Meet Hannah
I'm Hannah. I spent twenty years getting very good at being who everyone else needed me to be. This is what happened after I stopped.
Twenty years ago, if you'd asked me what success looked like, I'd have given you all the usual answers. Career. Education. Marriage. Kids. Achievement. Looking like I had it together.
Then life happened.
I lost people I loved. My marriage ended. I burnt out.
Somewhere in all of that I worked out something I hadn't expected. I had become incredibly good at being who everyone else needed me to be. I wasn't sure I knew who I actually was anymore.
That question changed everything. Not because I found a neat answer. Because I finally started asking.
I went to therapy. I trained as a life coach. I studied breathwork facilitation. Not because I had a business plan. Because I was trying to make sense of what had happened and find a path through it that didn't involve pretending I was fine.
What I believe
- People don't need fixing. Most people have just become disconnected from themselves.
- There are far fewer real rules than we think. We spend our lives complying with belief systems that were never ours.
- Self love doesn't come first. Understanding yourself does. You can't love a person you've never actually met.
- Becoming yourself isn't invention. It's uncovering who was there all along.
- Behaviour always makes sense in context. Including yours.
The bit that goes on a conference programme
Before this I spent twenty years in sales, business development and growth, running large teams across Auckland, Sydney, Bangkok and London, most recently at one of New Zealand's fastest-growing tech companies. I hold a Bachelor of Arts and a postgraduate diploma in business. I am a certified life coach and a trained breathwork facilitator. I have written for Bangkok Expat and produced commercial copy across a range of industries. I also run KindAI, helping organisations use AI as a thinking tool rather than a novelty. And I do stand-up, which turns out to be excellent training for saying true things to a room that isn't sure it wants to hear them.
When I'm not doing this
Stand-up comedy. Walking Presley. Too much coffee. Gangsta rap at a volume my neighbours have opinions about. Thinking about why people do what they do, which is less of a hobby and more of a condition.
Why HB
HB started as my initials. They have come to mean more than that.
Human Being.
Human Behaviour.
Honest Becoming.
This isn't about becoming someone you're not. It's about understanding yourself well enough to stop living as someone you're not.