YouSaid · the spoken record

Aly Raisman

lines on the record
19
first
2024-07-17
most recent
2024-07-17
sittings or episodes
1
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podcast

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  1. “That really aligns and fits in with my values. And I've seen firsthand how my most successful campaigns I've actually been able to be a part of the marketing side of it where I can like meet with like the CMO or the CEO. And there's been many campaigns I've been a part of where I've actually been able to be a part of those like brainstorming marketing conversations, which is just so fun this generation really votes with their dollar and people really want to support companies that they believe in that are doing good and aren't just like trying to sell a product. They also have found the more honest I've been, I've been so surprised so many people can actually relate to what I've experienced.”

    2024-07-17 · a16z Podcast · Transitioning From Gymnast to Investor with Aly Raisman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  2. “Yeah, well, thank you. As soon as my perspective, as being a survivor of abuse and how that might be less triggering or easier for someone to use, I have sort of brought that perspective if it's in the healthcare space. And then, of course, as an athlete, I'm very fortunate to have the platform that I have. So I think where it makes sense, most of the companies that I invest in, I do it privately, but there are some that we decide together it makes sense to do a partnership and to promote it. The campaigns that I do publicly that are just like pushing a product that don't talk about like something philanthropic, whether it's abuse prevention for me or mental health, they don't really do well. And I honestly frankly don't do that anymore where it's just like a specific product. Like we always try to make it more of a conversation and how is it authentic to me? Is it something that I really use? Is it something?”

    2024-07-17 · a16z Podcast · Transitioning From Gymnast to Investor with Aly Raisman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  3. “Yeah, I've done a lot of calls and worked with a lot of companies over the years where it might be like a company that's around women's health, but then a lot of the execs are men and men are welcome. I think there's so many amazing men in my life, and I'm really grateful for that. But if you're doing a product that's for women, it's really important to also talk to women and have them be a huge part of the conversation to make sure you're making a product that is helpful and feels good for them.”

    2024-07-17 · a16z Podcast · Transitioning From Gymnast to Investor with Aly Raisman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  4. “Single month. And I know a lot of women that at least one day to multiple days of the month, we feel terrible. I just don't think there is enough conversation and research into women's health. And I don't think it's acceptable that it's normalized that so many women have postpartum and there's not a solution to help women as they're navigating that huge change in their life.”

    2024-07-17 · a16z Podcast · Transitioning From Gymnast to Investor with Aly Raisman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  5. “There's like no step At the age where some of my friends have had babies, some of them are pregnant, some of them are freezing their eggs. We're kind of all in different stages. And I just find it very odd that so many women, we don't realize if we're going to have trouble getting pregnant until we actually want to start getting pregnant. And I just think like if there was something that when whatever age doctors think is appropriate, whether it's in your early 20s or in your late teenagers, I don't know. I'm not a doctor, but I think that this idea of just what if you have an underlying issue that could have been fixed? What if there's an underlying issue that's been a problem for 10 years? And if you fix it 10 years ago from a blood test or something, then it wouldn't have affected you. And I think in this world where miscarriages and infertility is so common and postpartum, there's so many things that women suffer and go through. And there's just not good solutions. And then also we get our period every.”

    2024-07-17 · a16z Podcast · Transitioning From Gymnast to Investor with Aly Raisman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  6. “Should be more front and center for doctors because, you know, I obviously have the utmost respect for doctors. But as a patient, a lot of people I don't think are comfortable speaking up for themselves or advocating for themselves. And so, you know, while I talked about mental health a lot and how it's more normalized and there's still a stigma, I actually found it took me so long to get diagnosed because doctors would say to me, well, you just have anxiety and depression. And I'd say, well, I didn't mention anything to you about anxiety or depression. Why do you say that? And they say, well, you know, I've read your story in the news. And I'm like, okay, well, now I feel like you're not really paying attention to me as the patient. And you're like making an assumption based off of what you saw in the news. And so that was really challenging for me. And I find that incredibly unprofessional. And even if somebody is, you know, they are feeling sick from mental health. I feel like the doctors are just like, oh, just go to a therapist, like see you next year.”

    2024-07-17 · a16z Podcast · Transitioning From Gymnast to Investor with Aly Raisman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  7. “Yeah, well, it's interesting. I mean, I'm obviously a patient, and so I have, you know, seen a lot of different doctors over the years. A couple of years ago, one of my best friends, Abby, had stage four cancer and she thankfully is in remission and she has a beautiful, healthy baby. So I'm so thankful and just forever grateful to her doctors for truly saving her life. But her and I, we've had a lot of conversations around just watching her go through that horrific experience and just the anxiety, the mental health side of having cancer. And she talks about how there are some doctors who are amazing and then there's some that are not amazing. And, you know, when she was in the hospital, she told me that there are certain instances where like she could hear the doctors or nurses like making fun of patients when she's resting and laying in bed. And I think that the patient experience.”

    2024-07-17 · a16z Podcast · Transitioning From Gymnast to Investor with Aly Raisman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  8. “Where I bear seeing something that's lacking or seeing something they want to do differently and they're solving a problem and fixing it. Similarly with my gymnastics career was like the same thing all the time you're so focused. You have this like tunnel vision and I just really respect founders because they're working so hard and I can't imagine how stressful it is and just like the whole process of raising money and there's probably so many different stressors that I don't even know the first thing about but I just really admire and respect their work ethic and their passion”

    2024-07-17 · a16z Podcast · Transitioning From Gymnast to Investor with Aly Raisman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  9. “When I started to learn about my own finances, I felt like I was like being put in this box of a dumb athlete. And so I just felt very overwhelmed and I also realized how much anxiety it was giving me not understanding. And I really believe that like knowledge is power. And I think why I say it's correlated to mental health, because the more that I learned about finances, the more confident I became. And there's so much shame around talking about money. And so I just became really interested in that idea of like, why is it so hard to talk about and if it was more normalized would more people be able to understand how to better save their money and if people felt less shame around asking questions, I think it could really make a big difference. And I've been fortunate since I was about 17 years old getting to work with a lot of different companies. And so it got me really interested in learning more about like the behind the scenes of how these companies operate. And then I got excited about this idea of meeting with.”

    2024-07-17 · a16z Podcast · Transitioning From Gymnast to Investor with Aly Raisman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  10. “It's been so fun, and I really love the experience of learning about investing and meeting with founders. I became really passionate about financial literacy. I think that financial literacy and mental health are very correlated because I feel like I don't know if I know anyone who doesn't feel stressed about finances, some capacity. And our system is kind of set up to make it really confusing and hard to understand. I'm very, very passionate about pushing that conversation because I think that in schools, as early as kids can really understand, I think that they should be taught about like finances and the importance of speaking up and asking questions. And I know sometimes when you're in a classroom, it can be intimidating to ask questions. And I kind of just told myself, if I'm going to get into this like financial world or this investing world, I'm just going to make a pack with myself that I'm not going to be afraid to ask questions. But I think that I found out really quickly.”

    2024-07-17 · a16z Podcast · Transitioning From Gymnast to Investor with Aly Raisman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  11. “It depends on what the coaching is when it comes to working out. Like, I don't want any coaching. If I'm like doing a cycling class or if I'm doing yoga or something and the teacher corrects me or they try to push me, I'm like, I've had enough of that in my life. I love being able to just go to a class. And if I just feel tired or I don't feel well, I can just like sit there and relax because when I was training for the Olympics, like if I was tired, I felt like almost my coach was harder on me on the days where I didn't sleep well. He'd be like, okay, well, too bad. If you don't sleep well, then the night before the Olympics, we need to push you more today so that you feel more prepared. Because when you're competing at the Olympics, if I'm jet lagged or if I don't feel well, it's not like the judges care if I'm like, hey, can I do this tomorrow instead? It's not an option. You've got, you know, your one opportunity. So I actually feel the opposite where I love sort of having the flexibility and I love.”

    2024-07-17 · a16z Podcast · Transitioning From Gymnast to Investor with Aly Raisman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  12. “So, it's so funny. It's like if I'm in a yoga class, like I don't want the teacher to tell me anything. Like, I've had enough coaching in my life where I think that.”

    2024-07-17 · a16z Podcast · Transitioning From Gymnast to Investor with Aly Raisman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  13. “Re enjoy working out because I feel like for so long it was so just intense. I did the same thing every single day. And I felt like no matter what I did, there was always something that needed improvement, which it never got boring, but it was just a lot of pressure. My workouts mostly consist of walking a lot. And people always laugh when I speak at events because I say I walk on the treadmill on an incline. And people think that's so funny because I think people expect me to do more. However,”

    2024-07-17 · a16z Podcast · Transitioning From Gymnast to Investor with Aly Raisman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  14. “I get asked this a lot, and I think people would be really shocked. I think people think I'm being like modest or I'm kidding, but I honestly don't work out that much. So first of all, I spent most of my life in a gym. I started gymnastics when I was two years old. And at the age of eight, I was so busy with my gymnastics career that my coaches said that if you want to go to the next level and you want to get better, you have to stop everything else. So at eight years old, it started to get really intense and I would spend six days in the gym. I had Sundays off and I would train somewhere between four to seven hours a day. And it was like really intensely training. I still feel like I'm recovering from it because it was exhausting. So I think part of it is it's nice now to be in control and to not have to go to the gym every single day. I will also say that I believe that working out can be really good for our mental health. So I've kind of had to learn how to like.”

    2024-07-17 · a16z Podcast · Transitioning From Gymnast to Investor with Aly Raisman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  15. “At such a high level. I was obviously so nervous and so stressed. And it's kind of crazy to look back. I didn't really have any tools to help me calm down in those moments. So I have been on this journey of just really trying to figure out how to just be calm. I kind of let go of this idea of like one day I'm going to feel perfect. I'm going to feel happy all the time. I think that's extremely unrealistic. There's so many things in life that can happen. And so I guess the way that I take care of my mental and physical health today is that I see a therapist weekly, which has been super helpful. And I plan to do that for a long time. It's so fascinating to me because when I really take care of my nutrition and I feel like my mental health is so much better, even if something my friends make fun of me, even if something tastes disgusting, but it's really good for me and it makes me feel good, I'm going to eat it. And I do wish that I had this when I.”

    2024-07-17 · a16z Podcast · Transitioning From Gymnast to Investor with Aly Raisman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  16. “Yeah, so I've learned a lot the last several years about my own mental health and also just my own physical health. I think that mental health is much more of a conversation now than it was when I was training and I was competing in gymnastics. However, even so, there's still such a stigma and there's still so many people that are suffering in silence. I do reflect a lot and wish that a lot of the tools that I've learned now and in still learning, I wish I had when I was younger, it's really interesting because when I was training and competing, you know, for example, if I had an ankle injury, I would do whatever I could to heal my ankle. I would do recovery. I would ice it, heat it, whatever I needed. And I also did a lot of physical therapy for it, but there just wasn't that same emphasis on the mental health aspect of it, which I think was a huge problem. And I didn't know that at the time. But, you know, competing.”

    2024-07-17 · a16z Podcast · Transitioning From Gymnast to Investor with Aly Raisman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  17. “Oh, well, thank you so much. That's so sweet. I am so excited to be here with both of you. And thank you both also for all of your support. You've been so helpful in my new investing journey.”

    2024-07-17 · a16z Podcast · Transitioning From Gymnast to Investor with Aly Raisman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  18. “And I just really respect founders because they're working so hard. And I can't imagine how stressful it is. And I think it's cool that they're seeing something that's lacking or seeing something they want to do differently and they're solving a problem and fixing it.”

    2024-07-17 · a16z Podcast · Transitioning From Gymnast to Investor with Aly Raisman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  19. “You're competing at the Olympics if I'm jet lagged or if I don't feel well, it's not like the judges care. So at eight years old, it started to get really intense and I would spend six days in the gym. I had Sundays off and I would train somewhere between four to seven hours a day. When I was training for the Olympics, like if I was tired, I felt like almost my coach was harder on me on the days where I didn't sleep well. It took me so long to get diagnosed because doctors would say to me, well, you just have anxiety and depression. And I'd say, well, I didn't mention anything to you about anxiety or depression. Why do you say that? And they say, well, you know, I've read your story in the news. What if you have an underlying issue that could have been fixed? What if there's an underlying issue that's been a problem for 10 years?”

    2024-07-17 · a16z Podcast · Transitioning From Gymnast to Investor with Aly Raisman · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source