About James

James Bigelow is an educator, curriculum designer, and facilitator with over two decades of experience at the convergence of healing, education, and community. He has taught Nonviolent Communication for more than 14 years and trauma-informed, nervous-system-based education for the last nine. He currently serves as the lead educator for Echo Parenting & Education and spent four years at Wolf Connection, where he rewrote their flagship eight-week youth program, mentor training frameworks, and staff development curriculum.

Across both Echo and Wolf Connection, James was entrusted with updating and deepening their core curricula—bringing greater practicality, cultural humility, and emotional integrity to the work. His current offerings—workshops, single-day immersions, and consulting—integrate nervous system education, nature-based learning, and relational healing practices.

Much of James’s approach has been quietly shaped by his long-time relationship with Rick Klein, an elder from New Mexico, and the land-based ways of learning and living that Rick carries. These teachings live in the way James honors responsibility, reciprocity, and the ordinary ceremonial nature of daily living. At the heart of his work is a shift from the isolated “I” toward a collective understanding of self and responsibility. He designs learning spaces that invite people out of individualism and into shared belonging—where healing is not a private project, but a communal one. James’s teaching has also shaped by years of community organizing. He is a founding member of the Los Angeles Tenants Union. His political practice is grounded in community, relationship, and movement-building.

Rooted in critical thinking, relationship-building, and social-emotional development, James’s work bridges ceremony and frontline service, personal responsibility and collective care. His teaching rests on a simple belief: that healing is possible, that connection is a skill, and that ordinary people—gathered together—can help repair what has been broken in families, systems, and culture.