Exclusive Interview with Community-Minded Entrepreneur and Musician, Dr. Julie M. Lane

Dr. Julie M. Lane is a speaker, writer, educator, harpist, and founder of JM Lane LLC, where she leads three initiatives rooted in redemption, healing, and purpose. Through Redeem Thyself, she supports professional women navigating trauma, abuse, and the reclaiming of worth. Through 7 Pedals, she has returned to music after a thirty-year hiatus, creating contemplative harp arrangements designed for reflection, peace, and transition. Through Empowering Parents Network, she equips parents of children with disabilities to navigate educational systems with clarity, confidence, and advocacy. 

Julie’s life and work are deeply shaped by her journey through childhood trauma, abuse, failed marriages, resilience, motherhood, faith, entrepreneurship, and leadership. A classically trained harpist turned educator and professor, she has built multiple successful careers while learning that resilience can build capacity, but it cannot define worth. 

Through her keynote, Redeem Thyself: Weaving Your Story into God’s Purpose, and her podcast, The Redeeming Stories Podcast, Julie explores healing not as fixing ourselves, but as returning to truth — allowing God to redeem every thread of our story into something meaningful, integrated, and whole.


What are some major achievements or accolades that you've accumulated? 

I have been fortunate to have accomplishments across two very different professional careers, first as a professional harpist and later as an educator, researcher, and university leader. 

Academically, earning my Doctorate in Educational Leadership, Administration, and Policy with Distinction from Pepperdine University is something I am very proud of. I went on to serve in higher education as a professor, division chair, program director, associate director of a doctoral research center, and dissertation chair. I have published research in peer-reviewed journals, presented nationally and internationally, received university research grants, and served as a contributing editor and reviewer for academic journals. 

Some formal recognitions along the way have included university merit awards, the Carol Gray Award, recognition as one of America’s Most Influential Teachers, and being named a semifinalist for a Spencer Foundation Postdoctoral Fellowship. I was also appointed by the Governor of Montana to the Montana Statewide Independent Living Council, where I later served as vice chair. 

One achievement that means a great deal to me is the doctoral students I have had the privilege of mentoring. I have chaired numerous dissertations and served on many additional doctoral committees. Seeing those scholars complete their research and contribute their own knowledge to the field is an accomplishment I share with them. 

My first career was music. As a professional harpist, I performed with orchestras and well-known artists, including Ray Charles, Harry Connick Jr., Bernadette Peters, Johnny Mathis, Robert Goulet, and The Who. I performed with the Disneyland Candlelight Orchestra for sixteen years and was a soloist during the 1984 Olympic Games. 

But at this point in my life, I think one of my most meaningful achievements may be returning to the harp after approximately thirty years away. There is no award attached to that. It required me to return to something I loved without knowing whether I could be the musician I once was. 

Perhaps that is how I see achievement differently now. Degrees, publications, appointments, awards, and performances matter, and I am proud of them. But so do the quieter accomplishments: raising my daughters, beginning again, creating work that reflects who I am now, and finally bringing together the educator, researcher, survivor, writer, and musician rather than believing I have to choose among them. 



How do you use your platform as an influencer to spread what's good to the world and who have you impacted?

I do not know that I have ever really thought of myself as an influencer. I think of myself more as a fellow traveler. I use my platforms to share what I have learned through education, research, music, and my own lived experiences, including the parts that are still very much unfinished. 

Through Redeem Thyself, I write and talk about healing, trauma, abuse, resilience, identity, faith, and what it means to begin reclaiming parts of ourselves that may have been quiet for a very long time. I am careful to identify this work as peer support. I am not a therapist or clinician. I am simply willing to say, “This has been part of my story. This is what I am learning. Maybe something here will accompany you in yours.” 

Through Empowering Parents Network, I bring more than thirty years of experience in special education and higher education to parents and educators. My goal is to contribute meaningful scholarship that improves educational outcomes for students with disabilities and supports educators and families. 

Then there is 7 Pedals, which is deeply personal. I returned to the harp after roughly thirty years away from professional performance. Sharing that return, including the imperfect practice and uncertainty, has become another way of talking about beginning again. 

As for who I have impacted, that is difficult for me to quantify. I think about the students and doctoral candidates I have taught and mentored, the educators and families I have worked alongside, podcast guests, women who read my writing, and people who have quietly reached out to tell me that something I shared made them feel less alone. Those individual connections probably mean the most to me. 

What are some projects that you are currently working on or promoting? 

My work currently lives primarily within Redeem Thyself, Empowering Parents Network, and 7 Pedals, but there are several projects growing within each of those areas. 

Redeem Thyself is my peer support work for women. It includes my Healing Diary, the Redeeming Stories Podcast, community conversations, speaking, and Stories, Shared, which creates opportunities for women to gather around writing, conversation, reflection, and music. I am also working on books that are growing from many of the same questions I explore through Redeem Thyself, including what it means to heal, reclaim our voice, and accompany one another as fellow travelers. 

Empowering Parents Network draws from more than thirty years of my professional life as an educator, researcher, and special education leader. Along with developing resources for parents and educators, I continue to conduct research and write about issues affecting students with disabilities, families, educators, and educational systems. My goal is to contribute meaningful scholarship that improves educational outcomes for students with disabilities and supports educators and families. That research is an important part of where I see EPN going.

With 7 Pedals, I am rebuilding a relationship with the harp after roughly thirty years away from professional performance. I am working toward recording projects and developing The Harp in the Meadow, an initiative designed to make the harp more accessible through opportunities to listen, learn, experience, and eventually play the instrument. 

Although these projects may appear quite different, I increasingly see them as connected. I am writing books, conducting research, creating community, having conversations, and returning to music, but underneath all of it are many of the same things: voice, belonging, education, story, creativity, and the possibility of becoming. I am finally allowing all of those pieces of my life to exist together. 


Who do you have to credit for your success? 

There are many people woven into my story. I have had teachers, professors, colleagues, mentors, students, musicians, friends, family members, therapists, and people who simply appeared at the right moment and offered something I needed. 

My daughters are certainly part of that story. Raising them while building my professional life taught me a great deal about persistence, responsibility, and what matters. 

I also credit the people who challenged me, although I probably would not have said that years ago. Some of the most difficult experiences of my life forced me to ask questions about who I was, what I believed, and whether I could build a life that was different from the one I had learned simply to survive. 

My faith has also been an important thread throughout much of my adult life. I do not pretend to understand how every part of my story fits together, and I am still working through many of those questions. But I believe there has been purpose even in places where I could not see it at the time. 

And somewhere in this answer I also have to credit myself. That is probably the hardest part for me to say. I kept going. I earned the degrees. I raised my daughters. I built two careers. I returned to music. I kept asking questions. I kept beginning again. I am learning that acknowledging those things is not arrogance. It is simply allowing myself to recognize the life I have actually lived. 

What is your ultimate goal in your career/life? 

I think my ultimate goal has changed. Earlier in my life, I probably would have answered this question with accomplishments, positions, publications, degrees, or professional milestones. Those things still matter to me, but they are no longer the whole answer.

At this point in my life, I want what I do to matter to someone. 

I want my scholarship to improve educational opportunities for students with disabilities and support the educators and families who accompany them. I want Empowering Parents Network to help parents feel less lost when they are trying to understand systems that can be incredibly complicated. 

I want Redeem Thyself to offer women a place to pause, reflect, and recognize that they are not the only ones trying to figure out what healing, worth, belonging, and becoming look like. I do not want to tell anyone how to heal. I want to walk alongside them as a fellow traveler. 

I want to play the harp again, not because I need to recreate the musician I was thirty years ago, but because music is still part of who I am. I want The Harp in the Meadow to give other people opportunities to experience that instrument in ways they might never otherwise have. 

Ultimately, I think I want to leave behind work that says people matter. Their stories matter. Children with disabilities matter. Families matter. Creativity matters. And it is possible to begin again, even when beginning again looks nothing like we thought it would. 

Is there anything else you would like to share?

One of the biggest things I am learning at this stage of my life is that we do not have to choose only one version of ourselves. 

For years, I compartmentalized my life. There was the musician. The educator. The researcher. The mother. The survivor. The woman of faith. The person who could accomplish a tremendous amount and the person who privately questioned whether she was enough. 

I am not as interested in separating those pieces anymore. 

Redeem Thyself, Empowering Parents Network, 7 Pedals, my scholarship, my writing, the podcast, and the community work I am developing may look like separate projects from the outside. To me, they are increasingly becoming one body of work centered around voice, belonging, story, education, creativity, and the possibility of becoming. 

I am still figuring out what that looks like. I actually think that matters. I do not want to present myself as someone who arrived at the other side with all the answers. I am still doing the work. I am still learning. I am still returning to parts of myself I thought were gone. 

I am a fellow traveler, and perhaps that is the most accurate description of what I hope to offer others.
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