About Aanya: The Founder of BYF

  By Derrick Harris

Aanya Mukherjee’s Buy Yourself Flowers (BYF) is a prime example of how personal experiences can be crafted into action. Here is her story:

   Mukherjee experienced the Bay Area’s “hustle culture” firsthand while growing up in a South Asian immigrant household in Los Altos, where she was expected to work hard and not discuss feelings. This pressure followed her into her academic life at The Harker School where the “hustle” was only amplified.

   When you go to their website, the phrase “Magic Happens at Harker” pops up on your screen. However, when transitioning into high school, she instead experienced the harsh reality of bullying. She reached out to administrators for possible solutions, but her situation only got worse after the school had little to no policies for bullying.

   “It was the hardest experience of my life,” Mukherjee said. She felt isolated, depressed, and anxious, but also inspired to help teens facing similar problems.

   “I started reaching out to coalitions of parents and educators to find solutions,” Mukherjee said. “But I was the only teenager there, and that voice was an essential part that was missing.”

   She decided to create BYF, a teen mental health community resource with the slogan “for teens, by teens.”

   Recently, she launched the mental health kits “bloom boxes,” which provide stress relief to high school students with lower-funded wellness programs. She has also recruited over 50 students to work as blog writers, social media and podcast managers, and to create chapters at their own schools. She wants to keep expanding and help students realize you don’t need to wait for external validation. “You don't need to wait for someone else to, quote, unquote, buy you flowers” Mukherjee said. “You should celebrate yourself and your achievements.”