The permission to build a life that's actually yours doesn't come from anyone else. Sandeep Acharya learned that the long way.

In this episode of Guys N' Chai, Ankur Varma sits down with Sandeep — founder and CEO of Octave Health, one of the most ambitious mental health companies in the country — for a conversation about the parts of him that don't fit in a LinkedIn bio.

Sandeep grew up in New Jersey, the son of two Bell Labs programmers, leaning into academics because he felt invisible everywhere else. He went to Bain, to Harvard, into investing, into startups, and eventually into founding a company that's now rebuilding how mental health care gets accessed and delivered in this country. Along the way, he taught himself music theory in college, became a music director for Penn Masala, and released an R&B-Indian fusion album on one of the earliest South Asian labels. He describes himself as risk-averse. His story tells a different one.

In this episode, Ankur and Sandeep go into:

The version of himself he kept quiet to be "smart and invisible" in a mostly white middle school, and what it cost him The permission problem: why so many South Asian professionals stay in jobs they don't want, and what actually changes when you give yourself the permission you were waiting on someone else to hand you

Building Octave and Wisematch, and why he decided fixing broken insurance directories was worth years of investor rejection.

The thyroid cancer diagnosis that came out of a routine dentist visit last year, and what he learned about equanimity that a decade of running a company couldn't quite teach him.

Intention over reaction: the daily practice he keeps with his best friend across time zones, and why he's off social media, off the news cycle, and more present than he's ever been.

Parenting three daughters in a world that treats his Indian-Americanness as cool instead of alien, and what he wants to consciously pass on that his parents passed down without effort.

Retelling, the Mahabharata musical he's writing with Grammy-winning collaborator Aakash Shah, and why he thinks our generation has to make our own culture accessible to the next one.

This is a conversation about the version of yourself you keep quiet, and what happens when you stop. Hosted by Ankur Varma, LCPC — licensed psychotherapist and co-founder of Brown Man Therapy.

Learn more about Octave at findoctave.com.

Follow Sandeep's music project @retellingmusic on Instagram.

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Learn more at brownmantherapy.com.

"Life is far more rewarding when you can be honest with yourself."

In this episode of Guys N' Chai, Ankur Varma sits down with Qasim Rashid — human rights lawyer, author, and one of the most recognizable South Asian Muslim public voices in America — for a conversation about what it actually costs to live a public life without a mask.

Qasim talks about the father he lost last year and the family lineage of service he was raised in, going back to a grandfather in Pakistan who kept feeding an abusive neighbor because the obligation to serve wasn't contingent on being treated well. He walks through his framework for responding to online hate without absorbing it, why he treats trolls as opportunities for what he calls collateral education, and why he refuses to stay quiet on positions that cost him clients, speaking gigs, and years of income.

This is a conversation about faith, resilience, and what it takes to stay whole in public.

The real conversation starts where the script ends. Pull up a cup.

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"Who am I" isn't a question you answer once. It's one you come back to.

In this episode of Guys & Chai, Ankur Varma sits down with Rahim Thawer — psychotherapist, educator, writer, and author of The Mental Health Guide for Cis and Trans Queer Guys — for a conversation about what it costs to find yourself when the community that raised you has already answered that question for you.

Rahim talks about growing up Ismaili Muslim in Toronto, the years he spent moving — Singapore, Melbourne, Winnipeg, South Africa, now Alabama — and how distance became the way he made room to ask the harder questions.

About coming out at 22, building psychic boundaries inside an insular extended family, getting sober at 38, and turning 40 with the kind of grief that comes from mourning who you didn't get to be.

This is a conversation about identity, belonging, and the quiet work of choosing a life that's actually yours — even when it means being punished for it. The real conversation starts where the script ends.

Pull up a cup.

Learn more about Guys N' Chai Podcast and Brown Man Therapy, a non-profit organization bringing awareness and solutions to South Asian men's mental health, by visiting us at the spaces below:

brownmantherapy.com

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