For some reason, I’ve always enjoyed bringing up the fact that Alex Tew, the co-founder of popular mindfulness app Calm, is also the creator of the (amazing, majestic, chaotic) Million Dollar Homepage.

I love this narrative arc for so many reasons, but for now I’ll note my top three, and I suspect I could write a lengthy blog post on each of these.

  1. Not thrilled about the idea of student debt, Alex reportedly wrote down “how to make a million dollars” before coming up with ideas. He of course did make a million dollars. What if he’d written down “how to make a thousand”, or even “how to make a hundred million?”
  2. Before there was Calm, there was a simple website, which only functioned to help you pause for 2 minutes. If you moved your mouse, the timer would reset. You simply stared at a picture of the ocean, listening to the sound of waves. Big ideas start as small ideas.
  3. The main alternative to Calm is Headspace. Andy, the founder of Headspace, trained as a monk for a decade. Alex… also meditated. There are many paths to the same destination. You don’t have to train as a monk to champion mindfulness (but I do fucking love that).