David Olusegun

Hi 👋🏿

I’m David. I’m driven by faith and committed to purpose. My work is simple: build and invest in consumer brands that make lives better and leave a positive legacy.

For over a decade, I’ve worked across CPG, entertainment, and media with global players.

I'm also privileged to advise founders and corporations on building products that truly serve people and I speak on faith, entrepreneurship and brand leadership with a focus on real-world impact and integrity.

Honoured to be recognised by Powerful Media, Music Week, KPMG Entrepreneur of the Year, HSBC x Black Business Week Top Entrepreneur and the UK’s Top 100 African Business Leaders, but the mission stays the same: help brands serve people, do good with excellence and integrity and honour God.

Reach My Team👇🏾

📧 Speaking & Commercial: adam@howtobeiconic.co
📧 Press Enquiries: press@howtobeiconic.co

Co-Founder & Co-CEO

CCV is a venture builder that partners with purpose-driven creators to launch global CPG brands. We are a creative-led team with strong end-to-end commercial expertise that provides the complete infrastructure to launch, build and scale these pioneering brands.

Our goal is to give our clients the opportunity to build something bigger than their personal brand, receive ownership rather than just another endorsement deal and leverage their following into a long-term future through building impactful businesses.

Our operating model is to work together with the creator as a co-founding team and enable them with the right infrastructure, tools, support, and capital. We love working with creators to change the world, one brand at a time. We believe it’s time we build businesses that shift the power paradigm to the hands of the creators. It’s what gets us up in the morning, it’s in our DNA and we are irretrievably obsessed with collective success by working with CCV you’ll be working with vested partners committed to global success!

Sometimes it’s hard to trust God, especially when things don’t seem to be going according to plan. 

This is me encouraging you to trust Jesus; He will guide you and set you on the right path. He has good plans for us, plans to give us hope and a future.

“Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding.” — Proverbs 3:5

Building and Investing in Purpose-Driven Consumer Brands | Angel Investor | Keynote Speaker

This is your reminder that this year, God should come first.

Before the plans and before asking everyone else.
Start with God and let Him take the lead.

“But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.” — Matthew 6:33

God is good. Always.

Even when we don’t see the full picture, He is working things out for our good. 

As we step into a new month, this is your sign to trust Him and lean on Him. 
He knows where He’s leading you. 


“For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”
— Jeremiah 29:11

Welcome to February, everyone🤍

Take a moment to think about the fact that Jesus laid down His life knowing you and I might not ever choose Him. What a love.

That sacrifice is exactly why life can only be found in Him.

“I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” (John 14:6)

Have a blessed Sunday.

No matter how impossible the situation seems, remember this: with God, there are no limits. 
 
Mountains move, chains break, and the unseen becomes reality when His power is at work. 

Trust Him, lean on Him and watch the impossible become possible.

Have a blessed Sunday.

Unilever isn’t “testing” India anymore. They’re committing.

Quietly but decisively, Unilever is doubling down on India’s premium beauty market with science-led, clean, founder-driven businesses.

Their VC arm just followed on in Secret Alchemist, a clean fragrance brand they first backed last year. 

At the same time, they joined the Series A for SkinInspired, a science-first skincare brand they initially invested in back in 2024.

Unilever has been clear: beauty and personal care need to drive two-thirds of future revenue. And when you look at where they’re placing bets, two markets keep coming up: the US and India.

India, in particular, is being treated as a premium innovation engine, not just an emerging market.

Since 2023, Unilever has backed or acquired 8 Indian beauty businesses, heavily skewed toward skincare and haircare.

The headline move? The $342m acquisition of Minimalist, often called “India’s The Ordinary.”

The pattern is obvious:
✅ Clinical or science-backed positioning
✅ Clean, credible formulations
✅ Brands that scale digitally first, then retail
✅ Founders who understand modern consumers, not legacy playbooks

As Unilever’s CEO put it, building a future-fit portfolio means going all in on beauty, wellbeing, and growth markets.

This is what that actually looks like in practice. They’re buying the disruption early and in the markets that will define the next decade.

Is it time to stop calling Unilever a consumer goods company?

Unilever Indonesia just sold SariWangi  for $89.5 million (Rp1.5 trillion), a brand that has been a staple in Indonesian homes since the 1970s. 

Just last month, they offloaded their Ice Cream business (The Magnum Ice Cream Company, Ben & Jerry’s). 

This is also the last of Unilever’s traditional tea brands, after selling its global tea unit (ekaterra) in 2022, including LIPTON Teas and Infusions and PG Tips.

The move signals a clear shift toward high-margin Beauty and Wellbeing, leaving legacy commodity businesses behind. 

SariWangi may be iconic, but it only contributed ~2.7% of Unilever Indonesia’s revenue; a sign that focus now outweighs nostalgia.

The Strategy: From “Everything for Everyone” to “Powerhouse Specialisation.”

✅ Fame ≠ Future: Legacy brands are being cut if they don't hit "Power Brand" growth targets.

✅ Margin over Volume: They are exiting "commodity" categories (Tea/Ice Cream) to focus on high-margin Beauty, Wellness and Personal Care.

✅ The 30-Brand Rule: CEO Hein Schumacher is narrowing the global focus to 30 "Power Brands" that drive 75% of turnover.

The question: is this the bold move the market has been waiting for, or is it stripping away what made Unilever Unilever?

The $11B Strategy: How ŌURA Beat Apple and Fitbit Without Competing With Them

It’s easy to look at ŌURA now and call it a huge success. But, back in 2015, they were a tiny Finnish startup trying to break into a highly dominated space. 

On paper, they should’ve been crushed: a sleep-tracking ring sounded kind of weird back then.

Yet here we are: an $11 billion valuation and over $1 billion in revenue in 2025.

Oura’s rise is proof that a clear vision can change how an entire category thinks.

Here are the key takeaways for any founder trying to carve out a space in a crowded market:

 ✅ Don’t Outrun Giants. Redefine your Race.
Apple and Fitbit (now part of Google) were locked in an arms race over "activity tracking." Instead of trying to build a better step counter, Oura focused on recovery and readiness. They realised that while only 5% of people exercise daily, 100% of people sleep every night. 

If you can’t be the biggest player in an existing category, build a new one where you own the narrative.

✅ From Product to Symbol
ŌURA’s decision to build a ring wasn’t just an aesthetic choice; it was a strategic one. They built something footballers, elite athletes and celebrities proudly wear. By turning data into jewellery, they escaped price wars with plastic gadgets and became part of people’s identity. 

When your product signals who someone is, not just what it does, you earn the right to stay premium.

✅ Move from Product to Platform
Oura didn't stay a sleep tracker. They evolved into a health intelligence system. This is a huge lesson for any builder: Don’t just sell a one-off tool. Build something that gets smarter the more a person uses it. 

When your product becomes an essential part of someone’s daily decision-making, you’ve moved from a "nice-to-have" to a "must-have."

✅ Master the "Omnichannel" Pivot
For years, Oura was a darling of the Direct-to-Consumer (DTC) world. But to hit the $1 billion mark, they knew they couldn't stay on their own website forever. They moved aggressively into Amazon, Target, and Best Buy.  

DTC is great for building a brand, but "Omnichannel" is how you scale to a billion. Go where your customers already are.


The big takeaway? The future won’t be built by brands trying to beat giants at their own game, but by those creating something new. 

When a brand knows who it is for and what it stands for, revenue becomes a result, not the goal.

It's January 2026, and I need you to get this through your skull: This year dies with you either being audacious or being forgotten. 

"Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened." - Matthew 7:7

You know what your problem is? You're knocking too softly.

Actually, scratch that. You're not even knocking. You're standing outside the door, practising your knock, wondering if it's the right time, the right door, the right knock. 

Meanwhile, someone with half your talent just kicked the door down and took what you've been "preparing" for.

There's no middle ground. There's no "strategic patience." There's no "right timing."  

Let me tell you about the day I stopped being a spiritual coward. I'm sitting in church, and the pastor reads that verse about knocking. 

But then he says something that messed me up: "Some of you are knocking like you're apologising for existing. God doesn't respond to whispers from people who should be roaring."

That same day, I went home and did five things that my "reasonable" self said would ruin me.

You can find this in my newsletter. Link in the comments 🔗

Happy to be featured in Entrepreneur UK where I share the lesson I learnt from spending 6 years learning CPG logistics the hard way.

Late-night calls about stranded inventory. Spreadsheets that stole my weekends. Retail relationships hanging by a thread because of delivery failures.

Nobody warns you about this part.

Everyone wants to talk about the sexy stuff:

→ The packaging design 
→ The influencer partnership 
→ The TikTok moment that goes viral 
→ The big retail meeting where the buyer says yes

But here's what I've learned scaling brands thousands of stores and across many continents:

Logistics isn't the backend of your business. It IS your business.

Get it right? You scale. Get it wrong? The best product in the world won't save you.

I've watched brands die with full warehouses. I've seen founders get their dream listing and then collapse under it. I've made mistakes that cost me months of momentum.

So I wrote everything down. The 6 things I wish someone had told me before I launched my first CPG brand:

1. Why your supply chain partners should be treated like co-founders
2. The lead time math that will either save you or sink you
3. How inventory killed more promising brands than bad products ever did
4. What actually matters when choosing a 3PL (hint: it's not price)
5. The mindset shift from firefighting to system-building
6. Why regional dominance beats national ambition every time

This isn't theory. This is scar tissue.

Full article in Entrepreneur UK 👇🏾

https://lnkd.in/eZb4ES-E

Thank you Patricia Cullen for the feature.

This might sting a little. No one owes you anything.

❌ No one owes you a repost.
❌ No one owes you a loan.
❌ No one owes you a handout.

Not your friends, not your family and not your partner.

YOU are responsible for your own breakthrough.

God has given you the tools, but He won’t do your push-ups for you.

He gave you the vision, now you provide the discipline.

He gave you the talent, now you provide the practice.

He gave you the opportunity, now you provide the courage to say "yes."

The "Handout Mentality" kills more dreams than failure ever will.

Because the moment your success depends on someone else's generosity, they control your limit.

Stop waiting for the perfect connection or the big break.

Pick up the tools you already have. Use the resources currently within your reach. Start where you are, with what you’ve got.

Stop looking for a hand up. Start putting your hands to work.

Your breakthrough is on the other side of your own effort.

This is your reminder to push yourself and open the doors in front of you.

The help you are waiting for will find you while you’re already working, not while you’re waiting.

Who is really funding the "Luxury Powerhouse"? Hint: It’s not just the banks.

The Saks Global Chapter 11 filing just pulled back the curtain on a staggering reality. 

Looking at the Top 30 unsecured creditors list, it’s clear that Saks Fifth Avenue and Neiman Marcus weren't just struggling with a "luxury slowdown".

They were being floated by their own vendors and service providers.

The numbers are alarming:
➡️ The Brand Dependency
The "Who's Who" of luxury fashion is essentially acting as an interest-free bank for the retailer:
• CHANEL: $136 Million
• Kering (Gucci, Saint Laurent): $60 Million
• Capri Holdings Limited (Michael Kors/Jimmy Choo): $33 Million
• LVMH: $26 Million

➡️  The Hidden Cost of Operations
It’s not just about dresses and handbags. The filing reveals the massive "tax" of running a modern digital behemoth. 
Even in a cash crunch, the bills for tech and "strategy" didn't stop:
• PwC (Consulting/Audit): $31 Million
• Meta (Advertising): $12 Million
• Google (Search/Ads): $9.6 Million

When you owe CHANEL $136M and Google nearly $10M simultaneously, the "middleman" model is officially in crisis.

We are watching a permanent power shift. 

Luxury houses are no longer just "partners"; they are major stakeholders in whether this restructuring succeeds.

If they decide to stop shipping inventory to protect their own cash flow, the "turnaround" ends before it begins.

How Kourtney Kardashian Built a $30M Gummy Empire in 16 Months.

Lemme, her supplement brand, went from zero to $30 million in revenue in 16 months.

And here’s what makes it even more impressive: In November 2025 alone, they drove $13 million through TikTok Shop.

In January 2026, Lemme is in 2,000+ Walmart stores nationwide, growing 25% month-over-month. 

The brand has generated 53,000+ creator videos from 13,000+ affiliates who actually wanted to promote the products.

Lemme’s trajectory looks more like a VC-backed startup than a celebrity brand. And that’s exactly the point.

Let me show you what Kourtney Kardashian and her co-founder Simon Huck actually did:

✅ September 2022: Launch
- Three SKUs (gummy supplements)
- DTC + Erewhon (premium positioning)

✅ Month 6 (March 2023):
- Revenue: ~$5M (annualised)
- Expanded to Ulta Beauty, REVOLVE, & Amazon
- Still primarily DTC

✅ Month 12 (September 2023):
- Revenue: ~$20M (annualised)
- Entered Target nationwide
- 25% month-over-month growth rate established

✅ Month 16 (January 2024):
- Revenue: $30M+ total
- Growing 25% MoM consistently

Now, this is where most celebrity brands plateau or decline.

To read the full breakdown and analysis, check out my latest Creators Blueprint newsletter

Link in comments.

Kraft Heinz is splitting in two! Is the era of the "Mega-Conglomerate" officially dead?

Steve Cahillane, former CEO of Kellogg Company, just took the wheel as CEO this month. 

He led Kellogg’s through one of the packaged food industry’s biggest and most successful breakups (and the subsequent $36B sale of Kellanova to Mars).

Now, he is back to run the same play.
By H2 2026, the $26 billion giant will be gone. 

In its place? Two companies with two very different missions.

I call it separating the "Racers" from the "Anchors":

The Racers (Global Taste Elevation Co. ~$15.4B)
• Brands: Heinz, Philadelphia, Kraft Mac & Cheese.
• Mission: High-velocity growth, "Flavour Tech" innovation, and global expansion.

The Anchors (North American Grocery Co. ~$10.4B)
• Brands: OSCAR MAYER FOODS, Kraft Singles, Lunchables.
• Mission: Operational excellence and supply chain efficiency. The "Staples of the American Kitchen."

You can’t run a global condiments engine and a domestic meat/cheese business with the same playbook. 

They need different capital, different leadership, and different speeds.

My Prediction: We are seeing the birth of a new "CPG Blueprint." Kellanova did it. Unilever is doing it. Now Kraft Heinz.

Investors no longer want "The Biggest Company." They want the Most Focused.

Is focus the new scale for 2026? Or will these smaller entities just become easier targets for M&A?

The $32B Question: Why Kevin Hart Just Became a Shareholder in the Company That Owns Elvis, Ali, and Beckham.

Kevin Hart quietly did something that should make every creator, athlete and entertainer rethink how they’re building their business. 

He became a shareholder in Authentic Brands Group, a $32 billion empire that owns the rights to Elvis Presley, Muhammad Ali, Marilyn Monroe, David Beckham, Shaquille O’Neal, Reebok, Champion, and about 50 other iconic brands.

He signed a deal to license his name to ABG and became an owner in the ABG platform.

The structure:

➡️ Hart co-owns and co-manages the “Kevin Hart” brand
➡️ Hart becomes shareholder in ABG (undisclosed stake)
➡️ ABG’s platform: $32 billion in annual retail sales
➡️ ABG’s has 2k+ licensing partners across 150 countries
➡️ ABG’s portfolio: 50+ brands reaching nearly 1 billion followers

Kevin Hart was already winning with:

✅ 292 million social media followers globally
✅ $108 million earned in 2024 alone
✅ HARTBEAT Productions (content empire)
✅ Gran Coramino (tequila brand)
✅ Fabletics (fitness partnership)
✅ VITAHUSTLE (wellness brand)
✅ Hartfelt (premium dog food)
✅ Partnerships w/ Qatar Airways, Netflix, JPMorganChase, DraftKings Inc., Verizon, C4 

So the question you ask is, why would someone already this successful give up control of their name to a licensing company?

The answer reveals something important about how wealth gets built in 2026.

I unpacked it in my newsletter. Link in the comments. 🔗 ⬇️

Welcome to 2026: The Year Beyoncé Became a Billionaire 

The year where AI writes your emails, autonomous cars actually work, and oh yeah Beyoncé officially joined the billionaire club.

Not through a tech exit. Not through a SPAC. Not through crypto or NFTs or any of the other ways people accidentally became billionaires in the 2020s.

Through something far more impressive: Actually building a diversified empire brick by brick over 30 years.

According to Forbes’ latest calculations, Beyoncé Giselle Knowles-Carter’s net worth has officially crossed $1.1 billion as of January 2026, making her the first Black woman to achieve billionaire status primarily through music and entertainment ventures.

But here’s what makes this fascinating. Only about $300 million of that came from music.

The other $800 million? That came from Beyoncé treating her career like a business from day one.

Let me show you how a girl from Houston turned vocal cords and strategic genius into a ten-figure fortune and why her playbook might be more valuable than her discography.

Beyoncé’s $1.1 Billion Net Worth Breakdown (2026):

💰 Music & Touring: ~$300M
💰 Parkwood Entertainment: ~$250M
💰 Ivy Park x Adidas: ~$150M
💰 Real Estate Portfolio: ~$180M
💰 Investment Portfolio: ~$120M
💰 Art Collection: ~$100M

Get the full breakdown of how she built and scaled on my newsletter. Link in comments.

Ralph Lauren never went to fashion school, yet he built a $7 Billion empire. 

Ralph Lifshitz was a college dropout from a struggling family in the Bronx.

In his high school yearbook, under "Life Goal," he wrote just one word: Millionaire.

But the path was anything but a straight line.

In 1967, while working as a tie salesman, he pitched a line of wide, colourful ties.

His boss shut him down instantly: “The world isn’t ready for Ralph Lauren.”

He could have listened. He could have played it safe. 

Instead, he:
✅ Started working out of a single drawer in the Empire State Building.
✅ Hand-delivered his ties to small boutiques.
✅ Walked away from Bloomingdale's, his dream client, when they asked him to remove his label.

The result? Six months later, Bloomingdale's called him back. They didn’t just want his ties; they gave him his own shop.

Lifshitz realised something most founders miss: People don't buy products. They buy dreams.

He didn’t just sell a polo shirt; he sold the feeling of a summer in the Hamptons.
He didn’t sell a blazer; he sold the "Old Money" legacy.

Ralph’s story reminds us that vision, persistence, and courage can outweigh credentials. 

If you’re willing to chase your dream on your own terms, you can create a legacy that others said was impossible.

While the world worries about an economic slowdown, Africa is projected to grow by at least 4.3% in 2026.

We’re seeing a fundamental shift in the soul of Africa’s economy. 

The continent is finally moving from the "Era of Extraction" to the "Era of Execution."

The old math never added up:

Export raw cocoa for $3,000/ton and import Belgian or Swiss chocolate for $30,000/ton.

Export crude oil and buy back expensive petrol.

As of January 2026, the script is flipping.

1. Energy: The import paradox is ending. In Nigeria, the Dangote Refinery is already meeting nearly 40% of the country's petrol demand and exporting to other countries, including the US.

2. Value Creation: In Ghana and Côte d’Ivoire, the cocoa industry is no longer just about harvests; it’s about processing. In 2025, Nigeria’s non-oil exports hit a record $6.1B, driven by finished goods, not just raw materials.

3. Trading within Africa: AfCFTA is finally doing the work. Countries like Kenya, Egypt, and Rwanda are moving industrial goods duty-free across borders. They’re no longer just feeding global supply chains; they’re building continental ones.

4. Local Production at Scale: Nigeria’s "774-Product Strategy" is a game changer. By identifying one exportable product in every single LGA, they are connecting local talent directly to a $3.4 trillion market.

For decades, Africa supplied the world. Now, Africa is supplying itself.

Goods are moving across borders and oceans. Value is staying on the continent, not leaking out of it.

Africa is building internal markets, regional supply chains, and economic muscle.

And for the first time in decades, the continent is finally in control of its own growth.

Africa Doesn’t Need More Fintechs. It Needs Better Infrastructure.

When most people hear “Invest in Africa,” what they really think of is real estate, fintechs and flashy startups.

But Africa is not one market. It is 54 regulatory systems and hundreds of micro-economies.

If I had £1M to deploy in 2026, I wouldn't chase the hype. 

I’d invest in the "Industrialized Rails", the quiet systems that fix the bottlenecks holding the continent back.

Here is the high-conviction roadmap:

✅ Agro-Processing & Value Addition ⇢ Africa produces 70% of the world's cocoa but retains <5% of the chocolate market's value.

The Play: Small-scale processing plants for cocoa, cashew, or grains to turn raw exports into finished goods.

✅ Energy as a Service (B2B) ⇢ National grids can't fuel industrial growth. Manufacturers aren't buying "green energy", they are buying uptime.

The Play: Reliable solar and storage for factories looking to escape diesel volatility and 24/7 power outages.

✅ Pharma Supply Chains ⇢ With the African Medicines Agency (AMA) taking off, the 80% import dependency is a massive opening.

The Play: Tech-enabled distribution hubs connecting local producers to fragmented pharmacies.

✅ Trade Logistics & Warehousing ⇢ Borders are opening, but storage is missing.

The Play: Cold storage and Grade-A warehouses along major trade routes and "dry ports."

✅ Foundational Digital Infrastructure ⇢ The world is building apps; smart money is building what powers them.

The Play: Data centers, fiber optics, and towers; the physical backbone of the digital economy.

My Take: The biggest opportunities are in building the assets the economy actually needs to function.

If you had £1M, which of these five would you back first?

I used to think market research meant decks, data rooms and dashboards. Then I heard a story about Bernard Arnault (CEO of LVMH).

He’s travelling in New York, gets chatting to a taxi driver, and asked if he knew who the president of France was at the time, but the driver replied "I've never heard of Georges Pompidou in my life, but I know what Christian Dior Couture is!"

..and that was the start of LVMH. On my trip to Nigeria I wanted to move through the city normally, talk to the drivers, speak to shop owners, listen to people who weren’t filtered through surveys or incentives, and understand how they actually think about brands, money and value.

So I asked uncomplicated questions, what do you buy again and again, what feels worth the money, what do you trust, what do you avoid, what feels overhyped but everywhere.

What came back wasn’t neat or scalable or easily turned into a slide, but it was honest, and in many ways far more useful than another report. Because people don’t speak in frameworks. They speak in habits, frustrations, shortcuts, pride and emotion, and those things rarely show up cleanly in data.

The reminder for me and maybe for other founders, investors and operators is that markets are human before they are mathematical. Data can tell you what happened, but it almost never tells you why, and the “why” is where brand, loyalty and long-term value are actually built.

If all you ever do is look at screens, you’ll optimise for numbers and miss the truth. 

Sometimes the real work is getting closer, listening longer, and being willing to hear things that don’t immediately fit your strategy.

Markets aren’t charts. They’re people. 

And people will always tell you more than a dashboard ever could, if you take the time to ask and actually listen.

Founder at LVS Hub | Helping brands and retailers create omnichannel live shopping experiences

Winnie Akadjo has a decade of professional experience in sales and digital marketing within technology startups across venture capital, social media, and e-commerce environments, having worked at Benefit Cosmetics, Zipcar, Groupon, Founders Factory and TikTok.

Over the last two years, Winnie founded LVS Hub, a marketing agency specialising in helping brands and retailers expand their audiences and drive sales through innovative live and video shopping technology, including TikTok Shop. Her entrepreneurial success includes winning grant funding from Foundervine and hosting workshops with the British Library. Winnie has also participated in panels with organisations such as AppsFlyer, Rarely Heard Voices and Carta.

As a care-leaver, Winnie's journey has deeply informed her understanding of resilience and the importance of mental well-being. Currently, she is building Aeli, a platform to help trauma-informed practitioners provide a better continuity of care to their clients by bridging the 168-hour gap between therapy sessions. 

Alongside her entrepreneurial pursuits, Winnie enjoys running, cooking, and exploring her Christian faith. She is also the proud mother of an eighteen-year-old son.

Winnie Akadjo

Today marks week 22 of building Aeli Health, and I’m very grateful for the progress we’ve made so far. In the last five months, we have:

✅ Built and are growing a community of our ideal customers who are readily providing feedback to support our product trajectory. 

✅ We are forming a team of experts, providing know-how and best practices across AI, mental health, psychology, product innovation and the public sector. 

✅ We're joining communities that can support our growth. I am now a member of the The British Psychological Society (BPS), MEXA by Wellcome Trust & Neuromatch, and the AI Mental Health Collective by Dr. Rachel Wood, PhD. 

✅ We have published our first report, titled ‘How Can Therapists Use AI Ethically?’ following the webinar discussion on 13th November 2025 with licensed psychologist and cyberpsychology expert, Dr Rachel Wood.

✅ I have completed my first term at City St George’s, University of London, studying an MSc in Psychology. 

We have a lot of exciting plans for 2026, and I can’t wait to get them started. 

As always, a big thank you to all the individuals who have contributed and supported our journey to date. 

#aeli #mentalhealth #startup

Bridging the gap between therapy sessions | Incoming MSc in Psychology | EMDR Certified | People’s Choice Award Winner

In 2017, I started therapy for the first time through a self-referral to a women’s therapy centre. 

Between the sessions, I struggled to manage the emotions that were coming up, and I used alcohol to escape the difficult feelings I was unable to cope with on my own. 

There’s a 168-hour gap between sessions where clients are left to interpret, practise, and cope on their own. Support is at its thinnest, especially if you’re accessing therapy through publicly funded services.

Research in this space has shown that in 2023/2024, out of 1.8 million referrals to talking therapy, only 38% of people completed treatment, and of that, 17% reliably recovered from their mental health disorder. 

It’s my lived experience and the existing problem that inspires me to build Aeli Health, because therapy doesn’t just happen in the room, and with the use of AI, we can bridge the gap. 

We’re building an infrastructure that allows therapists to offer extended support, share therapeutic tools, and help clients stay connected and aligned with therapy. 

In our executive report, “How Can Therapists Use AI Ethically?”, we explore how technology can strengthen the therapeutic alliance beyond the session without compromising trust or clinical integrity.

👉 Download the full report here: [https://lnkd.in/e25Xpb6A]

What happens between sessions matters.

#aeli #healthtech #mentalhealth #artificialintelligence #research

Studying psychology has taught me that it’s not that people don’t have mental health conditions, it’s that we’re too quick to diagnose without considering the biological, social and psychological context of an individual. 

We also don’t attempt to solve the biological, social and psychological problems that they are experiencing before affirming our diagnosis. 

For example, experiencing financial difficulties can lead to feelings of anxiety and low mood, and if this happens continuously for a long period of time, the individual may become depressed. Now, if we provide that individual with antidepressants before helping them secure a job or increase their financial stability, we’re essentially keeping them trapped in that state of depression and prolonged dependence on medication without dealing with the root cause. 

Another example can be a woman with Premenstrual Dysphoric Disorder (PMDD) around the same time every month, being diagnosed with Bipolar Disorder because we’re not taking into account the biological components of her cycle and how it’s impacting her mood, and once again, being diagnosed before dealing with the root cause. 

Another example could be living in an area where you feel unsafe, so you prefer to stay at home instead of going outside. This can easily be labelled as social isolation or social anxiety without considering the social context of why an individual wants to stay indoors. 

As you can see, there are several factors to consider when diagnosing mental health, and I know Aeli Health can play a pivotal part in helping therapists make holistic recommendations between sessions. 

Image courtesy of The Present Psychologist

#psychology #diagnosticdisparities #mentalhealth #aelihealth

One of my mental health goals in 2026 is to monitor the situations, individuals and instances that trigger me, and in the last two weeks, it has been writing an essay about whether psychology is still constrained by the historical biases that shaped its history. 

Naturally, I was very optimistic about writing about Black mental health, but researching, reading and writing about the history of psychology and its impact on Black mental health left me feeling very exhausted and triggered after submission. 

I’m going to make a video at some point sharing the five things I learned from writing the essay, but for now, I want to extend gratitude to Mind for their brilliant article about racism and mental health and how it’s not unusual to experience feelings of anxiety, frustration and overwhelm. 

I also learned that I was experiencing ‘Vicarious and historical trauma’, which is essentially, re-experiencing traumatic events after seeing or hearing about racism towards someone else, and the realisation of how your racial group has been oppressed over time.

I’m grateful for the article and highly recommend reading it if you’re experiencing something similar in your studies or profession: https://lnkd.in/e3T5CV59 

I managed to calm my nervous system by painting, and it was very therapeutic. 

How do you like my canvas?

#psychology #historicaltrauma #blackmentalhealth #arttherapy

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