Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Sara Thomas. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Sara, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Let’s start with the story of your mission. What should we know?

Ask The Stubborn Optimist LLC (ATSO) is a mental health advocacy company dedicated to breaking the stigma surrounding mental health, plus connecting people with the mental health resources and support they need. I founded ATSO because as someone who personally lives with severe chronic mental health issues, I know how prevalent and harmful the stigma surrounding mental health can be. I felt called to found a company that could help change that. The name for ATSO was inspired by the fact many people with mental health issues may not feel comfortable asking the mental health questions they really want to ask. With the stigma around mental health, it can be difficult to feel comfortable speaking up and asking for help. I know it took me a long time to feel comfortable opening up about my mental health and receiving the help I needed. So ATSO is here to answer not only the mental health questions people do ask, but also the questions that people with mental health issues may want to ask, but do not yet feel comfortable doing so.
For much of my mental health journey, especially in the beginning, I felt alone in my struggle. This loneliness led to me feeling ostracized, and like I did not deserve help. Which of course is false, because we all deserve access to the help we need. So I founded ATSO, so that no one would ever need to feel alone in their mental health journey again. Thanks to ATSO, I have been able to help people worldwide with their mental health, spread awareness, and create a community of people who, every day, become more comfortable with their mental health.
Additionally, at ATSO, we donate 5% of all proceeds, even from brand deals, to the mental health nonprofit, To Write Love On Her Arms (TWLOHA). We do this because we believe in giving back to the community, and want to help inspire other companies and organizations in all industries to donate a percentage of their proceeds to nonprofits that make a positive impact on the world.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

My name is Sara Thomas, and I am a multiracial woman from Massachusetts, USA. My entire life, I have been fascinated by other languages, cultures, history, psychology, and people. These interests have definitely influenced both my educational and career paths. I have my B.A. in Art History from UCLA, and am currently pursuing my M.S. in Psychology from SNHU. With a professional background in human resources, recruiting, plus diversity and inclusion, I decided to make a change and start a mental health advocacy company. With the break of Covid in 2020, I really felt compelled to find a way to help others on a deeper level, and use my skills to help improve the general quality of life for all. As mental health relates to all parts of our lives, but there is a harmful stigma surrounding it, I felt especially drawn to mental health awareness. When coming up with the idea for Ask The Stubborn Optimist LLC (ATSO), I drew on a lot of my personal experiences living with mental health. While attending UCLA, I began to be more open about my mental health, and I realized this led to everyone in my network and their network of friends and family feeling comfortable coming to me with mental health questions. I realized that many of us have questions we want to ask about mental health, but don’t really know where to start or feel comfortable asking. All of these experiences led to me founding ATSO, a mental health advocacy company dedicated to spreading mental health awareness, breaking the mental health stigma, and connecting people with mental health resources and support in a user-friendly way. At ATSO, we offer our free blog full of coping mechanism guides and mental health resources, plus we offer personalized mental health guidance and support sessions to help people along their mental health journey. Our ATSO Shop also offers products for raising mental health awareness, mental health friendly organizational tools, and we are always adding more products for mental health support.
I am most proud of how ATSO helps people feel less alone in their mental health journey, and how the people we have worked with feel more comfortable after talking with us. It is a gift to be able to help so many people, and I am so grateful that I, through ATSO, can help people feel more stubbornly optimistic and less alone. Everyone’s mental health matters, and at ATSO, we really care about you and your mental health, no matter what.

How did you build your audience on social media?

I built my audience from scratch on social media, and actually started growing the ATSO audience before I even officially made ATSO a company. I started posting on social media with the goal of reaching my ideal audience – those struggling with mental health- and letting them know that they are not alone. That I believe in them, and am here for them. I started off mainly with posts and graphics, but then ventured more into reels, which is when I started to see more growth on my Instagram specifically. I focused on one social media platform to begin with, Instagram, and first became comfortable posting and showing up consistently there. I have found authenticity to be the best approach when posting on social media, because people want to see the real you. You don’t have to share every part of your life, but when you do show up, show up authentically.
I keep my content aligned with ATSO’s mission of spreading mental health awareness and breaking the stigma, but sometimes play around with styles, settings, transitions, and audio. Once I felt comfortable with Instagram as a Creator, I then started sharing my content to other social media platforms, like TikTok, YouTube, Tumblr, and Facebook. While Instagram is where most of my audience is, I still like posting to all of the platforms, because ATSO is about reaching out and offering mental health help, love, and support, no matter where our audience may be.

What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?

A lesson I had to unlearn was that my imposter syndrome is not right, it’s just loud and always happy to share its doubts. It is easy to second-guess ourselves and our content, especially with imposter syndrome, but that doesn’t mean we should stop sharing our content. One time I posted a reel to Instagram, and didn’t feel too confident about it. I was mainly stressing out over whether anyone would even want to see my content or my perspective. Well, that very same video, the one I almost deleted, went on to receive over 8.9 million views. So don’t second guess yourself! Your perspective matters, and if you feel passionately about something, then it’s for a reason. Chase your dreams and goals, understanding that you will have self-doubts, but also understanding that doesn’t mean you have to listen to them.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://askthestubbornoptimist.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/askthestubbornoptimistATSO
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/ask-the-stubborn-optimist-llc/
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/askthestubborno
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC4qV2o6Drp1jwxC0LKNSenw

Image Credits
Sara Thomas, Ask The Stubborn Optimist (ATSO)