Alyssa Cypher is a mental health advocate, public speaker, and self-appointed “professional crazy person.” Her life goal is to work towards combining the (often separate) worlds of professional mental health and lived experience, in order to change the way people living with mental illness are perceived and treated in society.

Alyssa is the Executive Director of Inside Our Minds, and organization that builds collective community narratives on mental illness in Pittsburgh. Through anonymous storytelling and personal narratives, Inside Our Minds works to reduce stigma by asking individuals to view mental illness through the written, verbal, and performative experiences of other Pittsburghers.

Alyssa also works as the Data and Communications Specialist at the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) Keystone PA.