Meet Emily – Insight Timer Strategist

More than half of our company is now made up of women! Many of them occupy our most senior positions too. We’ll be sharing some of their stories here. We hope they inspire you as much as they inspire us.
Insight Timer is the top free meditation app on iOS and Android.
Insight Timer is the top free meditation app on iOS and Android.

“I grew up in Sydney, Australia. As a shy tomboy, I’d be found adventuring through my backyard with my two dogs or curled up reading or writing fantasy. I’d always fictionalize myself as the male hero. I wanted to play the compelling protagonist, but I’d only ever seen women play supporting characters.

As I grew up, I became more curious about politics, stirred on by the casual racism I faced as a young Asian Australian in the 1990s. I decided to study law and politics and supported myself at university by working part-time on law reform projects. Getting paid to argue was a delight and a privilege.

A highlight was appearing before a senate inquiry with my professor to argue for the constitutionality of Australian same-sex marriage laws. After I graduated, I joined a law firm that helps Australian Indigenous landowners and worked for a judge on the Australian supreme court.

I loved the intellectual challenge of the law, but I didn’t feel I wasn’t making a difference. There are so many economic, social and psychological barriers to helping people; changing laws is important, but it’s just one step. So, I jumped into the public service then management consultancy, before finding my place in startups. Startup innovation is key to solving the world’s biggest problems: including the mental health epidemic.

It was early in university that I was diagnosed with a mental illness, which thankfully led to my introduction to mindfulness. (“Oh I can’t meditate, my thoughts never stop”, I explained in my first counseling session. My counselor suggested we meditate on my thoughts, which intrigued me enough to try it.) A decade later, mindfulness not only helps me manage my mental health – it’s how I discover more about myself and our world.

I work in Insight Timer’s Strategy Team, where every day we try to positively shape the future of mental wellness and meditation. To work at a company that also celebrates women and our stories is a dream come true. I wish my younger self could have read every post shared this month – I would have rewritten the gender of my heroes.”

Meditation. Free.
Always.