Today’s podcast features, Erin Mahone, founder of #IfYouCouldSeeMe project. Erin’s passion is infectious as she talks about the importance of “sharing our stories.” Her work is inspired by a childhood growing up in a family touched by mental illness, years working in the arts and in the mental health field, and her own experiences with anxiety and depression. She believes that life's struggles, no matter how severe, do not define, or limit, a person’s capacity for greatness, achievement, or love. Every person has a distinct story that is worthy of respect and Erin combines storytelling, writing, music, and other elements to share and teach this message.

#IfYouCouldSeeMe is a multi-media project and a podcast on the Mental Health News Radio Network that looks past labels and surface judgments to see real, diverse, fascinating people living with mental health diagnoses. They are mothers, fathers, daughters, sons, friends, artists, activists, veterans, and above all human beings with whole lives not defined by their diagnoses. The #IfYouCouldSeeMe project is a relationship between storyteller and audience; an understanding that through sharing, and by witnessing, we are all being seen.