Jean Marie Johnson is the first to say that she entered this life “with an inquisitive mind, a mush-melon heart, a significant degree of sass, and a passion for all things beautiful.” She has spent her journey focused on making meaning of it all. She secured her first full time summer job at the age of twelve as a babysitter, sold Avon and babysat through high school, won a scholarship to a commuter college and tutored and worked in the placement office for extra cash.
The ensuing decades filled her mind and her heart with the experience of the professional workplace. There she hired, trained, coached, promoted, fired, laughed and cried with others at all levels and developed a reputation as a wise and unconventional leader who held others accountable while always focused on doing the right thing. Over time, she evolved as a writer, speaker, and provocateur, channeling years of life experience to support women on their journey to embrace and express the person they were born to be.
Close to Jean Marie’s heart is the poem, “God Speaks to Each of Us” by Rainer Maria Rilke. A “spiritual believer” with no specific religious affiliation, these words resonate:
God speaks to each of us as he makes us,
Then walks with us silently out of the night.
These are the words we dimly hear:
You, sent out beyond your recall,
Go to the limits of your longing, embody me.
Flare up like a flame and make big shadows I can move in.
Let everything happen to you: beauty and terror.
Just keep going. No feeling is final.
Nearby is the country they call life. You will know it by its seriousness.
Give me your hand.
Currently the author of the blog, secondstagelifestylecoach.com/, Jean Marie focuses on personal style while offering insight and inspiration for cultivating an authentic, “perfectly-imperfect” life. In addition to providing one-on-one style and closet curation services, Jean Marie continues to write with and for leaders, crafting communication that supports organizational change and enhances the employee and customer experience. Jean Marie holds a BA in Social Work and an MS in Human Resource Development and Counseling. You will frequently find her walking, tending her herb garden, feeding her backyard birds, hunting for great finds, and always cultivating the beauty and the raw authenticity around her.