The Founder: Ken Hamilton, MD
 Ken grew up in
a healing environment of physicians, social healers, and Christian
Scientists! Health, as somehow related to love and the Source of
all things, fascinated him from his earliest years. At age 11 he
began a painful, depressive struggle to understand this. It became
his life’s goal. At 15, he started to shape an intention to become
a physician. Six years later he pulled himself out of his
depression and the intention became a commitment.
Ken is a 1960 graduate of McGill University's College of Medicine.
He completed a general surgical residency in 1966, out of which he earned Fellowship in the American College of Surgeons. He served
in the US Army from 1966 to 1970, and moved to South Paris, Maine
with his wife and their two children in 1971. In 1988, he sheathed
his surgeon's scalpel in order to devote his life to develop and
share his experiences with the psychology of human development that
he had begun to implement in his practice in 1975 . To think that
time-honored practices of human development should have any effect
on medical and surgical practices and therapies may not be
surprising, but the truth of the matter is: no psychologies of any
kind were taught in medical schools when he got his degree.
Ken's primary teacher was the successful entrepreneur, Earl
Nightingale, whose lifetime of study of the elements of success had
led to the creation of the successful Nightingale-Conant
Corporation in 1960. To Nightingale, the key to the vast reserves
of the mind lay in a single word, attitude--and attitude was always
a matter of choice. To Earl's associate, Brian Tracy, the key to
stress management was the discovery and pursuit of one's core
passion--and one is always born with a core passion. These two
ideas alone made a great difference to Ken and his patients, and
through an ongoing study of the offerings of Nightingale and his
friends, Ken discovered many effective ways to help his patients
through their operations and through serious health conditions like
cancer and disabling trauma.
In 1985, Ken decided to explore psychology more deeply, and was led
to the company of Barry Woods, M. Div., MD, with whom he spent the
next two years in further study, through which he came to
experience the power of the Twelve Step recovery program, and which
culminated in meeting Bernie Siegel, MD, and Jerry Jampolsky, MD in
1986. After hearing their experiences with support groups, he saw
that there was room for such a group in his practice that would
utilize the experience and skills he had been developing since
1975. Five of his patients, all of whom had cancer, were interested
in working together, and they gathered in the board room
of Stephens Memorial Hospital on Thursday, February 12, 1987.
At the first meeting, they talked about finding meaning and hope in
their lives and decided to call themselves a HOPE group,
choosing Healing of Persons Exceptional for the acronym. The
effectiveness of the work caught on quite rapidly and widely, and
the demands on his schedule led him to examine his life and make
the choice to devote his career to HOPE Shortly after sheathing
his surgeon's scalpel in 1988 he reached a peak of guiding seven
HOPE groups a week. In this way he acquired the experience of
working with over four thousand HOPE group meetings. As he
learned more about this process, he began to train others in it,
and was delighted to see that these groups were as effective as the
ones he guided in helping people facing serious health conditions.
Circling the Soul workshops and the
book about it are the culmination of
fifteen years of applying these processes.
Ken was a member of the Board of Trustees of the American Holistic
Medical Association for eight years starting in 1988. He joined the
Board of Directors of the Network for Attitudinal Healing
International in 1995. He became a founding member of the Fetzer
Institute's Relationship Centered Care Network in 1996. He is an
accomplished public speaker about matters of the soul, attitudinal healing,
stress management, and psychospiritual matters, including health
and healing.
Ken is always ready to answer your questions about HOPE and its
products and services. Send him your questions and ideas by
e-mail:
The Board of Directors:
Peter Stewart of Waldoboro, Maine., Board President
Steve Givens of Winslow, Maine.
Douglas Miller of Cape Elizabeth, Maine.
Kevin Michaud of Fairfield, Maine.
Colleen Lavigne of North Berwick, Maine.
David Humphrey of Falmouth, Maine
Kevin Wallace of Cape Elizabeth, Maine
Theresa McGraw of Gorham, Maine
The Staff:
Charleen Chase, Executive Assistant
Connie Allen, Planning Director
Rhonda Whittemore, Administrative Assistant
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