WARNING: This story includes descriptions of depression and suicidal ideation.
Lilly Goyah had a secret. As she sat in the crowd at a Christian youth retreat a thousand miles from home, no one around her knew she had made the decision to take her own life.
So when the young actors on stage launched into a skit about a teen struggling with suicidal thoughts, whose mother’s prayers called in angels to fight on her behalf, no one knew for certain why Goyah broke down and cried.
“I felt what I know is the Holy Spirit reaching out to me,” Goyah recalled. “And that completely changed my life. It stopped me from doing what I was going to do and it gave me hope to search for other things.”
One of the things from that skit Goyah felt compelled to search for was the music. “I had only heard Christian songs I felt were kind of corny,” she said. “This song (in the skit) expressed the emotions of a depressed child who was crying out to God. It was the first time I felt heard. The first time I heard something that accurately represented what humans go through.”
That song opened her eyes to the ways certain music can tap into certain emotions – and connect to God in the process.
Driven to depression
Goyah was born in Rhode Island, the first child of her mother, Cynthia Lavall. Lavall had immigrated from Liberia to escape civil war at age 19, and eventually found herself a single mother of two children, struggling to get by in a country where she had no real support network.
Goyah, along with her mother and younger brother, moved up and down the East Coast, spending time in government housing, homeless shelters and living with friends. Eventually, Lavall sent the children to live with their father in Minnesota.
She missed them terribly though, and quickly ended up relocating to Stillwater, Minnesota, to be closer.
“We would go visit her on weekends,” Goyah said. “Until eventually my brother and I were like, ‘We would rather live with our mom.’”
They moved around the Twin Cities area, from transitional housing to government housing to an apartment of their own. “That was really amazing,” Goyah said. “And we stayed there until I was in eighth grade and my mom decided she needed a change of scenery, so we moved to the Champlin/Brooklyn Park area.”
The family found an arrangement that allowed them to live in a single-family home with a path toward taking over the lease on their own. But that path took a turn.
“One day we had gone to do our laundry and to church and when we came back, all the locks on the doors had been changed,” Goyah said. “I don’t remember the details of why that was, but we were back to square one again. We were homeless and the only things we had were the clothes in the car from doing laundry that day.”
The frustrations and obstacles continued to add up for Goyah.
“It made me feel like I didn’t have a life that was worth living,” she said. “And that depressed state of mind turned into a suicidal one.”
That was the point where Lavall found the youth retreat through her church.
“My mom said, ‘It’s a church retreat and it’s taking place in Maryland and it’s a youth service and you guys have to go,’” Goyah remembered with a laugh.
Looking back, it’s a very good thing she did.
A path forward
Her experience at the youth retreat was a pivotal moment. She and her family eventually moved out of shelters and into an apartment in Anoka. Lavall remarried and the family grew.
And Goyah transformed herself educationally.
She earned her way into the National Honor Society. She joined clubs and embraced leadership. She took up sports and activities. By the time she graduated high school, she had been accepted at Augsburg University in St. Paul. But her first year there was 2020-21 – a challenging academic year everywhere, given the COVID-19 pandemic.
For her sophomore year, she looked for a place to reset. And she found the College of Saint Benedict.
“I had visited Saint Ben’s in high school,” she said. “I liked that it was far enough away. I liked the nature, with the trees and the environment. I knew I would be able to calm down a bit here. I had been living a fast-paced life at that point, and I knew I needed somewhere I could come to myself and learn myself.”
She began as a music major, aiming to become a Christian music artist. But the music she was beginning to create didn’t fit cleanly into either a contemporary worship or a gospel music lane.
And to Goyah, those were the two worlds of Christian music.
“The more research I did, the more I found that it’s very difficult for artists like me to find a platform,” she said. “So I decided I was going to start a publishing company where I could write and perform all my own music and my company would own the music, so I would have the upper hand when it came to royalties and such.”
The idea made sense to her. The problem was going to be planning and execution.
So when a classmate in a Marketing Club meeting began talking about the Entrepreneur Scholars program at CSB and Saint John’s University, her ears perked up immediately.
“I was like, what on earth?! I don’t know what this program is, but I know I need to get in there,” she said. “Because whatever they offer, I know I would take it so seriously and go so far with it.”
The entrepreneurial spirit
The Entrepreneur Scholars (or E-Scholars) program, sponsored by the Donald McNeely Center for Entrepreneurship, is a unique opportunity for students at CSB and SJU. The highly selective, cohort-based program gives accepted students the chance to develop and launch a venture of their own. Through a three-course curriculum, domestic and international travel experiences and focused mentorship, CSB and SJU E-Scholars discover and embrace the entrepreneurial spirit.
McNeely Center Director Paul Marsnik remembers when Goyah approached him about the program.
“As I recall, it was sort of a pop-in,” Marsnik said. “She just came up to the third floor of Simons Hall. And sometimes you can tell almost right away – there’s something special about this student. The way they conduct themselves. And as I explained the program to her, I could see her eyes lighting up.
“This was in the fall though, and we had already chosen our cohort group that would start in January, which was disappointing. I just felt like it was really important that we get this student into this program.”
When an accepted student unexpectedly backed out, Goyah got her chance. And, true to her word, she has taken it seriously – and there’s no telling how far she’s going to go.
A new psalm
Goyah began research to launch her own music label to help alternative Christian music artists find their audience. She quickly learned she didn’t have the capital or the network to make that happen.
No worries, she deftly pivoted.
“I thought about my life and how there are two things I’m really passionate about,” Goyah said. “One of them is the Christian music industry and the other is mental health. What can I do to bridge and blend those two?”
That was the genesis of her new venture ANP (A New Psalm) Streaming. As she explained it, “It’s a streaming platform app that streams Christian music and podcasts and allows users to search and select content based on their emotional needs.”
She researched relentlessly. She networked to seek out advice, input and mentorship.
“She’s genuinely interested in what people have to say,” Marsnik said. “And she’s absolutely unafraid to talk with anyone. Accomplished musicians … potential funding sources … she has no fear of the face-to-face conversation.”
In January 2024, as a junior, she and her E-Scholar cohort (the E-19 group) traveled to Vietnam. She had done her research on finding an app developer. When she discovered that many of the pricey U.S. developers were outsourcing the coding anyway, she opted to “cut out the middleman” and find her developer in Vietnam.
This year, as a senior, she needed to make a follow-up trip to work with the developer.
“The E-20 cohort was going to Vietnam this January,” Marsnik said. “But I couldn’t justify taking scholarship money out of the budget to pay for her to make a second trip. That didn’t slow her down at all. She went out and found a grant for $10,000 to help her develop her business idea and was able to use part of that to fly out with us so she could hunker down with her software engineers and coders and really start putting this thing together.”
Meanwhile, she has shifted to create a self-directed major crafted to best prepare her for her future with ANP Streaming. She continues to blend in music courses while also incorporating her entrepreneurship courses and a healthy collection of global business leadership courses.
“This is just a cool school to go to,” she said in describing her ability to blend music and business education in pursuit of her dream. “I have a recital coming up at the end of spring semester – just like most music majors do – where I plan to showcase material from the first album I’ve written since I’ve been at school here.”
Prayers for the future, respect for the past
“Lilly still has a long way to go on this,” Marsnik said. “I mean, this thing will take at least another $50,000 to get the platform built. But it’s absolutely in the top one percent of the most ambitious projects I’ve seen through 20 cohorts of E-Scholars.”
Still, bet against Goyah at your own peril. She has drive, vision and faith. She also has a role model who continues to inspire her.
“My mom is the strongest woman I know,” she said. “She’s endured challenges that would break most people, yet she never gave up. Her resilience wasn’t just about surviving, it was rooted in her steadfast faith and commitment to God. At the time, I didn’t always understand it, but now I see it as the most valuable silent lesson she taught me: there’s nothing stronger than a woman determined to rise.
“From surviving a civil war to raising seven children, she’s been our rock and our #1 supporter every step of the way. I want to thank her for supporting me and for instilling values in me that have truly saved my life.”
