Meet Julio Rivera, founder of Liberate

Julio Rivera brings a tireless curiosity to every aspect of life, from building apps to searching for inner peace. This inquisitive nature and drive led him to create Liberate, a meditation app designed to support the Black community. We spoke with Rivera about his personal journey and finding solace in trying times.

Julio Rivera: I had my own challenges with mental health. I was 26 and a senior software engineer at a company building mobile apps and was severely burned out. I was basically focusing my entire life on getting a promotion, working day and night. And when I got it, I didn’t feel fulfilled at all. It was all of these things I had internalized as happiness, but I wasn't happy at all – and quite frankly, I was the most depressed I'd ever been in my life.

I’d been programming since a very young age, and when I no longer wanted to, it was kind of this existential crisis [laughs]... Why am I here? What is my purpose? Asking that question every day and not having an answer was very unsettling for me.

In the pursuit of remedies for my depression, I downloaded a meditation app. That was my first introduction to meditation and mindfulness. Then I hit a wall with my practice, so I started bouncing around physical communities in NYC and landed in a Buddhist community dedicated to people of color, primarily Black and brown folks. This experience was very different, because I was able to be more vulnerable. My meditations were deeper. I felt safe in this space. And in my safety, I was able to build a new relationship with myself and to heal.

I was going through this transformation when I had a lightbulb moment. I realized I could use my experience building apps to allow myself and others to easily access teachings and guided meditations from teachers who identify as Black and people of color, who are talking about our unique challenges.

What I’m really trying to create with Liberate is a container of safety, so when someone opens the app they feel connected, supported, and empowered. Dealing with depression and mental health challenges, people can feel alone in their challenges and end up isolated themselves. And maybe that “The world is telling me that I don’t belong.” Liberate is this portal to feeling a sense of community.

For Black folks in particular, this is a highly traumatic time we’re living in with COVID and police brutality… It’s always happened, but it’s just more and more in the media, so there's not a lot of spaces where we feel safe. There’s this constant barrage of messaging saying that we aren’t safe, we aren’t accepted, and we aren’t allowed.

I remember at eight years old, working on Visual Basic with my father. He planted the seed. And then around fifth grade, my uncle showed me how just a few lines of HTML could build a website and I was like, “Wow, this is awesome.” From there, I taught myself and ended up going to college for software engineering. During my master’s program, I taught myself how to build iOS apps and worked at Priceline.

Then I co-founded my first startup – a short-lived golf app. I was responsible for the design, the analytics, the user experience... I discovered that I like these different aspects of the product, beyond the architecture and programming. Then I worked for an agency, where I grew as a software engineer and eventually moved over to product management. That was where I had the burnout.

When I left that job in 2018, I had no clue... I just knew I wanted to bring meditation to the world. Since then, it’s been a lot of trial and error, a lot of testing ideas and strategies. As my own healing journey progressed, so have my thoughts around what I need and what folks need. That’s the entrepreneurial journey: It’s all about iteration and learning from the community.

More of my meditation now revolves around noticing when I’m in anxious states. I continue to deal with burnout, because my go-to when I'm feeling anxious and fearful is working. I’m using my practice to notice when I’m in states of fear and anxiety – relaxing and using meditation to remind myself, “I’m safe, I’m loved, I’m appreciated.” It's really looking to build more self-compassion.

I recommend “For the Ancestor in You,” from Kaira Jewel Lingo. This supportive, empowering meditation connects us back to our ancestors and lineage. Juneteenth is this celebration of a step toward freedom and liberation. Connecting to our ancestors who were part of that event – knowing that we have that within us – is healing.

It’s healing from the messaging that we’re potentially internalizing as a community today, with all of the police brutality, that we’re not safe. When our racial trauma gets activated, when we don't feel safe, there’s this underlying message that our lives are at risk. I know that may seem dramatic, but it's a real traumatic experience and a traumatic response for folks. Knowing that we are safe and we are strong is healing.