Welcome back to Being Invested. In this absorbing Ep5, I'm joined by Marine Mallinson, datatech business-builder, cross-cultural navigator, status quo questioner and now an investor in mental healthcare innovations. Marine's story starts in Western France and takes us on a journey of bold adventuring, and then returning with powerful focus to what is most meaningful and essential. She reflects on the excitement and empowerment of entrepreneurship in Asia, the value of taking time to pause and pay attention, and how grief has led her to purpose. She is passionate and intentional about finding new and scaled solutions for people suffering with mental health globally, and those around them. I found it refreshing and thought provoking to talk with Marine about her life and to hear the coherence of her own personal story with the work she’s doing. I very much hope you enjoy the conversation, too, and thank you for listening!

WHAT'S IN STORE

• "I don't want to repeat things that have already been done, I just don't want to follow. There is also just simply a sense of the excitement of discovery."
• "Back then, if you were an entrepreneur (in France), it's basically because chances were you failed at school, right? ... In Asia it was the opposite. It was like, 'well, of course you're going to just go and start your business and here is the money and who are you going to talk to first? And who do you want to team up with?' "
• "I knew who I was, I never felt like I had to lose myself into all (the diversity of Asia). I felt, on the contrary, that I had much to learn, to complement that self that I was quite clear about already. It felt like I was an open recipient of something. I was very welcoming of all this diversity and these different approaches ... It's this appetite, this curiosity, but not at the risk of losing myself, not at the risk of having to adapt so much that I forget what works for me and what I like to do and how I like to interact with people."
• "There are attitudes, some might call them values, that were quite prevalent in the work environment ...when I came to Asia. In France... it was 'you work, you're diligent, you're disciplined, but without necessarily an awful lot of joy attached to it. In Asia, I learned there is a gentler way to get things done without giving away the discipline and the hard work ... being able to pause, take pleasure in the little things of everyday life."
• "Asking for money is an integral part of running a business as an entrepreneur, and you should try to enjoy it because it's bloody hard and it's constant."
• "I think you just have to be in denial, honestly, to be an entrepreneur, especially when a young woman in the tech world in China."
• "We badly need innovation when it comes to helping people who suffer from mental health conditions and helping the people who help them as well - their families and everyone who gets in contact with them. Because what people don't say about mental health is that it is contagious, de facto, right? Anyone who has had someone in their lives who suffered from mental health knows that deeply. It absolutely creates chaos in people's lives, right? Not just the one with an illness."
• "It's just not one pill or one device, it's the continuum of mental health care, starting with prevention. It's just a fantastic time to be doing what I do."

MUSIC: Pink Floyd

QUOTE: Le sel et le vent (salt and wind) - the title and underlying meaning of the (as yet untranslated) book by France Quéré

PODCAST: The Rest is Politics, The Tim Ferriss Show, The Huberman Lab

BOOK: Cyrano de Bergerac, Edmond Rostand

Thank you for tuning in! I'd love your feedback, and if you'd like to suggest a guest, please message me on LinkedIn.

GRATITUDE

Sound: Alexander Russell

Design: Sophie Hardy

Music: Tom McKean

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