Today we’d like to introduce you to Ryan J. Kemp.
Hi Ryan, we’re thrilled to have a chance to learn your story today. So, before we get into specifics, maybe you can briefly walk us through how you got to where you are today?
Well, officially I started being born from my mother – thanks mom ;-). That was in a town called Beverly, Massachusetts, right next to Salem where the history is drenched in witch trials and sobering stories of immigrants trying out the American dream. I stayed in the New England area for my adolescent years, reading traveling stories from Jack Kerouac and poetry from Walt Whitman, dreaming of something more than what was known to me at the time. I followed the well-worn path (at first) and went to college at Northeastern University in Boston to play Division 1 Baseball and studied finance and history. An opportunity to study Chinese philosophy and international finance in Hong Kong opened up and I immediately packed a bag, said my goodbyes and began what I know now to be the foundation for the rest of my life. I was hooked! I tasted what I read in my childhood bedroom and there was no stopping it. I then flew to Spain and graduated college from there. Shortly after, I was recruited by a social entrepreneurship professor and moved to Bali-Nyonga, Cameroon in Central Africa to implement systems for farming confederations to cut down on food waste and bring in computer literacy and entrepreneurship to the local schools. Everything I knew about what I thought I wanted to do went out the window. I spent days in the hot African sun on the back of a scooter swerving massive potholes on muddy roads, finding villages to partner with. I learned how to kill my own chicken for dinner (which led me to being a vegetarian!), find and boil water to drink, and I nearly died from malaria and typhoid if it weren’t for a nurse that found the medicine I needed (though I did have to wake her up each time I needed a new IV). I was seeing humanity on a level that I wanted to swim in for the rest of my life. This is what led me to travel for the next 11 years of my life. I couldn’t stop after feeling what is it to be human from so many different lenses. There was so much to learn.
During the 11 years, I traveled to over 50 countries and all my senses felt like they were turning on for the first time. I began working within sustainable international grassroots development, renewable energy, start-up technology and learning some of the traditional lifeways of yogis and indigenous people from India, the Americas, Australia and Africa, respectively as well as diving into food sovereignty and re-engineering broken tourism models. Through my now expanded definition of what it is to be human, I realized that although there were top-layer differences based on what these worldwide traditional cultures were sharing, the roots were all the same in their uniqueness. I then began to connect these ancient cultural teachings with the business world where I saw overlap. I started to see the gap and why employees lacked engagement and kept on searching for purpose without ever being able to find it. It became clear why all of the sustainability or ESG frameworks were failing and falling back into greenwashing. This is from where my book ‘The Age of Separation’ A Holistic Framework to Reclaim our Power and Save our Planet came from. The book brought in people who began to see the need and Pueo Regenerative Consulting was born. To put it simply, Pueo (Owl in Hawai’ian, known as the guardian of the people and wisdom keeper) helps companies future-proof their businesses by reconnecting them to the wisdom of humans immemorial. My team and I create strategies from biomimicry and intersectional wisdom to move organizations from dysfunction to regenerative practices that infuse purpose and inter-connection into business.
Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
I’ll answer in a metaphor. Does a seed struggle to push through the soil to begin its blooming? Or does it just continue its journey through the friction until it bursts through the soil that was once unknown to it? Resistance or friction is just part of the journey of growth and ultimately, it polishes us to become smoother and more refined. I’m grateful for all the bumps and redirects in my life, even if it felt like I was running around in circles. I’ve found that the avoidance of struggle and pain is actually what creates the most harm. Something I’ve began to truly integrate into my life is that responsibility isn’t necessarily easy. We can complain about the struggle while we’re trying to get up on a wave or we can view it as a part of learning how to surf. We get to choose which perspective we see from every single day. That being said, there has definitely been a lot of struggling that has arisen throughout this journey. Struggling or suffering really comes from resisting reality as it and beginning to see things as they are. If we’re being honest with ourselves, we often don’t like to feel our feelings. Our expectations get in the way of accepting things as they are. So does our conditioning, our societal patterning of inadequacy, our values that are not coherent with nature. This is an important topic that I dive into on the 8-week online un-school I created called ‘The Regenerative Leadership Academy’. Consider the course an entryway back into remembering what it is to be human again. We fully embrace all the emotions that we hold close to our heart and use the sacred fire to burn out confusion so that we may see our inherent purpose that is aligned with honoring nature, our mother.
One of the greatest struggles for me was that understanding that I needed to decompose the false understandings of reality. Much of my thinking was limited to a very myopic WEIRD point of view; WEIRD = Western Educated Industrialized Rich Democratic. Many of these belief systems are creating degeneration in the world and they are not rooted in truth in accordance with natural law and eco-systemic functionality. Unlearning and decomposing these ways of being were large parts of the ‘struggle’ you could say…and the greatest gift.
Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
What I’ve come to understand is that I love being able to nurture many interests. I am a mix between an artist and an entrepreneur. Within my work, I call it ‘The Wing’, the feathers being some of the expressions of my multi-faceted being. Here are a few of them below:
Speaking + In-Person Workshops: I have spoken on many business summits from Myanmar to Hawai’i, podcasts such as Green Planet Blue Planet and to students at the University of Glasgow and Hong Kong University. I am available for speaking engagements and in-person workshops on purpose, empathic and transcendent leadership, inspirational stories, regenerative ways forward, and more.
Writer and Poet: I currently have four books available on Amazon, including ‘The Age of Separation’, two children’s books on Mahayana Buddhism and a poetry book called ‘Returning Home’. I also actively participate in spoken word poetry events around the greater Austin area, and I’ll share the schedule on my Instagram so you can catch me there. There are many more writings and books on the way, stay tuned.
The Regenerative Leadership Academy: An 8-week un-school in how to become deeply human again. This focuses on re-orientating from our skewed value system, understandings of time and language and many more personal growth topics on the cutting-edge of intersectionality in environmentalism, spirituality, business and health. The next one begins June 16th, 2022 and is available on my website www.ryanjkemp.com.
Pueo Regenerative Consulting: A boutique consulting organization that helps to accelerate behavioral change and economic evolution to regenerate ourselves, our relationships, our communities and our Earth. We help businesses build, attune, and run fully aligned world-class organizations that are resilient to future economic changes, purposeful and integrated within employees values and mission alike as well as a vehicle for social transformation and change that leads the burgeoning movement beyond sustainability. We also offer cutting-edge executive leadership focused on empathy, DEI, somatics of high performers, regeneration and purpose-oriented thought-leadership that brings us deeper into remembering our responsibility on Earth.
Is there anyone you’d like to thank or give credit to?
Thank you for asking this. It’s an important question because it shows the interdependence of everything to create everything else. We often forget that in our culture of the self-made man myth. I prefer the word appreciate or acknowledge over credit. Credit is engrained in the banking-value system and the deep appreciation I have for those that have helped me is far beyond an economic value system.
My first appreciation may seem simple, but it is the one I thank every day- Earth and the elements. For providing me with fresh air, clean water, sunlight and all of the food and fire that I have needed to survive and thrive up until this point in my life. This is key. We are very lucky to have these things, many do not. A few questions I like to ask myself are: am I using what I have been gifted and given to help those who are not as fortunate? Am I building my businesses that way? When we talk about gratitude, are we thankful for the water? Thankful for our breath? Not gratitude as platitude, but something we deeply feel into every day.
I’ve been blessed that this path has led me to incredible mentors, supporters, teachers, and friends. Family has taken on an extended definition these days, but my core family of mother, father and sister have always been supportive of me, even if my fantastical journey hasn’t made the most sense to them!
Beyond that, I would like to acknowledge and thank Sooriya Kumar of Mouna Farm on O’ahu, Jesus Puerto who is the founder of Soul de Cuba Café, Rashani Réa of Kipukamaluia La’akea on the Big Island of Hawai’i, Paulette Moreno, a dear friend and teacher of mine descended of the Tlingit people, Sri. Vijay Gopala of Yoga Gita in Mysuru, India, Rudy X.N. of the Mexica people, my beloved Marisa Franco who has led me deeper into love and self-discovery, and anyone else that I missed in here. This is not even mentioning all of the mentors and teachers who I have never met in the flesh, including teachers like Albert Einstein, Sri Ramana Maharshi, Ram Dass and countless others.
Contact Info:
- Email: ryan@ryanjkemp.com
- Website: www.ryanjkemp.com
- Instagram: @ryanj_kemp
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/RyanJayKemp
- Twitter: https://mobile.twitter.com/ryanj_kemp
- Other: https://pueo.consulting
Image Credits
Marisa Franco
