I’m Simone Grace Seol, steward of this digital academy. I live in Seoul, Korea with my husband and son, in close proximity to my extended family.
My family — both on my side and my husband’s — comes from North Gyeongsang Province of Korea, the land around the capital of the great ancient Korean kingdom of Silla. I always think of myself as a daughter of Silla’s great Buddhist teachers, warriors, and artisans.
My more immediate ancestors and elders — as recently as my parents — grew up in a pre-modern, pre-industrial world: rural, animist. I grew up steeped in the reality that everything is alive, everything is interdependent, and that we are living manifestations of our ancestors’ prayers.
So perhaps it’s no surprise that I was born with a profound thirst for spiritual communion. I grew up in Korea until age 12, and went back and forth between California and Korea until college.
I began my adult life in New York City, and my deepest heart’s desire was to be — if not a monastic, then at least a theologian. I studied religion in undergrad and immediately enrolled in Union Theological Seminary upon graduation — where many of my heroes in liberation theology had taught.
But somewhere along the way, I realized that the life I was called to was one of working more directly with human beings, in the secular world — to help us all have a better experience of life here on Earth. More whole. More beautiful. More alive.
So I dropped out of seminary and found my way into the nonprofit world, earning a Master’s in Public Health and raising hundreds of thousands of dollars for community health projects.
Still, something kept calling me to work even more directly with people, outside of mainstream systems.
That’s what led me to train in hypnosis, coaching, tarot, and all kinds of spiritual healing — and how I eventually started my own business.
And the same voice that led me there called me back home. So I moved back to Korea in the middle of my Saturn return.
After struggling to square my spiritual nature and ADHD brain with the rules of “business” for a while, I figured out how to make it all work — somehow — outside of extractive and manipulative practices. I got skilled enough at it that other people started asking me to teach them, and that became my “thing” for a while. Human-centric marketing and business.
My work has taken many shapes. For over a decade of business now, I’ve been writing and teaching on everything from creativity and spirituality to business and building post-capitalist infrastructure, both online and in person. I’ve been honored to have been invited to teach all over the world, from Norway to the Philippines.
I’m also a fundraiser and philanthropic investor. Together with my community, we’ve raised over a million dollars in the past five years for various humanitarian and environmental causes, ranging from Hawaii to Gaza.
The vision that animates me is one in which all of us siblings in the human family are re-indigenized — returned to the wisdom of our ancestors, who held brilliant technology for how to be in right relationship with nature and with each other. My Korean lineage taught me everything I know about that, and my ancestors’ prayers guide every step I take.
Thank you so much for being here.