By Michelle McLemore

What do you get when you merge a life called to support adolescents, spiritual awakening that all are one, and an ongoing relationship with the Lakota people? Omega Commons and a staff that lives to serve in higher truth and humility.

When you step out of your vehicle into the parking lot of Omega Commons, the calmness of this neighborhood in Adrian, MI wraps around you. Then, you notice the gentle nods to a deeper way of life. The building is a cornflower blue, a perennial of the grasslands, also psychologically shown to calm us physiologically and emotionally. To the right of the door is a signpost near tall pampas grass. In both Spanish and English, the sign reads, “May peace prevail on Earth.” In the distance behind it rises the newly constructed yurt.

As you walk to the door, standing nearly five feet high, is a metal bison silhouette. And on the building itself? The medicine wheel is affixed under the peak. The common black, white, red, and yellow equal quadrants is a vivid, subtle declaration that the Lakota way of life, love, and learning will be explored within the center for each client’s total health.

I joined Jon Schoonmaker, Licensed Professional Counselor and owner of Omega Commons, and co-worker Ryan Richardson, Certified Personal Trainer and wellness guide, to talk about their beliefs, practices, and actions uniting multiple cultures into the awareness of one healing humanity.

Omega Commons provides space for like-minded health and healing practitioners. Schoonmaker explained, “We are a collaborative here—we have the same vision and support each other. Our services are grounded in a deeper healing modality. Everyone here believes in the resilience of the human soul to heal rather than ‘just manage’ which is how the typical mental health profession functions.” He emphasized, “We don’t ‘manage’ stuff here. We heal.”

At 55, Schoonmaker has 30 years as a licensed professional counselor in personal healing and empowerment. He opened his personal practice in 2010. “The focus of my work is healing trauma and correcting problematic behavior patterns.” Yet, it is Schoonmaker’s work with youths beyond the counseling office that has brought him national attention and enabled youths to heal through serving in a transcontinental experience.

He developed the Legacy Program as an empowerment experience for school communities. Schools hire his team to do team building, stress reduction, assemblies, and other student enrichment activities. Over time, he fine-tuned the process. “We’ve created a line of understanding that I’ve seen change so many lives,” Schoonmaker said. “It’s powerful. I worked years pulling from various processes and building it into a movement of grace, safety, and vulnerability.”

Richardson has also witnessed the impact in the local community and the Middle College students in Adrian, MI. Richardson, added, “I know it is true because kids will contact us later saying, ‘that was the first time I shared X’ or ‘that was the first time one of my good friends heard me,’” and even more powerful… ‘that was the first time I felt understood.’”

Schoonmaker is also the founder of Omega Youth Programs and Wolakota Youth Programs, a 501c3 nonprofit youth-serving agency. He said, “I wanted a place for kids to pay it forward. I found that relationships are the primary way of healing and communicating the healing.”

After receiving multiple fliers about Pine Ridge Reservation, in South Dakota, he “decided to trust it.” With two other friends, he drove west and pulled into a small store in Manderson (which happened to be the center of the reservation.) After a long conversation with a local, he learned the churches that had come to “serve” have not served the community’s true need—ongoing support. He heard and responded.

Schoonmaker organized his first group visit in 2003 to Pine Ridge Indian Reservation at Wounded Knee. He enthusiastically explained, “It is built on mutual respect. It’s not a mission. It is a collaborative of kids from two different worlds sharing culture and experience, programming, genuine interaction—an authentic way to break down barriers and walls.”

It was the children of the Wounded Knee District School who eventually named Schoonmaker’s program, “Wolakota.” “Wo” as a prefix implies “very” or “to a great extent,” Richardson explained. So “Wolakota” means “Big friendship”—between Native and non-Native youths. It is peace, balance, and coming together.

Schoonmaker’s groups showed up as he vowed. Initially they “hung out” in the park 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. interacting with the kids, families, and responding to needs. “Most importantly, we were building relationships,” Schoonmaker stated. His group would return two to three times a year, every year.

At one point, “One of the [Native] kids went to the principal of Wounded Knee and asked if we could go to the school,” Schoonmaker related. Though doubtful, the principal consented. After the first morning’s interactions, Schoonmaker’s group was asked back for the afternoon and the rest of the week.

“After that, the visits were within the structure of the school day followed by more community sharing in the park. Time building, culture sharing, mentoring, tutoring, singing, and heart opening—every kid got to experience the group and love,” Schoonmaker explained with a voice mixed with passion and compassion.

The group website explains a bit deeper: “Wolakota Youth programs creates opportunities for Native and non-Native teens to build meaningful relationships that have the power to bend the ‘arc of history’ toward reconciliation, accountability, and healing. During Wolakota experiences, teens break down barriers through intentional interaction and the exchange of ideas and culture.”

“It’s a beautiful experience,” Richardson added in. “The effect someone can have on a culture and how interaction can be a beautiful life interrupt!”

At this point Schoonmaker laughed pointing at Richardson. “Look how excited you get!” Richardson chuckled with him, while humbled tears glistened in both men’s eyes.

The impact on both adults and youths of all involved is clear. Richardson went on share that in his four years of mentoring on the trips, he had seen three different principals at the school. Schoonmaker nodded. “It’s ironic that as a white man, I’m more of a consistent person in their lives, than the school staff.”

Richardson also smiled, adding, “The kids on the Pine Ridge reservation gave me my name—Ryan the Lion. It is how I define myself from a holistic perspective.”

Eventually, Havasupai Reservation in the Grand Canyon also opened to Omega Youth and Wolakota group involvements. The brochures explained, “Through Omega and Wolakota, many youths have overcome substantial obstacles in their lives whether it is negative past experiences, poor family dynamics, drugs/alcohol, and poverty.”

“Kids struggle. We struggle the same and heal the same; it’s quite powerful,” Schoonmaker mused.

In the interest of advancing the human experience, I asked, “What three things would be helpful for every child to learn?”

Schoonmaker’s answers…

“Number 1: There is no such thing as separation.”

“Number 2: There is no such thing as separation.”

“And number 3?” Yes, here he paused and smiled playfully. “There is no such thing as separation.”

Schoonmaker went on to elaborate: “It’s a lie. Kids know it, and then they learn the lie, and then they fight to keep the lie. If we could keep them knowing that we belong to each other, and we are connected and interconnected and not separate… to keep them from not losing that….” He gently shook his head.

The annual trips stalled, of course, when Covid-19 crept across the world. It is with optimism and openness that Schoonmaker ponders what comes next. Richardson questioned, “Does it stay small and intimate? Or is there a possibility of growth?”

Schoonmaker nodded. “We are sitting on a powder keg for this kind of work for healing. It isn’t a band-aid; it’s deep healing and it can’t stay small.”

Due to an unlawful arrest on a family vacation (with all charges eventually dismissed), Schoonmaker confided, “a platform is opening up.” [Insider Edition has spotlighted the multiple abuses of power that transpired across the police and judicial system in Schoonmaker’s case.] “Something has to change. This happened so I can affect change on a bigger level. That’s where we are sitting as a community. I am aware of the responsibility I have to remain in integrity and stay true to the calling of my life. We are grounding people in the reality of who they are—spiritual beings having a human experience.”

Schoonmaker continued, “I’m convinced that the people in my life, like,” [he head-motioned to Richardson] “and circumstances in my life, have put me in the right place to step into this at this time to speak what needs to be said to the systems in power.”

While waiting for a time when the trips can begin again, Schoonmaker and the Wolakota board were inspired to build a yurt. “It provides us with a grounded space for the Wolakota community. We have room for up to 50 for a gathering and that ceremonial space will keep the community connected when we aren’t out doing programming,” Schoonmaker shared. Richardson and local builder friends, assisted in the construction.

Read related article: Helping Our Children in Distress

Richardson explained in a methodical pace: “All of these boxes (in the modern world) make us sick. We need to come back to the circle, and we need to gather again around the fire. And we need to share our truths. And we need to heal. Time and time again I have witnessed young men healing in such a beautiful way. It inspires me to be a better man myself.”

Schoonmaker is the President of the Wolakota Youth board and Richardson has humbly served as a board member for four years. When asked what the program means to him, Richardson’s voice softened once again. “Through the experience of engaging with these youths in a therapeutic group session, group healing model, I found it was healing my own inner child. I was coming back to my youthful self and renegotiating some of the traumas that had occurred along my path in this life.” Regarding his trip involvement, he added, “I have been on a couple different trips–some profound realizations were happening in service to those I know that I am to serve.”

Practices at Omega Commons

Schoonmaker earned his undergraduate degree at the University of Findlay in Findlay, Ohio and his master’s degree at Siena Heights University in Adrian, Michigan. He is licensed as a Professional Counselor in the State of Michigan, certified as a Clinical Trauma Professional with the International Association of Trauma Professionals, and certified as an Advanced Heart-Centered Hypnotherapist with The Wellness Institute. He also uses Transpersonal Brain Change Therapy.

One day a client’s parent called him a shaman, so he looked into the training and found he recognized practices that he had been using for years instinctively. “I don’t call myself a shaman,” Schoonmaker clarified. “Though, I’ve always been pulled to nature and certain practices. I’ve always been taking clients into nature.” Still, he chose to complete the Power Path School of Shamanic Studies to earn the certification of Shamanic practitioner.

His specializations include interventions for at-risk adolescents, healing from sexual and physical abuse, grief counseling, adolescent development issues and support for teens and families, crisis intervention, self-esteem, and wilderness and adventure therapy. With intensity, Schoonmaker confided, “My commitment is to be for kids what I did not have. No one is not going to be served. Not on my watch.”

Richardson offers a spirit-guided session including modalities such as bodywork (physical training), energy work, smoke energy clearing, and chakra alignment to harmonize the mind, body, and spirit. His background includes working for Gary Gray physical therapy where he learned the functional approach to exercise that facilitates healing in the three-dimensional holistic approach. From there clients courted him as a certified physical fitness coach and personal trainer. He gained his RYT 200 yoga instructor certification and additionally teaches Qi Gong, Tai Chi, meditation, and paddleboard yoga.

Richardson explained, “When I found the mind/body fitness field through yoga and later explorations of karate, jujitsu, and Tai chi at a Dojo in Cement City, I found myself on the right path. It was a path that was guided by my heart, and path of love, and I could share that authentically because that is who I am as a person and who I want to continue to evolve to be in the future.”

Additional training came through the Friends Otter Creek teaching lodge in Ida, MI with traditions and lineage of the Turtle Clan and Lakota. He also completed Level II Usui Reiki and is in training through The Chek Institute as a Holistic Lifestyle coach.

Richardson concluded explaining, “We are open to possibility, to the great mystery, to guidance that we might have previously thought we didn’t have—that we were lone wolves on this journey. The time of the lone wolf is over. Now is the time for truth.

To contact Schoonmaker, call (517) 902-1754 or email jon@liveomega.net. For Richardson, email ryan@lionseyeliestyle.live or call (734) 255-9616. To learn more about the Wolakota program, visit wolakotayouth.org. If you would like to support Wolakota Youth Programs, you can contribute through AmazonSmile.