Jesi Hanley Vega
I was born in the Bronx and formally educated at Stuyvesant HS, Vassar College, and The University of Chicago Divinity School. I worked as a screenwriter and TV editor in Los Angeles until I had my second child, at which point I started reading tarot cards and surfing. In 2012, I moved to Tacoma, WA where I met the love of my life, founded Represent! and started paddle boarding.
My Story
I fell in love with Star Wars when I was 7 and from then on it fueled all dreams of what I wanted to do and who I wanted to be. Because of Star Wars, I studied acting (so I could be in a Star Wars movie), studied writing (so I could write my own Star Wars movie) and made short films (so I could direct it). And also because of Star Wars, I did graduate work at The University of Chicago Divinity School to understand the role that epic narratives play in spiritual traditions.
In short, I wanted to learn everything about stories: how to tell them, how to structure them, and how they impact our lives and our world. And, without realizing it, I did all this because I was looking for a way to tell my own story.
As human beings, we look for stories that reflect our experience and strengthen our identity and, from those stories, we decide what's possible. As much as I loved Star Wars, I couldn't see myself in it and so my intention was to tell a new story: one that featured the kind of heroine a Puerto Rican Jewish girl from The Bronx could relate to.
I continued honing my story expertise when I began working as an editor. and, in doing so, discovered the role I'd been preparing for all along. Today I am a guide for writers and nonwriters alike who seek to find and develop their stories.
