others find that freedom. Working with my clients, helping them realize dreams they barely remembered they had, helping them rediscover their own integrity, authenticity, and wholeness, is even more rewarding than I had anticipated.

Jon Hansen works at the cutting edge where spirit, skill and personal power come together to create practical social change. He lives from a place of inspiration, and can transmit that to others not only because he walks his talk, but because he operates through a wide-ranging set of interpersonal, organizational and meditative skills. His work promises to be profound and valuable, not only to the individuals who work with him, but to everyone whose lives they touch.

- Sally Kempton, spiritual teacher, columnist for Yoga Journal, author of The Heart of Meditation

My wife Ellen and I live in an artist’s cottage set in a peaceful northeastern Illinois landscape. In recent years, Ellen has found her own freedom and joy in a dream job that surpasses anything she had imagined possible.

Successfully achieving the best of several worlds, we spend part of each week in our urban condo, closer to Ellen’s office (that dream job came with a nightmare commute!). In either location, we begin each day sharing our stories, hopes, and ideas over “inspiration tea.”

And we share our cottage with two amazing cats, Sasha and Little Bear, who are my companions and kindred spirits.

I invite you to join me in this world, share a pot of tea, listen to the purring, and tell me about your dreams.

Jon and I met in 2003 at the International Coach Federation conference in Denver. We live very close — we’re about 45 minutes apart. Our initial thought was to collaborate to bring coaching work into McHenry (Illinois) County. Over three years we had so many ideas, you wouldn’t believe it! And we did a couple of retreat workshops on finding voice and vision. After three years, we decided that we had reached a juncture where our businesses were going to go in individual ways, though we’re still close colleagues and friends.

Jon sees and feels life in its glory and beauty and preciousness and all of that — he lives with such awe and consciousness. When Jon shows up, it’s sacred space — I don’t care if we’re at Starbucks or walking on a trail. He is reverent and respectful of witnessing things that want and should be witnessed: the precious, sacred process of someone and what they are immersed in, their transformations and their integrations.

He has great respect for whatever the process is that somebody is in the midst of, and he makes room for it. He doesn’t try to hurry the process into action. He is committed to giving room for contemplation and discernment and then taking inspired action. He creates and insists on the room to discern — he takes a stand for discernment, let’s feel into what’s right and true and authentic before we take action on it.

Jon is fearless and trusting about going to very deep levels with people, and just by showing up and being who he is, he creates the safest of spaces to do deep work, to come to deep work and deep questions, deep discernments. He listens at a really deep level; he knows how to ask questions to help a person really discern, and he hears it as well, their true authentic voice, the voice of spirit. It’s in the space he creates, but it’s much more about who he is and how he shows up and his own work that he’s done in and for himself.

- Lynne Fairchild, MBA, PCC, Marengo, IL
Professional Certified Coach, Reinvention Revolution
http://www.reinventionrevolution.com

© Copyright 2007, 2008; all rights reserved, Jon Hansen & The Remembering Room.