Raised in Chicago, with roots in Toyama. Waseda School of International Liberal Studies, then DePaul's graduate school. Joined Nomura Research Institute as a new grad; at BEENOS, worked in the CEO's office on venture-capital support and cross-border commerce. Studied programming at General Assembly, then founded a bento delivery service and a dating app. The beginning of a restless life shuttling between 🇺🇸 and 🇯🇵.
In 2016, joined Coincheck as the second hire — back when it was just a few people. Led international business development, marketing, HR, and web. Cryptocurrency had been called a scam until just before. Yet by selling nothing but electronic data, the company began earning hundreds of millions of yen a day. Then, in just over a year, ¥50 billion vanished overnight. While leading the international coordination to trace the stolen funds, one question kept circling. What had been called a scam created wealth, and that wealth disappeared in a single night. What is money, really? Were we ever creating any actual value? I left after the acquisition. When the illusion of money fell away, all that remained was the question.
After the illusion of money fell apart, I wanted to meet people working for something larger than themselves, and crossed the ocean to Silicon Valley. Studied product design and management at Tradecraft and supported startups in the US and Japan. But what I actually saw was a world where money — wrapped as "success" — mattered more than meaning. Funding rounds, inner circles, valuations. Everyone said "make the world better," but the underlying structure was the same: making money came first. It was, at heart, the same scenery I had seen at Coincheck. What does it actually mean to do good? Is making money the right answer? Can meaning and money coexist at all? I never found the answers — only the questions kept growing deeper.
I set down both the illusion of money and the yardstick of success. I stopped running by external standards, and turned toward what I actually wanted from the inside. I even released music on Spotify. There was no set path anymore. I did everything I'd ever wanted to do. But no matter what I tried, meaning kept slipping away.
Still searching for meaning, I went to Dhamma Dicchā for a 12-day Vipassana meditation retreat. In total silence, I observed only what was happening inside me. I had let go of the illusion of money. I had set down the yardstick of success. I had even chased every desire. And still I wasn't full — because the reason lived deeper. What had been driving me was a feeling of fear and anxiety: "I have to succeed or I won't be valued." I thought I had released the external standards, but inside, the fear was still there. From now on, I want to move forward in the feeling of love. That realization was the gift of those twelve silent days. An hour of meditation every day — still my practice.
Walking forward in the feeling of love, I launched Well-being AI products at ExaWizards and went through its IPO from the inside. Alongside meditation, I began studying coaching as another path to consciousness transformation. I joined to solve social problems. But before I knew it, I was being pulled by the gravity of capitalism. The tension between meaning and money that I had only watched from the outside in Silicon Valley — now I was living it from the inside. And I noticed one more thing. Behind the goodwill of "solving social problems" sat a self that wanted to be recognized. Through being someone doing meaningful work for society, I was reaching for approval. That wasn't the love I had touched in Vipassana.
Coaching kept teaching me one thing: by the time someone arrives at coaching, they have already stepped onto the path of transformation. The real question was about everyone before that step. How do you invite consciousness transformation in people who haven't entered the path yet? The answer I arrived at was comedy. I entered Titan's school and performed as comedian Kagayakiman. People notice the moment things tilt slightly off-center — and they laugh. Laughter is a small noticing, a small transformation. Its reach is vastly wider than meditation or coaching. The widest mouth of the same funnel, pointed at the same place.
In a cutting-edge legal consciousness-altering program, I had a near-death experience. What I saw at the border between this world and the next was emptiness — kū. Money, success, meaning, recognition — I had let go of each thing I had been chasing, one by one. And further down, I let go of my body, even of breath. In a world that was nothing but consciousness, everything was there, and nothing was there. When I came back, the ordinary in front of me was a miracle. To breathe. To have family. There was nothing but gratitude.
After seeing emptiness, the place I returned to was the everyday. I want to protect the ordinary for the next generation. Consciousness transformation is the doorway. So that even one more person might notice — everything I do moves on that axis.
My wife and I run ao. inc., which operates 11 beauty salons. No matter how far AI advances, the experience of being cared for by another human can't be replaced. Facing the person in front of you, with the hospitality that makes them more beautiful — as technology accelerates, that value only grows. That's why, in the age of AI, beauty salons are a growth industry, not a declining one. We're building a hospitality-driven business with our hands, together, as a family.
I host multiple podcasts. Stories, consciousness transformation, post-capitalism — the themes vary, but all of them are about delivering the moment a person changes, through voice.
Founder and Director of Wahyakuhachi Inc. We run STORYS.JP. In the age of AI, real-time primary information is what holds value. Through deep interviews and coaching, we capture the moment a person changes. By making a map of transformation, we invite the next person's consciousness to shift.
STORYS STAND — a 108-member invite-only media hub in Ikejiri-Ōhashi. Rebuilding the old culture of mutual aid at the neighborhood scale. Preparing for emergencies by cultivating connection in daily life. A practice of micro-community.
SHINDO — co-creating a form of agriculture that grows a thousand-year forest. Joined as a zeroth-generation partner. Clothing, food, shelter, community, energy — producing it all ourselves. Practicing sustainable post-capitalist daily life, one harvest at a time.
Meditation sparked my wish to deliver consciousness transformation. But meditation isn't the doorway for everyone. Dialogue lets people change on the extension of daily life. Because I once ran on fear and anxiety, noticed the ego, and returned to the feeling of love myself, I can sit with another person's inner transformation. Coaching is the quietest path to consciousness transformation — one person at a time. ICF-certified coach (ACC). 160+ cumulative clients, 500+ cumulative session hours (as of 2026-03-15). Past clients: seed–Series B founders / social entrepreneurs / former foreign-firm Japan CEOs / student founders / former PMs at big foreign IT firms / big-firm consultants / startup executives / CMOs of fast-growing startups / design-firm CEOs / design-firm executives / managers at big foreign entertainment firms / beauty company CEOs / engineering leads at mega-ventures / business leads at mega-ventures / freelancers / professional coaches / career counselors / comedians.