what if I told you that I had the secret
to improving mental health in fact this
whole time
the secret has been in your pocket now
you may have guessed it but I’m talking
about your phone this would be a really
boring talk if I simply said that the
key to improving mental health is your
phone and there’s more to the story but
before I get into that why does this
even matter and more importantly what
are some of the challenges that we all
face when it comes to our mental health
I refer to it as the sack of problem
sack stands for stigma access and cost
stigma as in I might be embarrassed to
share what’s on my mind whether to a
friend or a professional access who do I
even turn to and if I do seek a
professional will insurance cover it and
cost if insurance doesn’t cover it it’s
going to cost me a lot of money out of
pocket so it limits my options and
tonight through this idea I hope that we
can solve these issues but timeout here
for a second what even gives me the
right to stand before you and to say
that I had the secret to improving
mental health because I will tell you I
am NOT a psychologist nor my therapist
so how dare I stand before you and to
say that I have this idea I have a
confession I didn’t come up with these
ideas in fact two individuals two
psychologists by the in the 60s and the
70s came up with these ideas frank
Reisman and Fred Newman Frank Reisman
came up with this idea called the helper
theory and what it states is when you
help someone you are in fact benefitting
more than the person that you’re helping
so let me repeat this the helper theory
is when you help someone you benefit
more than the person that you’re helping
social therapy on the other hand was
defined as group therapy however in one
of friend Newman’s early interviews he
even admits maybe there’s more to the
story than simply defining social
therapy as group therapy maybe this idea
of social
therapy could evolve but he wasn’t quite
sure how it would necessarily look so
the big idea that I would like to share
tonight is imagine taking this idea of
helping people and combining it with
technology to make it easy to do that I
want you to imagine something for a
second I want you to imagine that you’re
walking on the beach and you witness
these dolphins washed up ashore what do
you do do you simply sit there and watch
them struggle or knowing that you could
do something do you take action or what
about this what if you’re in the subway
and you witness somebody falling between
the platform and the Train what do you
do you just hover over them hoping that
they’ll be okay or knowing that you
could do something do you try to help
them
you see we as humans have this innate
ability to want to help other people
it’s in our DNA if we see an elderly
individual slip and fall right in front
of us there’s a good chance that we’re
going to make sure that they’re okay
because it hurts us to see innocent
people in pain but what if we added
something else to this what if we added
our own personal life struggles couple
years ago I lost my mom as you can
imagine it was a tough thing to go
through after her death I observed
something interesting there would be
individuals who I wouldn’t necessarily
say I was close to but they would come
up to me and say something along the
lines of hey Mike I too lost a parent or
I too lost a loved one if you ever need
anything just know that I’m here and
conversely even today whenever I hear
somebody losing a parent or a loved one
I find myself getting this feeling like
if I perceive that person as suffering
that I want to be there for that person
because I know what it’s like and I know
that it’s it’s tough so now imagine
taking our life struggles our life
experiences and to help people that are
currently going through it today but I’m
gonna have to call another timeout here
for a second this is all great in theory
the idea that we can leverage our past
life struggles to help people going
today but is there a way that we can
test this a few individuals and I are
working on this idea called project oh
it’s a mobile app that allows people to
help one another get through life
struggles whether it be depression
addiction illnesses and it all stems
from these support groups that you
either join or that you create so this
is an example of somebody who created a
support group after losing a loved one
to suicide so she created this to not
only remember this individual but to act
as a resource for the other people in
the community to go to if they could
relate if they need to seek advice or
help a lot of people ask us why it’s
called Project toe tOA’s it doesn’t
actually stand for anything it was I had
a friend that was going through some
difficult times and we decided to come
up with a code word because it’s hard to
ask friends and family for help so while
walking on the beach we decided why not
why not toe and from there kind of
evolved but also what’s also great about
this is this is anonymous this is by the
username so whether you want to help
people or you want to seek advice
yourself because you’re going through
something you don’t have to announce it
to the world so it starts the
conversation we have thousands of people
using this on a monthly basis with over
600 active support groups just like this
one but my question is this if I’m going
to make the claim that this is going to
improve mental health around the world
how is it going to evolve what’s the
bigger picture what is this going to
look like in the decades to come so up
until now I’ve been focusing on the
community the peer support the support
groups a community of people helping one
another but as we grow this community
what if this acted as a portal to
therapy whether it be online therapy or
face the face because not only does this
improve the access but helps lower the
cost so we have this community the acts
as a portal to therapy which improves
the access lowers the cost what if now
because of that that meant less
dependency on the insurance companies
where it doesn’t cost an arm and a leg
to pay for therapy to seek a
professional giving us all more off
to choose from and finally what if we
take some of the day to hear some of the
resources that we’re learning and we go
to other communities offline communities
around the world to teach people how to
sustainably handle their own mental
health within that community because by
doing that this ultimately feeds back
into the community and the positive
cycle repeats and this is how we’re
going to change mental health around the
world and do you remember those sack of
problems the stigma access and cost what
about a sack of solutions one worth
through this idea we can lower the
stigma improve the access which helps
bring down the cost but it starts with
you and tonight I’d like to leave you
with one final thought a couple weeks
ago out of curiosity I wanted to see
what was my mom’s last email to me
before she passed away because she would
often send me these really great quotes
with pictures on them and sure enough a
month before she passed she sent me a
quote baba by Bob Marley that I would
like to share with you you never know
how strong you are until being strong is
the only choice you have we have a
choice to make
we can either take our past life
struggles it’s a fall victim to be the
victim or we could be the lion and to
leverage our past life struggles to help
people going through the same thing
today to leverage our life resume and to
use it as an opportunity to help someone
that’s going through it today because I
promise you this as you begin helping
people you’re going to feel really good
but it’s as you continue helping people
you’re going to ask yourself one of the
most powerful questions there is what
else am i capable of thank you
[Applause]
[Music]
to improving mental health in fact this
whole time
the secret has been in your pocket now
you may have guessed it but I’m talking
about your phone this would be a really
boring talk if I simply said that the
key to improving mental health is your
phone and there’s more to the story but
before I get into that why does this
even matter and more importantly what
are some of the challenges that we all
face when it comes to our mental health
I refer to it as the sack of problem
sack stands for stigma access and cost
stigma as in I might be embarrassed to
share what’s on my mind whether to a
friend or a professional access who do I
even turn to and if I do seek a
professional will insurance cover it and
cost if insurance doesn’t cover it it’s
going to cost me a lot of money out of
pocket so it limits my options and
tonight through this idea I hope that we
can solve these issues but timeout here
for a second what even gives me the
right to stand before you and to say
that I had the secret to improving
mental health because I will tell you I
am NOT a psychologist nor my therapist
so how dare I stand before you and to
say that I have this idea I have a
confession I didn’t come up with these
ideas in fact two individuals two
psychologists by the in the 60s and the
70s came up with these ideas frank
Reisman and Fred Newman Frank Reisman
came up with this idea called the helper
theory and what it states is when you
help someone you are in fact benefitting
more than the person that you’re helping
so let me repeat this the helper theory
is when you help someone you benefit
more than the person that you’re helping
social therapy on the other hand was
defined as group therapy however in one
of friend Newman’s early interviews he
even admits maybe there’s more to the
story than simply defining social
therapy as group therapy maybe this idea
of social
therapy could evolve but he wasn’t quite
sure how it would necessarily look so
the big idea that I would like to share
tonight is imagine taking this idea of
helping people and combining it with
technology to make it easy to do that I
want you to imagine something for a
second I want you to imagine that you’re
walking on the beach and you witness
these dolphins washed up ashore what do
you do do you simply sit there and watch
them struggle or knowing that you could
do something do you take action or what
about this what if you’re in the subway
and you witness somebody falling between
the platform and the Train what do you
do you just hover over them hoping that
they’ll be okay or knowing that you
could do something do you try to help
them
you see we as humans have this innate
ability to want to help other people
it’s in our DNA if we see an elderly
individual slip and fall right in front
of us there’s a good chance that we’re
going to make sure that they’re okay
because it hurts us to see innocent
people in pain but what if we added
something else to this what if we added
our own personal life struggles couple
years ago I lost my mom as you can
imagine it was a tough thing to go
through after her death I observed
something interesting there would be
individuals who I wouldn’t necessarily
say I was close to but they would come
up to me and say something along the
lines of hey Mike I too lost a parent or
I too lost a loved one if you ever need
anything just know that I’m here and
conversely even today whenever I hear
somebody losing a parent or a loved one
I find myself getting this feeling like
if I perceive that person as suffering
that I want to be there for that person
because I know what it’s like and I know
that it’s it’s tough so now imagine
taking our life struggles our life
experiences and to help people that are
currently going through it today but I’m
gonna have to call another timeout here
for a second this is all great in theory
the idea that we can leverage our past
life struggles to help people going
today but is there a way that we can
test this a few individuals and I are
working on this idea called project oh
it’s a mobile app that allows people to
help one another get through life
struggles whether it be depression
addiction illnesses and it all stems
from these support groups that you
either join or that you create so this
is an example of somebody who created a
support group after losing a loved one
to suicide so she created this to not
only remember this individual but to act
as a resource for the other people in
the community to go to if they could
relate if they need to seek advice or
help a lot of people ask us why it’s
called Project toe tOA’s it doesn’t
actually stand for anything it was I had
a friend that was going through some
difficult times and we decided to come
up with a code word because it’s hard to
ask friends and family for help so while
walking on the beach we decided why not
why not toe and from there kind of
evolved but also what’s also great about
this is this is anonymous this is by the
username so whether you want to help
people or you want to seek advice
yourself because you’re going through
something you don’t have to announce it
to the world so it starts the
conversation we have thousands of people
using this on a monthly basis with over
600 active support groups just like this
one but my question is this if I’m going
to make the claim that this is going to
improve mental health around the world
how is it going to evolve what’s the
bigger picture what is this going to
look like in the decades to come so up
until now I’ve been focusing on the
community the peer support the support
groups a community of people helping one
another but as we grow this community
what if this acted as a portal to
therapy whether it be online therapy or
face the face because not only does this
improve the access but helps lower the
cost so we have this community the acts
as a portal to therapy which improves
the access lowers the cost what if now
because of that that meant less
dependency on the insurance companies
where it doesn’t cost an arm and a leg
to pay for therapy to seek a
professional giving us all more off
to choose from and finally what if we
take some of the day to hear some of the
resources that we’re learning and we go
to other communities offline communities
around the world to teach people how to
sustainably handle their own mental
health within that community because by
doing that this ultimately feeds back
into the community and the positive
cycle repeats and this is how we’re
going to change mental health around the
world and do you remember those sack of
problems the stigma access and cost what
about a sack of solutions one worth
through this idea we can lower the
stigma improve the access which helps
bring down the cost but it starts with
you and tonight I’d like to leave you
with one final thought a couple weeks
ago out of curiosity I wanted to see
what was my mom’s last email to me
before she passed away because she would
often send me these really great quotes
with pictures on them and sure enough a
month before she passed she sent me a
quote baba by Bob Marley that I would
like to share with you you never know
how strong you are until being strong is
the only choice you have we have a
choice to make
we can either take our past life
struggles it’s a fall victim to be the
victim or we could be the lion and to
leverage our past life struggles to help
people going through the same thing
today to leverage our life resume and to
use it as an opportunity to help someone
that’s going through it today because I
promise you this as you begin helping
people you’re going to feel really good
but it’s as you continue helping people
you’re going to ask yourself one of the
most powerful questions there is what
else am i capable of thank you
[Applause]
[Music]
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