Speaker 1: You know, the best thing I've I've heard was just
Speaker 1: build a product that people desperately want. Investors will follow suit.
Speaker 1: Customers will follow suit too, But sometimes it takes a
Speaker 1: little pushing customers if it's something very new. Right, people
Speaker 1: didn't automatically want the automobile from going from a horse
Speaker 1: and buggy. But I talked to customers on a weekly basis.
Speaker 1: I have like an open calendar where you know, customers
Speaker 1: can like schedule time with me. I ask them, you know,
Speaker 1: what is it that they're experiencing, So we're I'm constantly
Speaker 1: like looking at the product from their perspective. I'm Will
Speaker 1: Lucas and this is black tech, green money. I'm gonna
Speaker 1: answer you. This you to some of the biggest names,
Speaker 1: some of the brightest minds and brilliant ideas. If you're black,
Speaker 1: in building, or simply using tech to secure your back.
Speaker 1: Its podcast is for you Tomorrow. Blewest, founder and CEO
Speaker 1: at Mental Happy, a mental health platform which helps individuals
Speaker 1: overcome challenging why events via professionally led peer support groups.
Speaker 1: The start up recently came through White Combinator, arguably the
Speaker 1: most admired startup accelerator. It's mental health month, and historically
Speaker 1: mental health was not a conversation in our community. And
Speaker 1: I do the opposite of a conversation a stigma, a
Speaker 1: reflection of weakness. So I asked tomorrow, can she talk
Speaker 1: about how at least the conversation that's changed in our
Speaker 1: community and what might be behind the openness to have
Speaker 1: the discussion about mental health. Yeah, that's that's a very
Speaker 1: great question. We started Mental Happy six years ago and
Speaker 1: it doesn't sound like a long time, but I feel
Speaker 1: like progress mental health is made. It feels like twenty
Speaker 1: years in the six years, because it just it wasn't
Speaker 1: a thing, and it definitely wasn't a thing about amongst
Speaker 1: people of color. I have a Caribbean background, my co
Speaker 1: founder UM is from you know, Ghana, West Africa, and
Speaker 1: we were the ones kind of pushing the charge like
Speaker 1: in our families and our friend friend groups to talk
Speaker 1: about it UM, especially like amongst even men right men
Speaker 1: of color. It wasn't a conversation. And I think now
Speaker 1: the reason why it is becoming UM such a hot topic.
Speaker 1: I think people are just worn out. We're just we're
Speaker 1: just worn We're fed up with everything that is happening
Speaker 1: in society. I mean you have work stressors, you have
Speaker 1: life stressors, you have um just really horrific things that
Speaker 1: are seeing UM and experience collectively through social media online.
Speaker 1: And I think we're just as a society just at
Speaker 1: our absolute breaking point mentally and emotionally, UM and and
Speaker 1: we want real solutions for ourselves and for our loved ones.
Speaker 1: What's important is that you have faith in people that
Speaker 1: they're basically good and smart and if you give them
Speaker 1: the tools, they'll do wonderful things with them. And how
Speaker 1: does technology fit in the scope of you know, helping
Speaker 1: people both protect their mental health and repair their mental health. Yeah,
Speaker 1: we we battle with that being a tech company to
Speaker 1: write because we're a platform that brings people together. But
Speaker 1: we're not necessarily bringing people together to just you know,
Speaker 1: do a dance or you know something else that could
Speaker 1: be healing to the soul. Right, But we're just not
Speaker 1: that platform. UM and I do believe that we are
Speaker 1: a tool. But I agree with him and that we
Speaker 1: are nothing without the providers on the platform who want
Speaker 1: to share their expertise. Were nothing without the survivors. Even
Speaker 1: on the platform, you don't have to just be a
Speaker 1: licensed professional to really help facilitate these groups. So it's
Speaker 1: a tool that we entrust in people who have experiences,
Speaker 1: who have expertise, and just who really have a heart
Speaker 1: to do this type of work. So did I hear
Speaker 1: you know this internal battle that you you battle being
Speaker 1: a tech company? Did I hear that in your voice?
Speaker 1: Just now? Yeah? Yeah, you know it's you don't you
Speaker 1: don't want people to to to to you don't want
Speaker 1: to heal, right, Like as a healer, you just that
Speaker 1: means people need to be sick in order for you
Speaker 1: to exist as a healer. Like it's it doesn't feel good.
Speaker 1: I don't feel good knowing that a problem needs to
Speaker 1: exist in order, um for me to like keep solving.
Speaker 1: So I I internally battle with that a lot. Um.
Speaker 1: And yeah, as a as a tech company, UM, we're
Speaker 1: always thinking about like are we truly solving something? And
Speaker 1: how do we keep people safe? You know? Um, when
Speaker 1: we started Mental Happy, we had over a hundred thousand
Speaker 1: people in a Facebook group that we were running these
Speaker 1: peer support groups through and it was tough, Like it
Speaker 1: was tough to keep people safe from trolling and and
Speaker 1: bullying and things of that nature. So we're always top
Speaker 1: of mind of like how impactful, Um, is our work
Speaker 1: and is it is it adding any value versus like
Speaker 1: creating one more thing that people have to like log
Speaker 1: onto and manage and things of that nature. So I've
Speaker 1: read a story, Um, another interview you were on and
Speaker 1: you were talking about how the company started and you
Speaker 1: started like giving away or maybe not giving away, but
Speaker 1: you know, distributing like actual product or maybe it was
Speaker 1: care packages or whatever it was. And I'm hearing you
Speaker 1: talk about now like you're a healer and you know
Speaker 1: you started it with a Facebook group. But I imagine
Speaker 1: and I'm going to speak. I don't want to speak
Speaker 1: for you, but I'm gonna I'm gonna say what I'm
Speaker 1: assuming is happening, and then I want you to give
Speaker 1: me clarity if you could. And so what I'm hearing
Speaker 1: is that you know you want to do the good work,
Speaker 1: but you might recognize that there has to be a
Speaker 1: market opportunity in order to do that work more fully
Speaker 1: and scale impact. Is that what I'm hearing you nailed it? So, Uh,
Speaker 1: giving is a is a good word. Um, It's accurate.
Speaker 1: We started off really creating these uh we call them
Speaker 1: wellness kids at the time, and we did give them
Speaker 1: away and we gave him away to just a few
Speaker 1: people that we had admired, and only the few people
Speaker 1: at the time. Um, in the in the text stas
Speaker 1: and just people of color talking about mental health. They
Speaker 1: shared it on their social media. Um, so social media
Speaker 1: can be good. I'm not saying it's bad. But they
Speaker 1: shared it on their social media, and the product immediately
Speaker 1: just went viral. Like we had people requesting to buy
Speaker 1: a product that we didn't actually even have at the time.
Speaker 1: We just made a few batches of this thing, and uh,
Speaker 1: my co founder looked at me and was like, well,
Speaker 1: I guess you know this is a business. We have
Speaker 1: to do this now. And so the product has evolved
Speaker 1: from us doing these wellness kids selling them to consumers
Speaker 1: who were gifting it to like friends, family member. We
Speaker 1: always get asked what's in the wellness What was in
Speaker 1: the wellness kids? At the time, it was a long
Speaker 1: time ago, so I'm gonna try to remember, but um,
Speaker 1: it was just a way to At the time, there
Speaker 1: was like this box craves right, like everything was a
Speaker 1: subscription box, and um, I just kind of joked with
Speaker 1: my co founder like, you know, there should be a
Speaker 1: box that you know, there were all these like beauty
Speaker 1: kit boxes, like there should be a box to help you, um,
Speaker 1: you know, focus on the beauty on the inside. So
Speaker 1: when we made these wellness kids, they had things like
Speaker 1: meaningful journals, but we also broke down like how to
Speaker 1: journal right, Like, remember, we're talking to a group of
Speaker 1: people who don't know what these tools are. And UM,
Speaker 1: I just kind of collectively took all my experience that
Speaker 1: I learned from therapy, you know, practicing gratitude, practicing mindfulness,
Speaker 1: like how to journal, UM, using positive affirmation, ends and UM,
Speaker 1: positive self talk and thinks just so were we took
Speaker 1: physical products that represented those things and UM we put
Speaker 1: them in this kit and the kid kind of walked
Speaker 1: everyone through how to UM A self care or what
Speaker 1: it's known professionally is is self activation self management UM.
Speaker 1: And people really loved it, and we started doing that
Speaker 1: back in two UM. It was a wonderful product. We
Speaker 1: actually got accepted into a y combinator because of it.
Speaker 1: We grew to selling it to very large corporations that
Speaker 1: had you know, thousands, like five thousands about employees that
Speaker 1: they were purchasing the kids for and and giving them to.
Speaker 1: And those always had a significant life event UM. But
Speaker 1: you know, just being obsessed with the work that we're doing,
Speaker 1: we just kept on thinking, like how do we reach
Speaker 1: more people? Like how do we you know, sell a
Speaker 1: product that's you know, even less in expense and less
Speaker 1: in uh um roadblocks and shipping and you know, just
Speaker 1: all of this stuff and like what if you speak
Speaker 1: another language, like how do we reach more people? Um?
Speaker 1: And that's how we made the transition from that physical
Speaker 1: product to UM the SaaS platform that we have that
Speaker 1: we have. Now, did you go into this thinking you
Speaker 1: were going to have to build something that scales or
Speaker 1: did when you started doing the wellness kits so care packages?
Speaker 1: Was that idea what we were going to do? Now?
Speaker 1: You know, I'm a big believer that you know, you
Speaker 1: can't get from here to there. You can only get
Speaker 1: from like right here to like right there. You know,
Speaker 1: just like these small, these small steps right because there
Speaker 1: to they're just feels like a big jump and you
Speaker 1: probably wouldn't do it because it feels too big. But
Speaker 1: at the time, we were just focused on the here.
Speaker 1: And then when we were focused on the here and
Speaker 1: then more things started showing up, more things started showing up,
Speaker 1: and someone introduced us to y Combinator and we were like, Okay,
Speaker 1: well you know, we'll we'll try to apply and see
Speaker 1: if we can if we can be this physical product
Speaker 1: company getting into this huge tech company, right um or
Speaker 1: this huge tech accelerator that has spawned all these great
Speaker 1: tech companies. So UM, it just really kept on snowballing.
Speaker 1: What do you think it was that it gets a
Speaker 1: Y combinators attention and what you were doing. Then I
Speaker 1: get what you're doing now why they would be interested.
Speaker 1: But if you were them, you know six years ago
Speaker 1: he said, or when or whenever that you know period
Speaker 1: of time was what was it about what you were
Speaker 1: building in your from your perspective that says to them,
Speaker 1: this is interesting? Yeah? You know, UM, if I had
Speaker 1: to look at it from their perspective, not putting words
Speaker 1: in their mouths, but their perspective is that, um, you
Speaker 1: know it. I think a lot of people have really
Speaker 1: great ideas. It's another thing to um figure out you're
Speaker 1: going to bring that idea into fruition on Zorow resources,
Speaker 1: like I started Mental Happy with like literally the last
Speaker 1: two hundred and fifty dollars I had on my American
Speaker 1: Express card. So um, and then we had to kind
Speaker 1: of figure out, like, how are we going to get
Speaker 1: money for the product from there? Um? And I think
Speaker 1: that what they find interests in founders is founders who
Speaker 1: are people who seem relentless and seem like they're not
Speaker 1: going to give up no matter what the obstacles. Um.
Speaker 1: And then also people who say like I've built this product,
Speaker 1: like I've built this company, and you should give me
Speaker 1: money to make it expand versus people coming and saying, oh,
Speaker 1: I have all of these ideas, you should give me
Speaker 1: money and let me figure out my idea. And and
Speaker 1: we we already had a business, um, we were selling
Speaker 1: to you know, really top companies in the country UM
Speaker 1: and and hospitals and so it was just kind of,
Speaker 1: I guess a no brainer for them at that point.
Speaker 1: And then when you think of our perspective, right, um,
Speaker 1: as people of color, like we're so resilient as a people,
Speaker 1: Like we were coming to y Combinator, no IVY league background,
Speaker 1: no parent connections, no, um, you know, our family helped
Speaker 1: us raise a hundred thousand dollars for our friends and
Speaker 1: family around. They probably looked at us like, who who
Speaker 1: left the door open to let these people walk in here?
Speaker 1: You know, like who left the window open? Like, how
Speaker 1: did you guys sneak in here? Because that's, honest to god,
Speaker 1: how I felt like, I felt like we snuck our
Speaker 1: way through. But um, we overcame a lot of ospitles
Speaker 1: to talk about that, because I've talked to somebody before
Speaker 1: who went through y C. And you know, you're a
Speaker 1: black woman and you're interesting, you're building something for mental health,
Speaker 1: and you're also in the same room with guys who
Speaker 1: are trying to implant your brain into somebody else's body,
Speaker 1: Like how does it how does it feel to be
Speaker 1: in that space? Yeah? Yeah, you know, Um, I just truthfully,
Speaker 1: I didn't know much about why comedy are going in.
Speaker 1: I know, when they see this video, they're gonna laugh,
Speaker 1: But I didn't know much about why comedy are going in,
Speaker 1: So I had like zero intimidation on like who they were,
Speaker 1: you know what. It was only until like I had
Speaker 1: gotten to the interview that I realized, oh my goodness,
Speaker 1: they spun up Airbnb, they spun up like door Dash
Speaker 1: and Stripe and just like all these companies, And it
Speaker 1: just kind of felt a little overwhelming in the interview.
Speaker 1: But um, I really think for for me, personally. I
Speaker 1: don't know about my my co founder. At the time,
Speaker 1: it just kind of felt like validation, Like I felt
Speaker 1: like I had been doing all these things all my
Speaker 1: life and for the first time, you know, aside from color,
Speaker 1: aside from you know, being a woman, someone was just
Speaker 1: saying you were you're a bright, smart human being UM
Speaker 1: and and we're not. We don't get that privilege ever
Speaker 1: or at all as people of color to just be
Speaker 1: smart human beings. You know. I love that often all
Speaker 1: too often technology can be the vehicle that things that
Speaker 1: want to attack our mental health right in and can
Speaker 1: you talk about how technology can be helpful to positive
Speaker 1: mental health? What we battle with right is like how
Speaker 1: especially on our platform with Mental Happy, we talk amongst
Speaker 1: ourselves all the time like how much of outside influence
Speaker 1: should we allow on the platform within the peer support groups.
Speaker 1: So one of the things that we mindfully do is
Speaker 1: that we don't allow other social media links to be
Speaker 1: shared on the platform. Will allow like video hosting links UM,
Speaker 1: so like the YouTube's the videos, because that's a medium
Speaker 1: for like sharing education and information at UM. News articles
Speaker 1: and social articles we don't allow on the platform. UM.
Speaker 1: We also are mindful about not allowing uh direct messaging
Speaker 1: like gams. So social media isn't bad, it's just taking it,
Speaker 1: just taking the best parts of it right. Like social
Speaker 1: media is great in that I wouldn't know what's happening
Speaker 1: out in Ukraine if it was like sometimes the truth, right,
Speaker 1: like the real videos of what's happening out and from
Speaker 1: like a perspective of someone who's you know, eighteen or
Speaker 1: sixteen who has to fight a war, or parents who
Speaker 1: have to be separated from their children. UM. So there
Speaker 1: there is a lot of valid information that can come
Speaker 1: from social media. I think what we've done UM, at
Speaker 1: least I hope what we're continuing to do is really
Speaker 1: taking the best parts of what makes UM a digital
Speaker 1: platform and technology meaningful for human beings and taking out
Speaker 1: UM or leaving out some of the harmful parts. You know.
Speaker 1: I say this and some people might, you know, raising eyebrows.
Speaker 1: I'm like, I don't watch the news. I don't read
Speaker 1: a lot of news. I'm very mindful of, you know,
Speaker 1: my own mental health, because I could find myself I
Speaker 1: can say I'm just watching news. I haven't watching news
Speaker 1: maybe nightline or whatever in a long time, or it
Speaker 1: might be interesting. Let me watch and then I find
Speaker 1: myself like having trouble going to sleep that night or
Speaker 1: the next day, being anxious or and I'm like, why
Speaker 1: am I so anxious? And I didn't realize that that
Speaker 1: gateway just watching a news program where it's you know,
Speaker 1: good news and bad news, but you don't realize what
Speaker 1: it's doing to you. And I wonder, what are some
Speaker 1: other maybe unknown drivers that may have that may be mainstream,
Speaker 1: may be pervasive, that we may not recognize as inputs
Speaker 1: of negative you know, inspiration to bad mental health. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: you know, um, just taking it off. I'm completely here.
Speaker 1: You'm the same way, and UM, you know, I think
Speaker 1: the feedback people would give people like you and me
Speaker 1: is that, well, how do you stay on top of
Speaker 1: what's happening in the world, Like how are you? Um?
Speaker 1: You know, you can be an impactful human being if
Speaker 1: you know what's happening and you can't know what's happening,
Speaker 1: But you know, I don't have to listen to hours
Speaker 1: and hours or watch hours and hours of the news,
Speaker 1: or have that be like the first thing that pops
Speaker 1: up on my phone, like whether it's a shooting, a bombing,
Speaker 1: and then that's like the piece of canet. I watched
Speaker 1: people and I sitting next to people and they have
Speaker 1: their phone and like news alerts will go off all
Speaker 1: day long. Yeah yeah, right right, right, yeah, a hundred percent,
Speaker 1: just like I don't know, I just I couldn't And
Speaker 1: then you become it's like watching a car accident, like
Speaker 1: you just you can't look away, you know, you want
Speaker 1: to know the developing thing, and the next developing thing,
Speaker 1: next the heloping thing. So UM, you know, I take
Speaker 1: it as sound bites UM and I limited, but I
Speaker 1: think the other way that people can be mindful of,
Speaker 1: like what they're digesting with their ears, UM and their
Speaker 1: spirit right is engaging in UM conversations with people that
Speaker 1: that may be negative. Uh. The hardest thing to do
Speaker 1: in that is disengaging from those conversations with family members. UM.
Speaker 1: We often here on the platform and there are a
Speaker 1: lot of groups that are around, like you know, dealing
Speaker 1: with like narcissism and your family, dealing with like toxic
Speaker 1: people in your family. So I think making that that
Speaker 1: disconnect with news is oftentimes like having to do it
Speaker 1: with the closest people around you UM and just saying respectfully,
Speaker 1: like you know, hey, my boundary is that I've I've
Speaker 1: had enough, UM or my boundary is I'm not emotionally
Speaker 1: in a space to really process this or talk about
Speaker 1: it now or even ever. And that's okay too. So
Speaker 1: we're having this whole conversation about Web three and particularly
Speaker 1: the metaverse, and you've probably been at least around a
Speaker 1: bunch of conversations around the metaverse and Ready Player one.
Speaker 1: I don't know if you've ever read the book or
Speaker 1: seen the movie Ready Player one, but it was my
Speaker 1: favorite book. UM. But it kind of describes, you know, vividly,
Speaker 1: what the metaverse could look like one day. But when
Speaker 1: you hear things like the metaphors being described and people
Speaker 1: potentially one day spending a lot of time in this
Speaker 1: virtual world, what does that make you think about? You know,
Speaker 1: regarding your position as a healer and you know, a
Speaker 1: mental health advocate, yeah that you know. Don't get me wrong,
Speaker 1: I think cool things should exist in tech, UM, I
Speaker 1: really do. UM. I think we've made a lot of
Speaker 1: technological advancements, and it only makes sense that we start
Speaker 1: imagining worlds in places are fun or interesting. UM really
Speaker 1: allow us to tap into UM. Escapism isn't a bad thing.
Speaker 1: Distraction is actually a really good mental health tool. You know,
Speaker 1: sometimes if you're experiencing moments of very high anxiety, kind
Speaker 1: of distracting yourself from that trigger works. But I do
Speaker 1: have some concerns that UM, you know, we might be
Speaker 1: really really really disconnecting UM from people and and relationships
Speaker 1: in a meaningful ful way. I could be very wrong,
Speaker 1: you know, I'd like to think I have a crystal ball,
Speaker 1: but I probably you know, not a dent accurate all
Speaker 1: the time, but it is caused for alarm, especially for
Speaker 1: like younger kids that are UM trying to make sense
Speaker 1: of their physical world around them. So there was this
Speaker 1: um a tweet I saw where this guy was talking about,
Speaker 1: you know, we already live in the metaverse. And his
Speaker 1: description was, most of so many things we care about,
Speaker 1: and so much of our lives is happening through virtual world,
Speaker 1: whether that be Twitter or our Instagram, which is you know,
Speaker 1: photoshopped in so many ways, filters and all these things
Speaker 1: with TikTok, and so we care the things that we
Speaker 1: value are the likes and the shares and the retweets
Speaker 1: and the reshares, all those things. And so he was
Speaker 1: saying that we already live in the metaverse. When the
Speaker 1: things that we do all day are in this virtual
Speaker 1: world the Internet. Now, what do you say to that
Speaker 1: sort of take if you will? Yeah, Um, I see
Speaker 1: his point, and I think I think no matter what
Speaker 1: you create in technology, because I sometimes you'll build a
Speaker 1: feature and then people take that feature to a whole
Speaker 1: another you know, I mean Instagram wash you know. It
Speaker 1: allows you to share your experiences, allows you to share
Speaker 1: where you've been through like video and photos and stuff.
Speaker 1: But human beings, once they touch your technology, they just
Speaker 1: kind of take it to a whole another level, for
Speaker 1: good or bad. Right, Um. But I would not completely
Speaker 1: agree that we live in a metaverse. I mean, these
Speaker 1: products were come they came together with people in a
Speaker 1: physical space that we understand it, right, Um, a physical space,
Speaker 1: and they collaborated together and they continue to collaborate together.
Speaker 1: The the images and photos that are shared in this
Speaker 1: metaverse are of of a real, concrete time in place,
Speaker 1: right Like if I post a picture of my family,
Speaker 1: yet it's out on the Internet, but we were, you know,
Speaker 1: on solid ground at the time that we took the picture. Um,
Speaker 1: So I I don't totally agree. I'm not saying the
Speaker 1: metaverse shouldn't exist. I'm just saying, you know, if if
Speaker 1: it is what it is, that's fine, but let's try
Speaker 1: to um digest it in a in a different way
Speaker 1: than than we have been digesting a lot of the
Speaker 1: digital things that are out there. You know, you raised
Speaker 1: a million dollars last outlook, it might be more now,
Speaker 1: but you raise a million dollars for this, and you
Speaker 1: talked a little bit about, you know, the technology not
Speaker 1: necessarily wanting to embrace or seeing the need to embrace
Speaker 1: being a technology company. But you you went through y
Speaker 1: C and so there's obviously market opportunity for being a
Speaker 1: healer in so many respects. I understand that it's needed
Speaker 1: and necessary, and it's you know, good work. It's um
Speaker 1: necessary work, UM, and it's purposeful work, you know. But
Speaker 1: when you think about market opportunity, when people are investing
Speaker 1: money into your thing, what is it that you know?
Speaker 1: How does that strike you as somebody who just wants
Speaker 1: to really help people? And I'm not saying you just
Speaker 1: want to help people. You want to live a good
Speaker 1: life too, I imagine, But how do you reconcile those
Speaker 1: two things? Yeah, I am, I guess I never thought
Speaker 1: of them as separate things. Um, you know, the best
Speaker 1: thing I've I've heard at y C was, you know,
Speaker 1: just just build a product that people desperately want. You know,
Speaker 1: investors will follow suit. UM. Customers will follow suit too,
Speaker 1: But sometimes it takes a little pushing customers if it's
Speaker 1: something very new, right, UM, people didn't automatically want the
Speaker 1: automobile from going from a horse and buggy UM. But
Speaker 1: I you know, I like to think that I am
Speaker 1: a product CEO UM. I talked to customers on a
Speaker 1: weekly basis. UM. I have like an open calendar where
Speaker 1: you know, customers can like schedule time with me, ask them,
Speaker 1: you know, what is it that they're experiencing on both ends, right,
Speaker 1: the group members and the providers themselves. So we're I'm
Speaker 1: constantly like looking at the product from their perspective, and
Speaker 1: when you when you're building something that you're passionate about,
Speaker 1: yet there is some like investors want to see this,
Speaker 1: investors want to see that. But I think we've I
Speaker 1: think we've grown up enough as a company to just
Speaker 1: be like, you know, we know what our customers want
Speaker 1: from us. UM. We know where the market opportunity lies
Speaker 1: in terms of you know, currently in the market, there
Speaker 1: are only about thirty or thirty one licensed professionals per
Speaker 1: every hundred thousand people in the United States. UM. So
Speaker 1: if we all decided in which we are collectively, we're
Speaker 1: all starting to decide that we want to seek out therapy.
Speaker 1: They just don't have the human power to deal with.
Speaker 1: Like I think the head of the a p A
Speaker 1: called this tsunami level demand, like the swell is just
Speaker 1: that much UM. And we we spend a product that
Speaker 1: allows these peer support groups to be either their soul
Speaker 1: practice in running peer support groups or an extension of
Speaker 1: their practice. And I think knowing the market, knowing where
Speaker 1: the pain point is is really what makes us very
Speaker 1: appealing UM to investors because UM, we do have the
Speaker 1: proof points. We have UM since we started, since we
Speaker 1: launched it, UH this particular product like eight months ago,
Speaker 1: we have thousands of people enjoying over fifty these UH
Speaker 1: specialized groups that are unique to life events. You know,
Speaker 1: They're not just I have anxiety or I have you know, depression,
Speaker 1: And we we get to like the core what people
Speaker 1: want to talk about, which is you know, their life stuff.
Speaker 1: I went through a divorce, you know, I was diagnosed
Speaker 1: with this illness or you know, I'm taking care of
Speaker 1: my partner and I'm now I'm a caregiver. I didn't
Speaker 1: expect to be married and be a caregiver. I'm taking
Speaker 1: care of an elderly parent UM or I'm adopted UM,
Speaker 1: and I'm just kind of unpacking that as an adult.
Speaker 1: So these are we have like over forty seven different
Speaker 1: life event related categories. And I think understanding your customers,
Speaker 1: understanding your market UM, and really knowing how you'd use
Speaker 1: these people's money and telling them specifically how you know
Speaker 1: how we're going to use your money to grow to
Speaker 1: be this UM you know, to be this global provider
Speaker 1: is really UM is really what gets them to believe
Speaker 1: in you. And if and if that doesn't align, which
Speaker 1: more often than not, you're going to hear a lot
Speaker 1: of nose from investors UM. And that's okay. UM. We
Speaker 1: are allowing people to invest in Mental Happy via start Engine. Yeah.
Speaker 1: UM we did a We did a stock a common
Speaker 1: stock ground which means people have like real equity stake
Speaker 1: in the company UM two years ago and we're bringing
Speaker 1: it back UM before we do our series A, just
Speaker 1: like one last time, letting micro investors invest in Mental
Speaker 1: Happy before we kind of only take on big investors
Speaker 1: in the in the check amounts are too high for
Speaker 1: people to thank. The minimum is uh. I've seen some
Speaker 1: people go through this well. Isaac Hayes went through this.
Speaker 1: Dawn Thixon told, so we just go to start engine
Speaker 1: dot com and search for Mental Happy and start engine
Speaker 1: dot com and the minimum the minimum is five to invest,
Speaker 1: So you know, just a couple hundred dollars and you
Speaker 1: can be a real investor and have um a steak
Speaker 1: in in Mental Happy. You get real investor updates, you
Speaker 1: really get treated like an investor. UM. You know, we
Speaker 1: don't treat you like second class citizens just because you
Speaker 1: know the amount isn't five hundred thousand dollars um like
Speaker 1: other investors. But UM, it's it's a really great opportunity
Speaker 1: that's near and dear to me because financial freedom is
Speaker 1: something I was taught about a lot as a kid
Speaker 1: from my mom, like owning a home, owning stocks and
Speaker 1: things of that nature. So UM, and she worked for
Speaker 1: a company that provided their employees with common stocks and
Speaker 1: things of that nature. So it just feels really great
Speaker 1: to be able to extend, you know, this opportunity through
Speaker 1: start Engine for people who want to invest in pre
Speaker 1: I p O opportunities, which there aren't a lot of,
Speaker 1: especially a people of color, there aren't a lot of. UM.
Speaker 1: I read in an interview you did that, you know,
Speaker 1: like the sheltering place orders we were under as a country,
Speaker 1: UM and in many places in the world UM two
Speaker 1: years ago. How it impacted the demand for your offering? UM.
Speaker 1: Can you talk about having great timing? UM? How you
Speaker 1: may see indicators in the market that the market is
Speaker 1: moving towards you in general terms, So it's not if
Speaker 1: I'm not building a mental health company, how to recognize
Speaker 1: indicators that the market is moving towards your offering? And
Speaker 1: then you know, if you were to embrace web three,
Speaker 1: what it might look like for what you're building. Yeah
Speaker 1: so web three? Yeah, you know, so Web three. I haven't.
Speaker 1: I haven't really UM gotten to the place of UM
Speaker 1: thinking that through, so you know, full disclosure. I see
Speaker 1: the conversations that even like other social platforms are having
Speaker 1: about it, Like I think the former CEO of like Twitter, Jackie,
Speaker 1: made some comments about it. It's one of you know,
Speaker 1: it's like one of those inevitable things like I think
Speaker 1: digital wallets and all those things are going to change
Speaker 1: as well, I don't. I don't think my I don't
Speaker 1: think my kids are gonna have they have bank accounts now,
Speaker 1: but I don't think they're gonna, you know, need a
Speaker 1: physical bank account even by the time they're five, right. Um.
Speaker 1: So so it is something to kind of like get
Speaker 1: ahead of and think about. But in terms of like, um,
Speaker 1: the other pieces of like what we're pulling together, um,
Speaker 1: with the technology and how it's it's going to change,
Speaker 1: it's something that we just we just try to stay
Speaker 1: on top of and be mindful of. And the only
Speaker 1: way I could like really best answer that question is
Speaker 1: just really kind of getting out in front of customers
Speaker 1: and and putting some type of product that looks like
Speaker 1: that in front of them and stuffing out like, Okay,
Speaker 1: is this useful? Is it not useful in terms of
Speaker 1: like market indicator. UM, I'm just you know, I meditate
Speaker 1: every day, so I try to like ground myself and
Speaker 1: see what feels internally true to me. Um. And we
Speaker 1: started doing this six years ago, and that's what felt
Speaker 1: true to me. And pivoting to software. UM, I'm not
Speaker 1: gonna lie to you, it was you know, I think
Speaker 1: we've me in particular. I think I've done a good
Speaker 1: job of proving everyone wrong with the product. UM. We've
Speaker 1: raised more money with this UM, with this as product
Speaker 1: than we did the physical product. UM, we have more
Speaker 1: users and more followers, we have more partnerships. And with
Speaker 1: the physical product, every want to saying, no, it's going
Speaker 1: so well, you should just you know, keep forging forward
Speaker 1: and doing that. And I was just like, no, I
Speaker 1: just I really feel like, UM, the ties are changing
Speaker 1: and we should UM change with that. And then boom,
Speaker 1: like the shutdowns happened. The lockdowns happened all kinds of
Speaker 1: like supply chain issues, like if we if we would
Speaker 1: have stayed a physical product, like everybody wanted me to,
Speaker 1: like even my co founder some investors, UM, we would
Speaker 1: have been kind of stuck, you know, we we probably
Speaker 1: would have forcibly, UM had to pivot versus having the
Speaker 1: forethought to pivot. And so I want to end here.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna ask you for some advice. Was you know
Speaker 1: a lot of our even me, I'm an entrepreneur outside
Speaker 1: of you know, learning the podcast and afro teching, etcetera.
Speaker 1: And I was thinking about this yesterday and the ill
Speaker 1: wake up to a hundred emails that I actually have
Speaker 1: to respond to. I have a whole different email account
Speaker 1: that the spam those too, but the emails that are
Speaker 1: in my inbox I actually have to do something about, right.
Speaker 1: And then you're out in the world and inputs are coming.
Speaker 1: All the people want demanding your time, and then responsibilities
Speaker 1: that you have to take care of. And I realized,
Speaker 1: if I don't take the time to write these things down,
Speaker 1: write the things down that I need to do, then
Speaker 1: they're all in my head and therefore that anxiety inducing
Speaker 1: and not just for me, but for the people like that.
Speaker 1: And so there are a lot the people who listen
Speaker 1: to this show, either startup founders, the entrepreneurs. They're trying
Speaker 1: to build something. Maybe they're doing that internally at another company,
Speaker 1: or they're trying to build their own thing, but they're doers.
Speaker 1: There are people who want to do something. So if
Speaker 1: you could give us some simple things we could do.
Speaker 1: Mine was just just writing keeping your list to do list,
Speaker 1: like actual written one, because my notes one wasn't really
Speaker 1: satiating my need for decompressing. So an actual piece of
Speaker 1: paper and a pen that helped me. But if you
Speaker 1: could give us some simple things that these listeners can
Speaker 1: do these viewers also, um, to help protect their mental health. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's that's a good So I am uh. I am
Speaker 1: cursive handwriting years old. UM. I only recently learned. I
Speaker 1: only recently learned. It's not taught in school anymore. UM.
Speaker 1: I guess it makes sense. But I am that old
Speaker 1: um where we had to learn how to write in cursive.
Speaker 1: So I'm a pen and paper person to even when
Speaker 1: I sketch out products and I do wire frames for
Speaker 1: the company. I know there's like a million wonderful wire
Speaker 1: framing tools out there, but I still uh pen and
Speaker 1: pad like sketch out a frame I do have because
Speaker 1: I'm paper conscious. I at least correction, my husband makes
Speaker 1: me favorite conscious. UM. I do now like a digital writer.
Speaker 1: And what I love about my digital writer it's called remarkable. UM.
Speaker 1: It's a little bit of investment. But when we go
Speaker 1: like Mabe twenty notebooks a year, UM, I had to
Speaker 1: cut down the amount of from using UM. But Remarkable
Speaker 1: feels like paper UM. And it writes like paper. And
Speaker 1: that's where I take my notes every day. So I
Speaker 1: empty out my thoughts at night. UM again like you,
Speaker 1: just so I'm not high anxiety. UM. And in the morning,
Speaker 1: I'll so empty out um my thoughts, um, and then
Speaker 1: the other things that I start off in the morning,
Speaker 1: um as much as I can is meditation. And honestly,
Speaker 1: now with my routine and being a new mom, that
Speaker 1: looks very, very different. I used to luxuriously take, like,
Speaker 1: you know, forty minutes of meditation and do yoga and
Speaker 1: all this stuff. But now it's like, you know, ten
Speaker 1: minutes of meditation and maybe five minutes of yoga stretching
Speaker 1: because that's all my little one will allow me to
Speaker 1: do before he wants my attention. UM. So you know,
Speaker 1: I definitely deeply believe in meditation. I think even if
Speaker 1: you're not sure how to meditate, you're not exactly sure
Speaker 1: if you're doing it right. I think just even taking
Speaker 1: them all meant in the morning where you're not immediately
Speaker 1: running to your phone like you buffer, like I'm not
Speaker 1: going to look at my phone before you know, seven
Speaker 1: am or eight am or whatever that looks like for
Speaker 1: your schedule. And you know, even if you can't clear
Speaker 1: your mind, you immediately clear your mind by just taking
Speaker 1: deep breaths in and holding and then deep breaths out,
Speaker 1: deep breaths in and then deep breaths out slowly and
Speaker 1: and just the the forcing function of focusing on your
Speaker 1: breath clears your mind. UM. And I would say the
Speaker 1: other the other tool that I that I do is
Speaker 1: if you can if you live in an area, connecting
Speaker 1: with nature is so important. And if you live somewhere
Speaker 1: where it's like hard er, you know, you don't have
Speaker 1: a lot of nature around you, even something as simple
Speaker 1: as getting a plant, you know what I mean is
Speaker 1: is close enough to nature. But I try to um
Speaker 1: walk outside um as much as I can, because UM,
Speaker 1: I did suffer from panic attacks in my twenties and
Speaker 1: those were some of the things that I learned through
Speaker 1: therapy and then also learning UM what's what's right for me?
Speaker 1: To Black Tech Green Money is the production to black
Speaker 1: of the Afro Tech on the Black Effect podcast Network
Speaker 1: and i Heeart Media, and it's produced by Morgan Dubon
Speaker 1: and me Well Lucas, with additional production support by Love
Speaker 1: Beach and Marissa Lewis. Special thank you to Michael Davis
Speaker 1: your main hall, Ivan Necessariano. Learn more about my guests
Speaker 1: and other tech disruptor to innovators at afro tech dot
Speaker 1: com and the video version of this episode We'll drop
Speaker 1: the Black Tech Green Money on YouTube next week. So
Speaker 1: tapped and join your Black Tech Green Money. Leave us
Speaker 1: a five star rating on iTunes, Go get your money,
Speaker 1: Peace and love, that's what