By Paul Karvanis, special to The Coaches' Chronicle™

I've known Jonathan for almost seven years. During that time I've watched him evolve from someone searching for answers into someone increasingly comfortable sharing what he's found. It's one of the things that has me want to be in his orbit. As we spoke, we covered coaching, spirituality, leadership, inner children, plant medicine, dragonflies, and what happens when you stop trying to become someone and start allowing yourself to be who you already are.

With Jonathan's 50th birthday arriving this month, it felt like a fitting moment to pause and look back.

Paul: You turn 50 in the month that this issue is coming out. What does this threshold let you see about your life and work that you couldn't see 10 years ago at 40?

Jonathan: First of all, I hadn't even become a coach at 40. I was just beginning my dark night of the soul as some people may recognize. I was going through a tough time and at that time I hired a coach and I had such incredible results very quickly that I said to my coach, I think I want to do what you do when we're through with all of this. We were in person, and he leaned across the table and he said, "you would make a great coach." And it just filled me with this instant belief that it was possible. And beyond that, it filled me with this belief that it was gonna happen. So that was around age 41. And now looking back, I can see that it's never too late to start anew. We can pivot at any point. And it's really changed who I've become. I'm a lot more at peace with who I am at turning 50 than I was at turning 40.

Paul: A mutual friend of ours, Amanda, says that people change from either inspiration or desperation. It sounds like your change was inspired by the desperation. What made it finally be enough?

Jonathan: Desperate times call for desperate measures. So I threw everything I possibly could in that moment at the situation. I hired not just a coach, but I went way into the deep end on the spiritual side of things. I hired a psychic, a Reiki master, a meditation coach, a mindfulness coach. I really took my physical body and my health a lot more seriously. By all accounts it was one of the most invisible but internal changes that I'd ever experienced in my life up till that point. The desperation had me choosing new ways of looking at things, knowing that I didn't want to go back over territory I'd already covered.

Paul: What have you spent years believing that you needed to be that you've since put down?

Paul: Your Way of the Dragonfly series is where all of this is written now. What made the book the right vessel for that work, and what did writing it clarify for you?

Jonathan: Well, first of all, the book is one vessel for the work. I am a vessel and so are the programs that I offer and every single one-on-one client that I work with is another vessel. But the process of writing a book asks you to refine, refine, and refine. If it doesn't add, it subtracts. There are 101 maxims in my first book about how to live a high vibrational and conscious life, but the approach was inspired by the Tao Te Ching. One page, one chapter. How can we distill this philosophy into something that's tangibly read in a single page? That process made me realize that most of us are no longer in need of more information. It's more about how we can refine what we already know into something we can practice daily.

Paul: My understanding is that you believe everyone desires to be seen deeply whether they're aware of it or not. When did you first understand that about yourself?

Jonathan: Vulnerable moment here. I grew up with a strong desire to be seen. I think we all have that, but mine skewed into this version of needing to prove something, prove that I was either enough or worth something. And as I've delved deeper into my own personal development and exposed parts of myself that needed healing, I've realized that there's nothing to prove. It's really now about demonstrating who I be, which is allowing myself to be witnessed as opposed to having to prove that I am worth seeing.

Paul: You speak about witnessing the higher self rather than the curated self. What are you actually looking at when you witness the higher self?

Jonathan: I believe it's one of my greatest gifts, to see people beyond their limitations, beyond the version of themselves that feels they need to look a particular way, speak a particular way. I'm looking at their spirit, the divine self, the version of them that exists when they have transcended the limitations that they feel, the fear that holds us back. The higher self has no fear, has no limitations, is expansive and is pure love. That's what I'm seeing. And I'm doing my best when I'm working with clients to help them remove those limitations to bring that higher self forward.

Paul: How do you create the safety to let them move past the limitations caused by their fear?

Paul: So much of your work points back to a six-year-old inner child. What does that part of you still have to teach the man who's turning 50?

Jonathan: It's a more recent chapter in my work, allowing the inner child more space, more freedom to not only express themselves, but also to steer. The six-year-old will be quick to remind me that this is not fun. That this is taking too long. So it's having me get face to face with what would bring me more joy, what feels like nap time, what feels like ice cream. Those are beautiful ways of meeting yourself that are less rigid. I also think the six-year-old is the pre-programmed version of ourselves. The six-year-old exists before we were told who to be by the rest of the world, parents, schools, industry, religion, the news, and they're equipped with the most potent blueprint of who we get to be in this lifetime.

Paul: You've written about authentic expression as a kind of disruption. Why does someone expressing themselves truthfully unsettle the people and systems around them?

Jonathan: Back to conformity. A lot of us are used to delivering a script that is widely acceptable by those around us. If you've worked in a corporate environment, there's the party line, and we toe that so that we are not seen as standing out. When we begin to feel the safety within ourselves to be authentically expressed, it's going to rub some people the wrong way because it will likely be non-conformist. Not for the sake of it. It's just that we're each uniquely different, and our authentic expression will sometimes have people face the mirror and see parts of themselves they're not willing to look at. That's not a reason not to be authentically expressed, but it does make it more difficult.

Paul: You've talked about cycles of expansion and contraction. How do you hold your authentic expression differently through each?

Paul: I want to push you here. Steven Pressfield in the War of Art talks about the difference between an amateur and a professional. An amateur shows up when they want to, and a professional shows up because it's 9:00 a.m. on a weekday. That strikes me as true. And yet what you're saying also strikes me as true, that respecting the contraction is the fastest way through it. How do we reconcile those two ideas?

Jonathan: One is to appreciate that not showing up at 9:00 a.m. to sit in front of a computer when you're low on power, energy, and inspiration is a win. It's you honoring that I will not be effective in this moment, and what my human needs is something other, and I'd rather show up for that than show up to work and be a dud. I think too few people honor themselves and their energetic rhythms. So much so that we end up with super high cortisol levels, people who are stressed out, who need a glass of wine, a beer, several, food, whatever gets them through. And all they really needed to do was not show up at 9:00 a.m. and give themselves a breather. If more people could remove the stigma of honoring themselves first, they'd be way more productive, way more inspired, and have a lot more fun doing it.

Paul: So as long as you're showing up, period, it doesn't need to be nine because society says nine.

Jonathan: Can you create the rhythm, the version of your professional output that suits you? And can you communicate that if you work in an environment where most people show up nine to five? Can you broker a conversation where you're articulating how you'll be most effective?

Paul: How do you help someone tell the difference between being visible and being seen?

Jonathan: Let's use social media as an example. A lot of people show up to be visible. Let me create a post that allows me to get one more out this week. My name shows up on someone's feed and they have something to consume. That's being visible. I think being seen is really allowing yourself to be exposed, to let somebody inside the meaty bits of who you're becoming, your process as a human, what you're learning, what you're feeling. That doesn't necessarily mean it happens in real time. Some things are still developing. But are we letting others in, or are we just creating surface level content that keeps us visible? I think that's the difference.

Paul: You've hosted your Sanctuary Conscious Leaders Retreat on a belief that true community calls on the gifts of everyone in the room, not just the host. Why build it that way when so many events center on a single figure?

Jonathan: Our industry is filled with experiences offered by coaches, and many of them are incredible. But something in me didn't fully resonate with the coaches who show up to be seen on a stage and not really share that stage. Without attacking those coaches, what I saw, and who I'm being in the world, was witnessing that everyone's got these beautiful and authentic gifts they can share. How can we make this more inclusive, where I give a little bit and I receive a lot? Everyone shares a small slice of their own perspective or their gift, and we all receive something as a result. That to me is a parallel to what a strong community looks like. Everybody's involved, everybody's sharing what they're good at, and we all benefit.

Paul: That feels similar to The Coaches' Chronicle™, which exists to witness coaches and tell the stories of their authentic expression. How is the publication an extension of the same witnessing you do one-to-one?

Paul: A few questions on spirituality. You work with coaches, entrepreneurs, and leaders who share your belief that we each arrive with a soul mission that will either be activated or left dormant in this lifetime. Why does that belief shape who you choose to work with?

Jonathan: Part of my spiritual beliefs is that everything is energy and like attracts like. A similar vibration attracts a similar vibration. If I'm outwardly sharing my spiritual views about our human existence, those who have a similar bent will lean in. Our western society at least hasn't made it super easy to be a spiritual being and a professional at the same time. So my authentic expression is one of sharing that more openly so people can find normality, and see that there are people doing really well in the world and offering their services who are also openly spiritual. They reach out because they see something that isn't readily available in many places. A coach who can help them with their business and aligning their life and goals, but who also shares similar spiritual values. We decide together if it feels like a right fit. I'm not the only one choosing. We're both in choice. But first and foremost, it's energy.

Paul: When did the spiritual aspect start for you, and when did Ecuador and plant medicines enter the picture?

Paul: Imagine an ordinary day pre-pandemic versus an ordinary day now. What's changed for you?

Jonathan: I'm so much more at peace with what is. The phrase that everything is happening for you, I really believe that, but to really believe it you have to take every single word literally and at face value. Everything is happening for me. So even the crappiest of days is revealing something in me that I can embrace as part of my own development. When everything's feeling great, sure, it's easy to adopt the mentality that it's happening for me. But it's when things go south or turn sour, if you can see that as happening for you, that's the real nugget. I used to think I was a victim and the world was happening to me, that I had bad luck and needed to be fixed. All of those things led me down the path of discovering I was wrong to think any of that.

Paul: When you see people who are still in that victim mentality, how do you keep an open heart?

Jonathan: Huge amounts of compassion, huge amounts of empathy, having been there myself. Underlying that might be an almost impatient desire to see them shift out of it. But I have to put my impatience aside and adopt the patience that allows them to discover this on their own timing. It makes me feel hopeful that if I can find my way, everyone can find their way.

And I knew immediately for me it was going to be the dragonfly. It just dropped in. Now, at my very first Reiki appointment, I'm getting up off my friend Kelly's table, and I see a matchbox and a paperweight on her altar, both with massive dragonfly images. I asked if I could take a photo, they're kind of a sign for me right now. And she said, "Oh yeah, dragonfly, transformation." And I had this step back moment, because I had recently incorporated my new coaching company, Tidal Transformation, Inc., and inside the logo, only because I love dragonflies, I'd put the image of a dragonfly. She read from a page about the dragonfly as a totem, coming from the underworld and then experiencing flight. The life cycle skips the larval stage. The nymph lives underwater, this little grayish brown goblin-looking thing eating mosquito larvae, and then one day under the cover of darkness it emerges, its back splits open, the wings come out and fill with fluid, and it achieves flight with these iridescent wings and colourful body. And then, the most successful predator next to the dragonfly is probably the tiger, around 25 or 26% kill rate. The dragonfly is at 96%. There's a 70% delta between the dragonfly and the next most successful hunter. So I see this as what we're here to do. Not necessarily to hunt, but to get what we desire, achieve full flight, let our colours out, and be fully expressed. I can't think of a better image for the work I'm doing. Plus, they just look cool.

Paul: You had me at eating mosquitoes. And if you think about it, the mosquitoes are there to suck our vitality. So isn't that one of the big parts of transformation? You're already whole. Just get rid of the things that are holding you back.

Paul: Last question. If you could give one piece of advice to a new coach entering the industry today, what would it be?

One of the themes that kept showing up throughout this conversation was subtraction.

Jonathan spoke about letting go of other people's definitions of success. He spoke about removing limitations rather than acquiring new capabilities. Even the dragonfly story ultimately pointed in the same direction.

Dragonflies and dragonfly nymphs both eat mosquitoes (insects that drain our vitalogy). In a strange way, that feels like a fitting metaphor for Jonathan's work. He helps people identify and remove the fears, expectations, and limitations that drain their energy and prevent them from expressing who they already are.

That idea seems to sit underneath much of Jonathan's work.

Whether he's coaching a client, hosting a retreat, publishing The Coaches' Chronicle™, or talking about dragonflies, he is helping people see beyond the version of themselves they think they need to be and reconnect with the version that was there all along.

I suspect that's why so many people leave conversations with him feeling lighter. Not because he gives them answers, but because he helps them hear their own.

And after spending the last year and a half helping the rest of us tell our stories, it was nice to hear more of his.