Reflect Like An Olympian: Manage Stress, Gain Perspective and Find Balance! 

If you follow Child Mind Institute news, you may have heard that in January we launched Mirror, an intuitive mental health journaling app. The benefits of journaling are well-documented, and Mirror is designed to help teens process emotions and build self-awareness through mood tracking, guided prompts, and private self-expression. Creating tools like Mirror is one way the Child Mind Institute is demonstrating a commitment to making science-based mental health information, resources, crisis support services, and care more accessible. You can read more about Mirror’s benefits and features — including how it makes digital journaling seamless, safe, and engaging — on the Child Mind Institute website under Science and Applied Digital Technologies.

To celebrate the launch of Mirror: Journaling & Insights, the Child Mind Institute recently hosted an event at UCLA. The event, “Prioritizing Mental Health Fitness: Child Mind Institute Special Discussion on Mental Health & Wellbeing,” featured UCLA student-athletes Daniella Ramirez (Team USA Artistic Swimming Olympic medalist), Emma Malabuyo (2024 Philippines Olympian and UCLA gymnast), and Sophia Hartwell (UCLA Track & Field athlete) in conversation with Jocelyn Meza, PhD, Assistant Professor In-Residence at UCLA and Director of the Youth Mental Health Academy Evaluation Core.

During the discussion, the athletes discussed personal strategies they use to prioritize mental health while balancing the demands of school, training, and competition. They covered how tools like Mirror can support students in managing academic and athletic pressures. The athletes shared that while they sometimes struggle with identifying their stressors, it’s an important first step for managing their stress. They each spoke about how Mirror’s integrated AI summaries have helped them with this process and pointed out features they appreciated the most, such as the guided journaling prompts.

Ms. Malabuyo shared one of her favorite prompts:

“I really like the one, ‘What are three things that you’re grateful for?’ That really helps me maintain perspective . . . it helps keep me balanced and refocus my energy.”

At the Child Mind Institute, we look to the future of mental health care with the knowledge that digital tools can increase access to mental health services. It’s a topic we explored earlier this year through our Tech & Youth Mental Health Webinar Series.

For years, digital tools have played an integral part in creating and curating our multiple openly shared datasets — the Healthy Brain Network, ABIDE, and PRIME-DE — that collectively have fueled over 3,000 high-impact, peer-reviewed publications by researchers worldwide and advanced insights into the developing brain and mental health.

Now our teams are actively taking steps toward expanding our impact — advancing youth mental health initiatives to close the gap between research and care. And science-based, culturally responsible digital technologies such as Mirror will play a big role in that.