Background wanderings:
- Native American Studies at Dartmouth because the dominant stories didn't capture the realities of rural Alaska life (a way of knowing grounded in the ecosystem).
- Teach For America in New Orleans. Never been to a city before, suddenly learning that real connection and trust is earned, not inherited from institutions.
- Executive Director on Navajo and Zuni nations, learning to listen very carefully to elders and discovering that existing structures couldn't accommodate the local-based wisdom that was trying to emerge.
- Special educator in New York City, working blocks from Ground Zero and in Hunts Point, diving deep into how learning must be constructed by the learner.
- Studying mandolin with an orthodox musician in Flatbush who taught him to listen even more deeply (where music met contemplation).
- Teaching in rural Vermont, developing curriculum with farmers, mastering bucket brigades from river to garden, and falling in love with calendula.
- Years as a principal implementing restorative justice, then working with rural districts nationwide to listen to their communities and redesign how learning happens
- Leading district-wide work in mental health, engagement, and investigations, while staying present with the hardest conversations.
- Hosting regular old-time gatherings with banjos, fiddles, and various forms of comfort food (pie), plus evangelizing for the dying art of classic ski waxing in British Columbia.
- Married with two teenagers, two dogs, lots of running, and ongoing work to help his youngest fix up a forty-year-old Vanagon while still refining the mysteries of the perfect pie crust.
Currenty exploring:
What it looks like to show up fully integrated—with all of your gifts and all of your shadows. How to help people find the courage to grow toward their light. How our spirit creates healing within ourselves and those we care for every day. How we might cultivate a garden for each other, informed by the wilderness around us.
There's something about this overwhelming time that demands a different kind of leadership—one that can stay present with complexity without losing connection to what's sacred. This exploration shapes how I companion leaders through their own challenging thresholds—helping them lead from wholeness while staying effective, trusting the knowing that already knows.
Creating space for the full human—where the garden and the wilderness inform each other, and where the sacred that's already within each of us has room to breathe. (Still learning that the best conversations happen when you slow down and really listen—turns out the moose were right all along.)
BACK TO ALL
"I have discovered that learning and meaning are constructed in relationships between humans. Wisdom sits in relationships. That's why Wisdom in Action calls to me—we are working to draw forth the sacred that's already within each of us. The knowing that already knows, but needs connection and trust to emerge."
"The human spirit is already free. Let's help each other remember."
meet Justin May
Justin's been talking to moose since childhood, when trail encounters in Alaskan forests taught him that real conversation happens when you slow down and listen. That quality of patient attention has followed him through every decade—from building seawalls in Kachemak Bay to classrooms in New Orleans, from community on the Navajo Nation to farmers in rural Vermont. All while noodling over another Appalachian melody in the back of his mind.
A Note:
