Women In Wellness: Noga Sapir On The Five Lifestyle Tweaks That Will Help Support People’s Journey Towards Better Wellbeing
An Interview With Candice Georgiadis
Fewer screens, especially at night. I started sleeping much better when I created a routine that involves leaving my phone out of the bedroom. I also started reading a lot more. It’s become such an ingrained habit in our household that I have to restrain myself from showing my surprise when someone talks about scrolling before sleep.
As a part of my series about the women in wellness, I had the pleasure of interviewing Noga Sapir.
Noga Sapir studied Neuroscience at Tel Aviv University and textile design at Shenkar College of Engineering and Design. She invented the Reflect Orb by weaving together the two disciplines to create a device that is soft and inviting on the outside but contains a formidable inside. Noga founded Reflect Innovation in 2018 and has raised $4M to date.
Thank you so much for joining us in this interview series! Our readers would love to “get to know you” better. Can you share your “backstory” with us?
I’m Noga, I’m 35 years old, I live in Tel Aviv and I’m the founder of Reflect. My backstory includes some twists and turns. I started by getting a bachelor’s degree in Neuroscience from Tel Aviv University. After graduating, I decided not to pursue a career in science and paused to think about what I love doing. The answer was knitting, crafting, art, and creating. My grandmother had taught me to knit when I was young, and so I decided to study textile design. I received my BDes degree from Shenkar, Israel’s most prestigious design school, specializing in knitting. While in school, I also worked at a start-up, having some technological background from my army service. In my final project in Shenkar, I combined my technological, scientific, and design knowledge and created the Reflect Orb. I wanted to address my most pressing problem — suffering from anxiety and dealing with a lot of stress, through a soft and tactile physical object that utilizes tech and science while being unassuming and comforting. After graduating with a working prototype, I pitched Reflect to a VC, and it became a start-up, founded in 2018. It is now a 10 person company and we are just about to launch Reflect to the market.
Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you started your career? What were the main lessons or takeaways from that story?
There was one “lightbulb moment” after I graduated and went around showing Reflect in many exhibitions and competitions. It was at an outdoor innovation festival in Tel Aviv when watching people interact with the prototypes, I realized that Reflect should be a product and not just a school project. It was an incredible moment for me to see how people engaged with Reflect, becoming completely immersed in the experience, ignoring all the bustle of the festival and the street, and with the orb light shining on their faces. I didn’t seek out starting a venture, I feel like I stumbled upon it, creating something that just had to become a reality because people want it to be. From that experience on and in all our activities in Reflect, I feel guided by users’ input, striving to maintain the magic of that first interaction.
Can you share a story about the biggest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?
I don’t personally think it’s a mistake, but many people thought I would be making a huge mistake founding a start-up as a solo founder. I will, however, acknowledge that it’s a huge challenge. All the highs and lows of the entrepreneurial journey fall squarely on my shoulders without anyone to share the burden with, and being a woman founder, it feels sometimes like I have more obstacles and am looked down upon more than male founders. At times, it is super hard, and many people don’t believe in you — like the people who advised me against founding Reflect. The lesson I learned, first and foremost, is sometimes people don’t necessarily know what’s right for you better than yourself, even if you’re just starting, and it’s better to try and fail than not try at all. The second lesson for me was how crucial it was to find the absolute best people to surround myself with, who share my vision and will share my journey. I feel grateful to have found and assembled the best possible team, who make being a solo founder a much easier job.
Let’s jump to our main focus. When it comes to health and wellness, how is the work you are doing helping to make a bigger impact in the world?
In Reflect we’re developing the Reflect Orb, a hand-held soft biofeedback device designed to help people learn how to control their stress and anxiety. Reflect’s biggest message is how important it is to listen to your body, how empowering it can be to learn how to control it, and through it impacts your mind. We’re making Biofeedback therapy accessible through a small device you can take with you wherever you go, and carve out a quiet moment of relaxation anytime in your day.
Can you share your top five “lifestyle tweaks” that you believe will help support people’s journey towards better wellbeing? Please give an example or story for each.
- Fewer screens, especially at night. I started sleeping much better when I created a routine that involves leaving my phone out of the bedroom. I also started reading a lot more. It’s become such an ingrained habit in our household that I have to restrain myself from showing my surprise when someone talks about scrolling before sleep.
- Prioritizing yourself and your wellbeing. I aim to make time for things that make me happy and to take breaks whenever I feel overwhelmed. You can’t take care of others (family, friends, work) if you don’t take care of yourself. For me, it means always having some craft project going to soothe myself, and a happy moment usually means indulging in something sweet and yummy.
- Meditate — I started meditating three years ago, around the time Reflect was founded. For a long while, I thought it wasn’t for me — I’m a very logical, grounded, and even skeptical person, and I thought meditation is all spiritual woo-woo. I came into meditation from the scientific angle, learning how it changes and improves the brain. It turned out, that meditation is really for everybody, and you can find the type of meditation that works best for you. Ultimately, it’s a practice. It’s about showing up consistently, even when it’s hard, and training your mind to be still and mindful.
- Be kind to yourself — Don’t feel guilty for feeling what you feel. My best friend calls this “not suffering twice”. I try not to feel bad about feeling something, or being some way, or having an off day and just wanting to do nothing. I can be very judgemental of myself, and also have a penchant for jumping into guilt pretty quickly, but I try to cut myself some slack, listening to myself and my needs.
- Be open — your feelings aren’t your burden to bear alone. Sharing with others and being open with others always makes me feel better.
If you could start a movement that would bring the most amount of wellness to the most amount of people, what would that be?
My movement would prioritize always listening to your body and your mind. Wellness starts there.
What are your “5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me Before I Started” and why?
- Find the right investors — alignment of vision is key.
- Your internal drive is the make or break of your startup. This is nerve-wracking and exhausting but also exhilarating.
- It’s not quite the wellness message, but the truth is that your startup becomes your life. Not that there’s no room for other things in your life, in fact, it’s important to prioritize other things. However, you will care deeply and think about your startup obsessively as it becomes a part of you.
- Finding the right team is hard, but it’s one of the things you shouldn’t compromise on and it’s what makes the ride worthwhile.
- It’s hard to overestimate the thrill of seeing the impact of your startup on the people you meet during the journey. Make sure to always be open to feedback and expose your ideas to others.
Sustainability, veganism, mental health and environmental changes are big topics at the moment. Which one of these causes is dearest to you, and why?
The cause that is dearest to me is mental health, of course. As a sufferer of anxiety, it took me a while to accept it as a part of myself and learn how to leverage it to try to connect to others and make an impact on others. I love that mental health is becoming less of a taboo, and that the good side of social media allows us to share our experiences and our weaknesses with others to feel stronger and not alone. I love that I can talk openly about my struggles and that I get to come to work every day to try to help people, like myself, feel better.
What is the best way our readers can follow you online?
Instagram — link
Facebook — link
Blog — link
Thank you for these fantastic insights!
Women In Wellness: Noga Sapir On The Five Lifestyle Tweaks That Will Help Support People’s Journey… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.