We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Janna Hockenjos. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Janna below.

Janna, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Can you open up about a risk you’ve taken – what it was like taking that risk, why you took the risk and how it turned out?

Well, what good timing to share “taking a risk.” I feel like I’m living that right this very moment, and I have no idea how this story is going to end. I can only tell you how it begins.

I recently walked away from the yoga business I’ve built and been a part of and I decided to stop teaching yoga. I’ve been a yoga teacher since my late twenties (I’m 40), and I’ve owned yoga studios and written a book on the subject of yoga. I’ve held trainings and hosted retreats. I’ve only taken breaks to have my two children. Quitting yoga teaching was one of the hardest and scariest decisions I’ve made in a long time, and it feels extremely risky to strip away what has become my identity, what people know me by, and how I’ve been using my talents to give back to the world.

But I was running out of space in my life, or maybe I’m in a new season. My own personal practice was showing me this, and if I don’t listen to my own practice–on a mat or cushion or wherever–then was I even ever a good yoga teacher? Change is our constant. Do we forget that we are allowed to change? Change is really freaking terrifying, right?

So, about that risk. I’m throwing my all into piloting a preschool program on environmental awareness. My heart has been steadfast in helping people live in harmony with our planet for as long as I can remember, and the time feels like now. Now, I am a mom. Now, I have the resources. Now, I have the experience. Now, is my window to give the minds and hearts of our youngest humans the opportunity to learn about what is around us, to love our environment, and to develop their own self-agency to make ecocentric choices.

“Earth Friends” is my risk, and this is just the beginning.

Janna, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

Hi, I’m a book editor, and I’m piloting an environmental awareness program for 3-5 year olds. That feels strange to say, but you’re catching me at the time of reinventing my career. Some backstory will help, and for once in my life I feel certain that all my switches and achievements and flops have lead me to exactly where I am right now.

I received my masters degree in magazine journalism from NYU, which lead me through stint of jobs in fashion and home magazines in marketing, advertising, events, and some writing. The plan was all writing, but it was 2007 and the industry was shifting rapidly. I lived in New York City, and after almost a decade living there I quit magazines to write my first book and become a yoga teacher. Scary. Risky. Worth it! I became a yoga teacher in 2011, and in 2012 “He Never Liked Cake” was published, the memoir of growing up with a parent with a traumatic brain injury. Not long after, I moved home to Pittsburgh, PA where I wrote a second book (on yoga for brain injury), became a freelance book editor, got married, and opened a yoga studio. Inhale Pittsburgh was a deep dive into yoga and business, and there can be a lot of friction when yoga and business come together. Despite those challenges, my studio was a wonderful experience. We welcomed students from all over, opened a second location, and hosted teacher trainings and two retreats to Mexico. Everything I learned in magazines helped me in business, and I was a little surprised, albeit happy, to see that carry through.

Covid happened. I continued editing books, but I closed the doors to the studios–but not to Inhale. A few teachers and I shifted Inhale to an online space and yoga and my business evolved. There was so much to unlearn and learn as the world rapidly changed. We learned about what really matters. It was accessibility, not what kind of pants we wore. It was diversity, not fitting into a broken system of the way it always was. It was the actual, not only the potential. All the shifting and changing circled me back to what I cared about so deeply before brain injury usurped my life and my New York City days shifted my focus. I have always cared about our natural world and about fostering positive human impact, and in the last few years, since having kids and moving to the coast, creating inspiration and information to help others live more in harmony with our natural world had been taking up all of my free time. I loved it, and I was good at it.

We’re human. We age. We shed layers of ourself. I no longer say, “I’m a yoga teacher and a book editor.” I now say “I’m piloting a program for preschoolers on environmental awareness,” and once again all of my previous experience is playing the right roles. I know how to teach. I know how to write a program. I know how to execute. I know how to edit what doesn’t work. I know how to encourage others. I am still a book editor, but I what I am unabashedly passionate about is giving the youngest humans in our population the chance to see a different view of our world. What if they didn’t have to fight climate change or save our planet? I believe if we lead them with love and curiosity they will each make decisions aligned with the way they want to see their world evolve. So come find me if you want a way to integrate a 6-module 30-week environmental awareness program into your current early education curriculum. Or come find me, if you need a book editor.

How’d you build such a strong reputation within your market?

I once was approached by someone who wanted to buy the yoga studios. We had a few very serious conversations that ultimately ended in a retracted offer, because the person didn’t feel they could carry on the brand successfully because the brand was Janna. They couldn’t be me. I had no idea that was my reputation in the market, but the further I get away from the time of owning that business, the more I realize the role I played in its success.

What I believe helped build that reputation was a practice I had started when I was trying to get the word out about my first book. I was terrified of telling people about it. I had no clue what anyone would think of me or how I would work it into conversations. But I was damn proud of it and I knew the population that it would help bring awareness to, and that was more important than my fear. For 60 days in a row, I would tell someone about my book. I would share a business card (that’s what you did then, I swear!) with a different person each day. Maybe they would think I was crazy. Maybe they would go online and buy my book. I would never know my impact on strangers.

In doing so, I quickly learned how to talk about my book, how to work it into conversations, and how to get over my fears. I learned a lot about what you might call grass roots marketing, and I had a lot of really great conversations. I still have no idea who bought it. I know some people did, and I’m sure others did not, but that no longer became the point. I became very comfortable showing up as an author.

I have since used this practice in every business endeavor, and I can say I’m pretty darn confident introducing myself and sharing what I am doing with new people. The conversations are always interesting and I learn about myself and how I want to show up in the world. And it always scares that crap out of me those first few days. We don’t have business cards like we used to, but how can you put yourself out there in a consistent way? When you figure it out, I bet you’ll reap rewards!

If you could go back in time, do you think you would have chosen a different profession or specialty?

I’d choose my crazy, winding path again and again. Some days it feels like I’m a woman with too many careers, but today it feels like everything leads to something else. I started college wanting to major in environmental science. I took a class called “weather and climate,” and the professor told me, in so many words, I was not smart enough at math to major in this. I listened. I switched to Spanish. I didn’t look back. I kept looking forward. Majoring in a language led me to writing, and writing led me to journalism, and journalism led me to telling stories, and telling stories led me to writing a book, which led me to finding ways to heal, which led me to yoga, which became my career. Until now, but now I am laughing because maybe that ol’ weather and climate prof would be surprised to know I’m teaching weather and climate to preschoolers and feeling just fine about my knowledge on the subject.

Regrets will keep you in the past. Sure, you can have them, but perhaps it’s better to look back and see what were the stepping stones to lead you forward.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.jannahockenjos.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/theimperfectgreenguide/
• Other: I also have this website, which is on my main website, but it illustrates my latest work in the world. https://www.theimperfectgreenguide.com

Image Credits
First photo (VW van): Nicole Lockerman