Google expert's 'beautiful soul' helps young people overcome anxiety disorders

Khanh Linh at a recent Google event - Photo: NVCC

In April, Google announced that Nguyen Khanh Linh is not only the first Vietnamese woman to become a Google Developer Expert, but also the company's first machine learning GDE expert in the field of artificial intelligence (AI) in 2025. This Hanoi girl born in 1991 was selected to participate in the Google Developer Expert network program.

But Nguyen Khanh Linh did not stop there, surprising everyone. The girl who struggled for many years with anxiety disorder until being diagnosed and actively treated overcame her personal struggles, established the non-profit organization Beautiful Mind VN to support young people with the same problem as her and to help raise public awareness about clinical psychology and mental health.

Journey of "Beautiful mind" Nguyen Khanh Linh

It was 2015, and Nguyen Khanh Linh was 24 years old, studying for a master’s degree in AI engineering at the National University of Singapore. She had just been diagnosed with an anxiety disorder, and was receiving intensive treatment after years of living with serious psychological problems without even knowing she had them.

Khanh Linh remembers when she was in 4th and 5th grade, after each semester exam, Khanh Linh felt unwell, tired, had a headache, her heart beat fast, and she sweated. Sometimes the symptoms came suddenly, Linh was scared and didn't know what was wrong with her. In Vietnam in the 1960s,

2005-2007, there was very little documentation about psychological illnesses and mental health, and the Internet was not yet popular. Every time Linh got seriously ill, she went to the hospital and was prescribed supplements.

Just like that, Linh grew up with increasingly severe illnesses when she entered university. There were times when Linh was so sick that she couldn't leave the house, didn't want to go anywhere, and was afraid of crowds.

Linh didn't understand why she was like that. Until one day she went to see a doctor and was diagnosed with anxiety disorder.

Thanks to the correct diagnosis, Linh sought active treatment. She attended courses on self-control of emotions and psychological first aid to apply to herself. She also read many documents about her illness from foreign documents on the Internet.

Then Linh received a scholarship to study for a master's degree in Singapore. Here Linh received more intensive treatment, started taking medication seriously and underwent psychological therapy. Thanks to that, her health became more stable, Linh was able to study and work normally.

From this moment, Linh began reading many documents about anxiety disorders, translating and posting them to share with the community. Some other young people studying clinical psychology and therapy found Linh's work useful and contacted her to contribute more in-depth articles about depression.

The group gradually grew bigger and stronger, organizing more meaningful activities such as psychological first aid, free 1-1 chat under the supervision of experts with friends with psychological problems who came to the group.

So that beautiful souls are not alone

Khanh Linh at a workshop sharing about anxiety disorders organized by Beautiful Mind VN and EzPsychology in 2018 - Photo: NVCC

From her own case and observations around her, Nguyen Khanh Linh realized that in Vietnam, people with mental disorders in 2015-2018 still did not have appropriate help.

Linh is very lucky to have the support of her family and friends, but many people are not so lucky. They are misunderstood and judged simply because the general awareness of the community about clinical psychology, mental health and mental disorders is not high.

Linh learned that abroad there are many organizations like Beautiful Mind VN to support patients with mental illness, but in Vietnam there is very little support. People do not know they are sick, do not know they need help, do not go to the doctor. Some people find out for themselves, know they are sick, go to the doctor, but sometimes they go to the wrong place, and their family does not help or understand.

Social prejudice about mental illness is still strong, so people with the disease do not share much, making the disease worse.

In addition, there are not many psychological treatment facilities in Vietnam and the prices are high... All of this causes many patients with mental illnesses in Vietnam to not receive timely support.

As an insider, Linh deeply understands that knowledge, sympathy and non-judgment are what people with mental illnesses need the most. So Beautiful Mind VN started by uploading many accurate scientific documents to the website, updating new research in the world about mental illnesses and depression.

Helping hands overcome anxiety disorders

Up to now, there are posts of Beautiful Mind VN that are 10 years old and people continue to read them. Linh understands that these are valuable things for the community, even though Beautiful Mind VN is no longer active after COVID-19 because Linh and her friends are busy with their own work.

In nearly 10 years of operation of Beautiful Mind VN, about 1,000 young people with mental health problems have been supported with reliable documents, talked to, given psychological first aid, and given a helping hand. Many workshops and discussions on psychological issues have also been organized to raise public awareness of mental health.

Many of you, thanks to timely and necessary help, have now returned to normal life, started families, and gone to work. Some of you have decided to pursue a career in deep psychology. Many of you continue to contact Beautiful Mind VN members, some have become friends with the group. They do not forget that Beautiful Mind VN reached out to pull you out of the depths of despair.

The thanks Linh and her friends received made Linh really happy. She is considering arranging time in her super busy life as an AI director at a Silicon Valley startup to get Beautiful Mind VN active again.

Khanh Linh and her friends chose the name of their organization as Beautiful Mind VN, based on the name of the movie A Beautiful Mind , a unique and humane movie about the life of famous mathematician John Nash - who won the Nobel Prize in Economics for his work on game theory.

The name conveys the group's desire to bring humanistic values to the community, especially those with mental health problems, similar to the humanistic values that the movie A Beautiful Mind brings.

Source: https://tuoitre.vn/tam-hon-dep-cua-chuyen-gia-google-giup-ban-tre-vuot-qua-roi-loan-lo-au-20250728085231911.htm