May 7, 2025

Therapists Need Therapy Too? Forbes Under30 Who Turned Pain into a Powerful Platform

Therapists Need Therapy Too? Forbes Under30 Who Turned Pain into a Powerful Platform

Learn from Milica Krstic, a Forbes Under 30 psychotherapist about her personal journey through trauma and the creation of Safe Space, an online platform providing free, global mental health support.

Milica's journey began with the loss of friends to suicide during the COVID pandemic.

In this conversation, Annie and Milica discuss the importance of open communication in startups, the role AI has to play in mental health, and why you should not always put others first.

Trigger Warning: This episode contains discussion and references to suicide, which may be distressing for some listeners. Please take care while listening, and prioritise your mental well-being. Listener discretion is advised.

Learn from Milica Krstic, a Forbes Under 30 psychotherapist about her personal journey through trauma and the creation of Safe Space, an online platform providing free, global mental health support.

Milica's journey began with the loss of friends to suicide during the COVID pandemic.

In this conversation, Annie and Milica discuss the importance of open communication in startups, the role AI has to play in mental health, and why you should not always put others first.

 

Chapters

00:00 Introduction to Milica Krstic and Her Journey

04:44 The Impact of Personal Loss on Mental Health Advocacy

09:53 Creating Safe Spaces: The Birth of an Online Platform

12:31 Navigating Burnout: Lessons Learned

16:44 Building Healthy Routines for Mental Well-being

19:55 Understanding Team Dynamics in Startups

23:36 Overcoming Trust Issues in Team Settings

26:13 Building Inner Safety for Better Relationships

29:30 Cultural Insights on Emotional Well-being

32:30 The Role of AI in Mental Health Support

34:36 Final Thoughts on Improving Mental Health

35:19 Conclusion and Call to Action

 

Follow Milica:

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/millicakrstic

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/milica-krstic888

Website: https://www.milicakrstic.com/

 

Follow me:

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/wenmiao-yu-b37bba151

 

Follow Low to Grow:

Instagram: @lowtogrowpodcast

Say hi at lowtogrowpodcast@gmail.com :)

Please Note:

This podcast is for general awareness and educational purposes only, and should not be considered a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Please consult with qualified mental health professionals for specific concerns or situations. Check out ⁠https://www.mind.org.uk/⁠ for free resources.

Transcript

Low to Grow Podcast - Episode Transcript

Annie Yu WM: Welcome to Low to Grow, the podcast transforming life's toughest moments into personal motivation. I'm Annie, a Forbes under 30 technology founder, whose entrepreneurship journey ran alongside a mental health awakening. In each episode, I sit down with inspiring individuals who have each faced incredible challenges, tackled it head on and emerged stronger on the other side. Together, we'll explore the stories, unpack the lessons that they have learnt, and also understand how they managed to turn challenges into opportunities for personal growth. Whether you're navigating uncertainty in your personal life, or simply looking for motivation to keep going, this is your space for the honest conversations that you will want to hear. If this resonates with you, hit subscribe so you never miss an episode. And if you know someone who's struggling, share this with them. You might just prompt them to take the first step towards better mental health. Now, let's dive in. Today, we're joined by Milica Krstic, a psychologist and body-orientated psychotherapist. I actually first met Milica in Botswana at the Forbes Under 30 Conference. And there, I was really struck by her deeply personal story behind why she does what she does today. After several of her friends attempted suicide, Milica took action to create an online platform that has since provided free therapy to thousands of people across the globe. And Milica was celebrated and honored for this work as a Forbes Under 30 Lister. And in fact, Milica now helps founders to navigate the invisible emotional dynamics shaping the teams in order to build cultures of clarity, trust, and sustainable growth. She is currently also developing an AI-based inner ally tool to make emotional support accessible, private, but still human. And of course, this is all driven by Milica's belief that each individual deserves to feel seen, safe, and supported, and that our most painful moments can become the seeds of something meaningful. And this is what makes her a perfect guest for the podcast Low to Grow today. Milica, it's such a pleasure to have you here. Let me start by asking you, who would you like to be listening to our conversation today?

Milica Krstic: Thank you so much for having me. It's my pleasure as well to be here today with you. I imagine a woman who is sitting at her home and feeling ashamed to step out of her comfort zone and show others what she is developing, thinking about, researching whatever she is doing. So this is for her that is scared to go out and say what she truly believes. I think that there are a lot of us like that out there, but very often we tend to put some masks on in order to feel more comfortable in communities and societies. So deep down there inside, there is a fear that people will reject us, that they will laugh at us. And this is for all those men or women, it doesn't matter, but mostly since I'm woman, I can, you know, I'm woman that very often I feel ashamed and scared. And I think that people who can understand what I'm talking about, this will be mostly helpful to them.

Annie Yu WM: That's a really profound experience, and I really hope that your story will resonate and be able to help some of the listeners today. Let's start from the beginning. How did your personal challenge really inspire you to do your other work and the projects in mental well-being that you have done to date?

Milica Krstic: So basically, in 2020, that summer when COVID pandemic started, I was seeing my friends. We tried to live normal life and to behave like everything is fine. But sadly, later on, I realized that some of my friends attempted suicide and two of them committed suicide. So basically that shocked me. I was so scared, sad, vulnerable, that things like that, they're not happening to someone else somewhere there. They happened to me. I saw that people few days ago before that happened, right? That was one of the lowest points in my life where I was like, you know, I was educated to be psychologist and psychotherapist. So I supposed to see, I supposed to feel. And I just realized that they were those, my friends, they were so very well in pretending that they're okay and not showing how they actually feel that I was not able to realize how they are really. So it was very sad moment for me where I felt like a loser, like a failure, because I was not able to do what I was trained to do, actually, what I studied for. It was five years ago. And actually that moment motivated me to create safe space that we have right now that is helping people to receive help that they deserve.

Annie Yu WM: So this is the online platform that people globally can use to access free psychotherapy. And I've been a user of that before, and I think it's a fantastic resource to have. And when I was using it, I was still based in the UK. And of course, I was able to speak to a psychotherapist from Serbia. So that was really, really special and quite a useful tool. Milica, for your experience during COVID, that was a very dark time for a lot of people. And as you were saying, for you to have spent time with your friends, and then later, a few days later, realize that they had tried to commit suicide. And of course, for you being in the psychotherapy and the psychology profession, that sense of self-judgment that you had on yourself could have been quite damaging, but it seems that you managed to convert that into something that was positive and took action from it. What were your initial reactions when you realized that some of your really close friends tried to commit suicide? Did you have people around you that you could turn to for support?

Milica Krstic: That first initial moment was very damaging, like you said. I was very lost, scared, ashamed, confused. But then I started to speak with my parents and my psychotherapist. I started to talk about it because I realized throughout my education that if you don't talk about your challenges, they seem bigger than they are. So that's what I just used, what I've learned, to talk about the issue that I'm dealing with. When you share it with one person, it becomes smaller. When you share it with three people, then it becomes more real. You can do something with that. It becomes more flexible, right? But then when it's just in your head, it seems impossible, unsolvable, crazy, insane, right? You don't know what to do with it. So basically, I started to speak with people how I feel, and I realized that many people have suicidal thoughts, and that they didn't seek help, that we are not educated well enough, that we need to seek help when we have one negative thought, you know, to do prevention. No, we are taught that when it starts to be very bad, and we start to fall apart, then start to seek help. So actually one of the things that we did, and we are doing in Safe Space, is that we extended our vision to education, because I think it's very important to educate people how to prevent things, not just to heal them and help them in the end, and in some very, very difficult moments in their life, but to learn them how to avoid that, to sense what is happening, to understand what is going on. You know what they say, it's very easy to give advice to someone else, but it's much harder to use that advice in yourself. So very often you will see that psychotherapists, they can help others, they can heal others, but they need their selves, that they need themselves, psychotherapists, who will support them so they can manage and, you know, have their normal life and quality that they are giving to others, that they can keep that silence, calmness, peace within them.

Annie Yu WM: That's actually a really interesting point because I don't think I realized until a bit later in my own kind of mental health awareness journey that therapists and psychotherapists, they too need to see psychotherapists and to have therapy themselves in order to almost have a barrier between what they're taking on from the sessions with the clients and for their own lives internally. And I think, you know, for you, Milica, you saw a problem and you created a solution and you've really turned your personal pain into impact and you've created this platform that has been useful for a lot of people. What did you learn about yourself in the process of creating that first iteration of Safe Space?

Milica Krstic: I learned that I'll put others on the first spot and I'll care about others and in that journey, I'll forget about myself and I'll not take care of myself. And that's one of the as well low points that I met throughout this past three years while I'm leading Safe Space is that we're helping, we're growing, we're trying to add more psychotherapies, to work on marketing and everything. And in one moment, I just realized that I'm burning out, you know? It's just like I didn't realize how bad I am because I'm not sleeping enough and I don't have at that moment social life. That was last August that I'm so into my project to help others so others can get have accessible mental health, feel better, help psychotherapies to gain their licenses by helping more people that collect hours that helps them to receive the license. Doing so many things, but in the end, I didn't care about myself. So literally, that was a burnout for me. And then I took off, I took time off in order to recharge, recollect and I learned that when I'm very passionate about something, I can forget about myself and my health. So that's something very important that I gained as a knowledge throughout this experience that if you don't care, if you don't take care of yourself, your product will just fall apart.

Annie Yu WM: The work that you are doing is to help other people have better emotional well-being, but you gave so much of yourself in that process. And of course, because you are so meaningful and interesting for you, you're almost in the flow state and you don't realize how much of a toll that is taking on you personally and in other areas of your life. So I think that's something that I can probably relate to. I think a lot of founders or just people in some high intensity jobs can really just fall trap to that. It's quite encouraging to hear you talk about your own experience with burnout, because I think a lot of the times, burnout there are different stages. It's not just like a switch. There are many, many steps leading up to that final, final, final crash. And there are actually some signs that people can look at in order to identify that and maybe prevent that. For you, Milica, you decided to take some time off. Was that something that people around you really encouraged you to do?

Milica Krstic: To be honest, I realized that I have a burnout when I wanted to quit, to delete the platform, to tell everyone that we are done and that's it. And then my friend started to say, hey, don't do that. You build this on your own. You did this with your ten fingers, literally by yourself, by your funds, by everything. Wait a second, maybe you just need a break. And then I realized that it's a burnout because literally, I was crying for a month. I was crying and I was not able, you know, when you're that bad, that you cannot open WhatsApp to answer the message. You cannot speak with people. You cannot go out. So it was that bad, but the moment when I realized it's a burnout, it's when I decided to quit, but then all my friends and my parents, they were like, no, no, no, no, don't do that. Don't do that. You just need a break. Then I took a break. It was like literally a month or a little bit more, let's say between 30 and 60 days. And then I said, okay, let's change how this works. Let's make this sustainable. Let's change the organization so this can stay alive in a long run in many, many years. But even though it's very interesting, like I said previously, you can give advice to others. You can help others. You can catch when you're not involved, but when it's your story, sometimes you cannot realize what is happening. And because of that, it's always important to have someone to reflect on, you know, someone always to talk with someone, to talk about what's happening in your life, how you're dealing with that, what kind of strategies, techniques and tools you're using in order to deal with that. Because there is a stigma around the mental health, of course. We always talk about that, but we don't even understand how that is internalized in our lives that such as experts, we cannot sometimes understand that there is mental health issue happening with us, and we help others deal with that. You know, it's a paradox, right? It happened to me, and because of that, I'm speaking from my experience, right?

Annie Yu WM: Mm-hmm, that makes a lot of sense. Since your experience of burning out, what changes have you made in your routine, or what kind of new things have you started doing in order to still be able to work on growing self-space into your vision for it, but to still remain healthy and also emotionally well?

Milica Krstic: So I started to have slow mornings, you know, to wake up and not to have obligations immediately when I wake up. Before my burnout, it was immediately. I wake up, I start to work something, answer emails, have healthy breakfast, go out, have a little walk, so many things, you know? And then I realized that that doesn't work for me. I need a slow morning to slowly wake up, to do a meditation, then to have warm tea or to slowly move my body or go for a walk. So I need slowness in order to be sharp when I'm working. And then I realized when I started to reorganize my life after that burnout, I realized that I'm a very social person, but on the other hand, I'm very introverted. So I was not respecting my own boundaries. And I just realized that after that happened, that as introvert, I need to respect that I love silence, to be by myself, to have slow mornings, to not go out that much, etc. But very often I was like, no, let's go, let's do a million meetings per day, let's go out that night, let's read 20 pages of book, even though I cannot look, my eyes are hurting. Be so productive, you know? And then I realized after that burnout that that's not the way I function, that doesn't work for me. I need to be slow to have parts of my week when I'm very productive, and parts of my week where I'm literally breathing, walking, drinking water, I'm very present. And then when I implemented that slowness, but extreme slowness into my week, I recharged and I learned how to stay productive, to have results, to help people, but as well to nurture myself.

Annie Yu WM: A point about nurturing yourself, I think that's something that perhaps some young professionals can take a while to learn, and I myself, hands up, am one of them, I think similarly to you. When I first started working, and in the really early days of the startup, I would check my emails first thing in the morning, as soon as I open my eyes, and then check my emails before going to bed. And sometimes that's not very productive because things can happen and it can be good news, in which case I'm super excited, or really bad news, in which case then I can't go to sleep, or I just feel stressed as soon as I wake up. So I think your point about having that personal boundaries and finding the tune and the cadence that really works for you, is super important. You've now also started working with founder led teams across Europe, to help them understand the dynamics within their team, in order to build a more productive and better culture. With the founders that you work with, what sort of challenges do you normally see them facing?

Milica Krstic: It's interesting that I see that they're facing the same challenges that I face. So I can help them better because I understand them. In one moment, my team was 120 people and I was me versus 120 people. So that experience with Safe Space literally helped me to understand better founders what they're dealing with, what they need to manage. Everything needs to function and they need to function well. Right now, I'm helping them to maintain healthy relationships within their teams. And you know, very often, startups, they're just about raising money, making results and earning money. And then, very often, they don't understand why they need me when they raise A round as example, and they want to invest in product, in marketing, in new tech solutions, whatever. And they're like, why do we need you? You're a psychology psychotherapist and what you will bring to us. But then when they take me as a part of their team, I work with them three weeks in person, and I speak with each part of the team in order to help everybody feel understood, and then how they can communicate differently, improve their communication, and then improve their results. People don't understand that if communication is not well, if people are not speaking much between each other within the teams in startups, they cannot bring the results that they are expected from them. It's very interesting, you can create solutions, startups, raise money, do so many things, especially when you're on Forbes 30 under 30 list, everybody wants you. They think that you're a god that is arriving there to solve them or problems, but then you're just human that brings human, like, you know, wives and everything. So I was thinking, how can I improve what I'm working, what I'm offering, what can I change in order to feel more aligned with me? Since I have clients one-on-one psychotherapy that I work with them for the past seven years, but now I just improved that, and I decided to give opportunities for startups to work with me in person for three weeks. So it's really something refreshing for me as well, but I feel like my clients feel as well nurtured and better.

Annie Yu WM: The culture of a company or an organization, whether it's public or private and whether it's a three-person team or like a 3,000 people team, culture really matters. And as you said, communication is super critical. And I think sometimes in teams, if there's a lot of nationalities or people with different lived experiences, that's a really ripe opportunity for lots of potential misunderstandings to happen. So I think the work that you do with the teams that you work with, it's really just making sure that everyone's intent is communicated and understood, and that is really, really important. I can see the value of that. But for you, when you first started working with the smaller start-ups, I think you mentioned, sometimes in start-ups, it can just be about fundraising and spending money on product, because in the end, this is what they're measured against. When you are brought in to join a team, what type of fish-back or challenges do you experience?

Milica Krstic: To be honest, there is a lot of not trust. I cannot call that trust, because people are confused, who are you now? Why do I need to talk with you? Why I need to share with you something private in order for you to help me to understand better my team? So people are at the beginning a little bit scared and they feel confused. When they sense my energy and they need between five and ten minutes to understand how serious I am, how present I am, and then naturally we build trust, which is not written or sad, but you can sense it as energy where I'm 100 percent present and I care about another person, and that other person can feel the presence. Very often we need to feel seen and then we need another person to sees us and then we need to feel that someone saw us. So that is very often what people need and when you give them, they start to trust you because they see that you care. And then very quickly we build trust, but of course initially there is no trust, you know, you need to earn it.

Annie Yu WM: What advice would you give to someone, perhaps someone who thinks that they're not great at forming bonds or connections with their colleagues? And perhaps someone who feels that they are not good at expressing themselves? What type of tips would you give them to help them improve their relationships with their co-workers?

Milica Krstic: So basically building inner safety so we feel safe within our space helps us have better relationships with other people. So we can be introvert and have amazing relationship with other people, but we need to know how to approach. Very often when people are lacking self-confidence, self-esteem, they have a lot of unprocessed shame, they think if they approach that someone will laugh at them, someone will misunderstand them or think that they're stupid. So it's very important to address that and to understand that it's completely natural to feel like that, to process that shame, because very often it's shame. Shame and feeling a sense of guilt, there are two most toxic emotions that are sometimes unconsciously there. We think we are anxious, but basically we're ashamed that something bad will happen and that we are wrong, that something about us is wrong. And then when you start slowly to practice that, that you are completely fine to work on your internal safety, then you start to approach people, and then you have more positive experiences and you rebuild that. So next time when you approach someone, you are not scared that something bad will happen. You are expecting good result, which means, hey, how are you? Good. How are you? What's new? And then you have conversation. You don't have someone saying to you something rude or something like that. But we need to have a little bit courage and hope that there is a possibility that we will have polite conversation.

Annie Yu WM: I really resonate with your point about having that safe internal, that inner space and dealing and maybe recognizing some emotions that we have suppressed or maybe we've just grown used to living with. And then seeing how that can be acknowledged, processed. And then it's just, you know, reaching out to people and making that first effort of interacting with someone else. I think from my experience, I think when I was younger, I was probably very, very shy certain times. And I would always, you know, think, oh, if I reached out to someone from like a cold call, for example, would they even want to respond to me? But then I actually find the more you do that, most people actually say yes. And I think generally people by default are kind. And this is something that for some reason can be forgotten about. But I think if more people just, you know, remember in the mind, people generally are kind by default and they will want to help you if you can communicate what you need. I think that's a way to make the world a more well-rounded and as an easier place to live in for everyone.

Milica Krstic: That's amazing. Yes, I agree with you 100 percent. People are kind by default. And when you try to reach out and you see that they're kind and they want to help you, you feel safer, right?

Annie Yu WM: Definitely. Completely agree with you on that. Milica, I know that you've been traveling and you were invited to speak about the future of well-being as well. Could you share some key highlights from that with us?

Milica Krstic: So I was invited by the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia in winter 2023 to talk about emotional well-being and how we can take care of ourselves. I was fascinated by the culture, you know, how they are developed, because I didn't know a lot about the culture. And when I went there, I saw people who are going on psychotherapy, talking openly about how they take care of their mental health. So basically, key points are that we need to share how we feel. People expect to break the stigma, but they don't want to talk about their feelings. And they have short conversations such as, how are you good, you? And that's it. But if we extend that, how are you really, you know, when you listen and sit down there and really care about what will come from the other side, that's how you change the mental health. It's maybe a simple way, but trust me, it's the beginning. It's first step when other person feel seen, like I was previously saying, we need to care about others so we can feel more safer, that we feel, that we live in safer environment, and then change start to happen. But the first step is to show the vulnerability, that gentleness that we all carry inside. We often feel like that's something bad, weak, sad, soft, that is not accepted by the society. But if you show that to others and like, look, this is me, and sometimes I'm very sad, and I don't want to meet with other people, and I want to sit in my house, but this is me as well, you know? And then when you talk about that, ask other people, hey, do you have sometimes phases in your life when you are closed in your home, when you want to be just with yourself? And then you start to realize that there are a lot of people like you, and you start to feel like, okay, I'm just normal human being. But if you don't talk about it, you feel weird. You feel like, oh, I'm odd, you know? But actually, you're just human. So I think the starting point is to start to talk about how you feel.

Annie Yu WM: For you, because I know that you're also doing some work incorporating AI into Safe Space. From your view, how does technology lay a part in the future of mental health?

Milica Krstic: So there are two sides. One side is that people are very scared of AI because they think that AI will take our roles and there will be robots that will behave like humans and then all psychologists and psychotherapists will lose their jobs and we will calm down our nervous system with talking with Chagy Pt or another AI models. But there is other side that says that combining AI with human will really help people. So I deeply believe that AI never can change human exchange that way, how we react on that. So basically there is oxytocin, a hormone that is activated within us when we have a human connection. So basically, I would say more intimate human connection, but that cannot be activated with AI. I never saw until now any research that did that. What I deeply believe that AI can really help us, and it can be our ally, it can help people be better, but they need to be educated how to use it. And we need, of course, privacy, ethical moments and everything, so people can really feel safe. But I think that AI is future, and we need to jump on that train and educate ourselves about AI, so we can use it and make our life not more difficult, but easier and better.

Annie Yu WM: That approach that you've taken, embracing technology and learning how to steer and use it, rather than being afraid and avoiding it. And in a way, it's almost like emotions, right? Bad emotions. You don't want to just press it down and ignore it because it will just fester and someday will blow up. But you just want to acknowledge it, embrace it, and then let it go. And in the end, once it's dealt with, you as a person will just feel so much better. It's been fantastic speaking with you. I just have one last question to ask you before we wrap up, which is our podcast staple. What do you personally think will allow more people to have better mental health?

Milica Krstic: Speaking openly about how they really feel, that is something that can improve mental health. So it's very simple. That means to say the truth in a not harmful way. And when you teach and train yourself how to speak truth, to be honest in a non harmful way, you fulfill your deeper need and then you have stronger mental health system within you.

Annie Yu WM: Thank you for sharing that. Fantastic. Well, thank you so much for sharing your personal journey, giving us a bit of a teaser of what you're up to with Safe Space and the future of that. I personally find your journey really inspiring because it really was a challenging, dark personal experience that you have had that then motivated you to create something that now really helps a lot of people across the world no matter where they are based and also no matter what language or culture they're from. And I just know that our listeners will take so much from this conversation.

Milica Krstic: Thank you.

Annie Yu WM: That's a wrap for this episode of Low to Grow. If you learned something today, help more people to find this conversation by hitting the subscribe button and leaving a review. Keep growing and until next time.