Melody 盈希 Li

Mental Health Liberation Activist

Organizer, Speaker, Educator, Consultant

Decolonizing & Reclaiming Mental Health Care, Healing Racialized Trauma

Melody Li, founder of Inclusive Therapists and Mental Health Liberation.  early-midlife nonbinary Hong Konger with short black hair, blunt bangs. First photo, wearing a knitted toque, black shirt, and a red & black keffiyeh.

About Melody (/they)

I’m a queer/nonbinary colony-born migrant, Asian diasporic settler on Turtle Island, therapist of Color, and mental health liberation activist.

I founded Inclusive Therapists: a social justice-oriented mental health directory and community that celebrates the power & centers the needs of marginalized communities. (With focus on QTBIPOC).

Our non-profit organization Mental Health Liberation is bridging Black, Indigenous and People of Color (BI&POC) with quality therapy, empowering clinicians of Color, dismantling systemic inequity, and reclaiming healing for melanated, marginalized and displaced Peoples. 

We lead a movement to decolonize, disrupt and dismantle oppressive mental health practices. In community, we reroot into, restore, reclaim, and reimagine our healing.

People with marginalized identities, abilities, and bodies deserve equitable access to quality mental health care.

I invite you to get to know more about me, the communities I love, and to connect.

Melody Ying-Hei Li

Work with Melody

Ways to Collaborate
v

Speaker, Panelist, Educator

Decolonizing Mental Health

Mental Health Justice and Liberation

Tending to Racialized Trauma During Crisis

Collective Liberation and Solidarity

2SLGBTQ+ Mental Wellness, Deconstructing the Binary

Asian Diaspora Mental Health, with focus on smashing: white cishet-patriarchy, racialized sexualization, and model minority myth

Reckoning with Colonial-Christian Violence Towards Queer, Trans, and Nonbinary People of Color

Consultation

I offer consultation to organizations and institutions such as ACLU Oregon and Seminary of the Southwest.

Areas of Speciality 

Beyond Diversity, Equity & Inclusion: Moving Towards Liberatory, Anti-colonial Practice

Mental Health Justice and Liberation

Tending to Racialized Trauma & Honoring Intersectionality in Organizations and Institutions

Community Care for Leaders, Clinicians, and Students of Color

Cultivating Inclusive, Decolonial, Anti-Oppressive Therapeutic and Relational Practices

Collective Care

Free, culturally responsive mental health care for Black, Indigenous and People of Color

Our Programs:

 BIPOC Therapy Fund

12 free quality therapy sessions with liberation-oriented BIPOC providers 

Liberatory Student Support Circle

Supporting BIP&OC students in mental health, psychology & social work 

Melody Li is a wonderful professional to work with! They shared their professionalism, wisdom, authenticity and kindness during their training titled “Tending to Anti-Asian Racialized Trauma Through Decolonial, Collective Healing” for the Texas Institute for Excellence in Mental Health housed at UT Austin.

Not only the participants shared great feedback and were truly excited to be part of the training, but our staff team was so pleased to be part of the planning process. They’re a joy to work with and an incredible educator to learn from/with. Thank you Melody for all you do!

Ari Acosta

Behavioral Health Equity Specialist, University of Texas in Austin

Beyond Diversity, equity & inclusion
liberatory Speaker & educator
Dr. Joy, Melody Li, Charli XCX, hayley williams at Sanctuary of Self Love

Decolonizing Mental Health Care, BIPOC Mental Wellness

With many organizations, including: Trane Technologies, Bain & Company, YWCA, Cornell University, Scaling Up: Be Bold Summit, and more

Palestinian Liberation Lessons in solidarity for mental health providers

Mental Health, Collective Liberation and Activism

With many organizations, including: Institute for the Development of Human Arts, Columbia University, National Council of Asian Pacific Americans, Asian Americans Advancing Justice, and more

Melody Li Speaker Flyer at Joy Justice Summit

Tending to Racialized Trauma & Ruptures

With many organizations, including: YWCA, University of Texas, Lines for Life, and more.

Melody Li Speaker Flyer at Clarkson University and St. Lawrence University. Decolonizing mental health

Uplifting LGBTQIA+ Mental Health

Celebrating Gender Expansiveness & Creating Affirming Community

At J2 Global

Melody Li Speaker Flyer at Clarkson University and St. Lawrence University. Decolonizing mental health

Decolonizing Mental Health for Students

Clarkson University & St. Lawrence University

Melody Li Speaker Flyer at Joy Justice Summit

Healing the Migrant Healer

Empowered Learning Summit

Dr. Joy, Melody Li, Charli XCX, hayley williams at Sanctuary of Self Love

Digital Space & Mental Health

Panel with Dr. Joy, Charli xcx, Hayley Williams

Queer Talks Immigrant Experience | Melody Li, LMFT Decolonize Mental Health. Inclusive Therapists Founder, Mental Health Justice Activist, Texas Counseling, Couples and Marriage Therapy for People of Color

Queer Talks

Migrant Experience X Queerness

Mental Health Liberation

LIBERATE

HEAL

THRIVE

As a colony-born migrant and diasporic settler on Turtle Island embodying many structural privileges, I advocate for Landback & Indigenous sovereignty, Black liberation and reparations, restoration of Land, and liberation of all humans and other-than-humans facing oppression, violence, exploitation, silencing, erasure, and forced displacement.

The change starts with my own unlearning and healing, to develop heightened awareness of ways I perpetuate harm.

I use my position as a therapist, voice as a queer person of Color, and ancestral knowledge to advance mental health justice in community. Visit: Inclusive Therapists and Mental Health Liberation.

That was amazing, above and beyond anything I could have imagined. I am so grateful for you and the wonderful work that you do!

I’m still getting people emailing me with such positive feedback. No less than 6 people have told me, “It’s the best training you’ve ever brought to Lines for Life”.

What you taught so well was that trauma lives in the body, and we can’t just talk about it in intellectual terms. We have to be with our bodies and heal ourselves so that we can do the important healing work with others.

Tending to Racialized Trauma & Rupture Workshop

Alexis Hilliard

Lines for Life

Using my Voice

SPEAKER, PANELIST

Melody partnered with Ryan Dillon and Prism, our LBGTQIA+ Employee Resource Group to create and facilitate an incredibly in-depth, educational, and empathetic webinar, “Uplifting LGBTQIA+ Mental Health,” as part of our company’s Pride celebrations.

Prism members were proud that the webinar truly centered them and took an intersectional approach when this is so often not the case.

Employees outside of the LGBTQIA+ community have shared that this webinar gave them the tools, understanding, and even the bravery to have conversations, make mistakes, and take action toward allyship.

We were so thrilled to work with Melody and so proud to present their teaching to our global workforce.

Margaret-Ellen Christensen

Director, Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion and HR Programs, J2 Global

My PeoplE

Communities I Foster

Inclusive Therapists team members

Inclusive Therapists

Mental health directory, community, education, and resources celebrating and centering on people with marginalized identities

Mental health liberation team members laughing together

Mental Health Liberation

Bridging Black, Indigenous and People of Color with free, quality mental health care, and empower emerging Clinicians of Color.
Austin therapists of Color leaders photo. Vanessa, Latina woman, Jenn Minor, Black woman, and Melody Li Asian womxn smiling holding each other and smiling at camera

Austin Therapists of Color

Professional support + collective care for BI&POC mental health professionals, academics, interns and students

It was a pleasure to bring Mel to work with our leaders (“Decolonizing Mental Health for Leaders” Keynote). Their commitment to truth and care was uplifting and impactful to our leaders as they navigate such an extraordinary time. Mel helped us create the space for people to remember that they are humans, not human resources. This is something we hold dear as we move through the world.

Tara Ashcraft

Diversity & Inclusion Leader, Trane Technologies

In the Media on Mental Health Liberation and Inclusive Therapists
In the Media on Mental Health and Relationship Therapy

I am still smiling – what an amazing exploration of gender and identity!!

We cannot thank you enough for your willingness to approach these topics, particularly in a way that was honest and did not diminish the content in order to make it more palatable for the cisheteronormative perspective.

Uplifting LGBTQIA+ Mental Health: Celebrating Gender Expansiveness & Creating Affirming Community Workshop

Madison Swain-Bowden

Data Engineer, Ookla

Listen In

PODCASTS

This webinar was one of the best I have ever seen. Melody was well informed, trauma-focused, and genuine. I felt heard and comfortable the whole time.

On top of that, I learned so much about racial trauma and rupture – I plan to use information from the webinar in my personal and professional life.

Melody honored the experience that Asian communities have endured in this country historically and presently. But more importantly, they contextualized the impacts, the intersections, and the methods of providing comprehensive mental health services to those effected by a wide array of racial traumas.

Their presentation style was fluid. Their macro and micro level analysis of the Asian experience, and their grounding techniques, blew me away.

Tending to Racialized Trauma & Rupture Workshop Participant

Lines for Life