IN PARTNERSHIP WITH
What does having a passion project mean in 2022? It means drawing on your own experiences, powering your ambition, and staying true to yourself and your community—with more good vibes and less burnout.
Together with Total by Verizon, we set out to find the wellness experts doing all of the above—and to tap them for a few of their go-to tips and tools. It’s time to get inspired by the innovators who are making moves in the physical and mental health space, with passion and balance at the forefront.
How did Claire Siegel, RD go from passion to project to profession? “The most succinct version of my background is: chronic dieter turned registered dietitian turned startup CEO,” she says. That startup is Flourish, the nutrition and body-image support digital platform Siegel founded to help people experience both physical and mental health while celebrating their inherent self worth.
“I spent years restricting calories and trying every fad diet or lifestyle,” Siegel says. “Eventually, I hit my goal weight—and I was miserable. Oh, and all the food rules and restriction? They’d wrecked my metabolism, mental health, and social life, too. That experience, and the realization that weight alone doesn’t determine health or happiness, is exactly why I founded Flourish.”
Upon downloading Flourish, the app matches you with an expert for a 30-minute session that’s private and totally free. From there, the program encourages members to eat veggies, channel intuitive eating, and move regularly—but that’s just the beginning. “My real passion is supporting the mindset shift that underlies these positive changes,” Siegel says.
And Flourish’s innovative technology encourages those shifts. Siegel remembers her first post-college job at a consumer-packaged-goods startup, where she witnessed the impact of tech on the industry. “I started imagining it applied to nutrition and habit formation,” she says. “Now, fast forward to founding Flourish, and our core offering is elegant technology that enables human experts to support our end users with behavior change,” she says. “With that, we really believe we can change the world.”
Thinking about turning
your passion into an entrepreneurial project?
The first step is validating your idea, Siegel says. Make sure the problem you’ve identified—and the solution you’re offering—resonates with others.
Flourish is all about letting go of expectations and welcoming growth. That’s the vision powering Total by Verizon, too, which offers the freedom of a no-contract plan from the network America relies on. Because feeling restricted is seriously outdated.
Get Connected
— Claire Siegel, RD
Claire Siegel
The Fulfilled
Foodie Founder
Just like Mine’d, Total by Verizon lets you push beyond boundaries—with wireless plans that free you from contracts. Consider it an invitation to spend more time growing and exploring without being held back.
Get Connected
Albert’s checklist for an in-progress passion project? Be totally relentless, cultivate a healthy combination of self awareness and blind idealism, and know that starting something without an instruction manual is a bit of a rollercoaster ride.
— Aaron Albert
The Mindful Emotional-Health Maven
Ultimately, human connection through technology ignited Albert’s passion for mental health support and advocacy—and it continues to propel his work today. “Mine’d is on a mission to celebrate emotions,” he says, “helping you navigate life’s challenges with a little more joy and a lot less stress.”
A few years ago, Aaron Albert found himself heartbroken and suffering. He tried all kinds of things to ease his feelings of brokenness and loss, from therapy to self-help books. “It all felt too expensive, inaccessible, or lonely,” he says. Along the way, he met a human-connection specialist who became his coach, his confidant, and ultimately his co-founder of Mine’d—a digital community that connects people to emotional wellness experts.
Through this coach and co-founder, Albert experienced firsthand the life-changing impact that radical human connection can have—but getting help wasn’t easy. Passionate about changing that, Albert made accessible, wide-reaching, and destigmatized emotional support his project-turned-profession.
The Mine’d app connects you to top wellness experts for daily live
and on-demand coaching in relationships, career, self love, and
more. The platform relies on smart technology to make this happen—but how does it differ from the flood of digital directives you’re served every day? “Where it gets tricky is navigating what information is helpful and what isn’t. That is one big area Mine’d is helping folks in,” Albert says. “We curate the best experts in the world to help make the difficult journey of healing and growth easier.”
Aaron Albert
Read More
An RD’s Guide to Building and Sustaining a Healthy Body Image
3 Ways to Use Technology to Help Support Your Mental Health
Project Passion Tip:
Project Passion Tip:
*Most reliable 5G: based on most first place rankings in RootMetrics® 1H 2022 assessments of 125 metros. Experiences vary. Not an endorsement.
What does having a passion project mean in 2022? It means drawing on your own experiences, powering your ambition, and staying true to yourself and your community—with more good vibes and less burnout.
Together with Total by Verizon, we set out to find the wellness experts doing all of the above—and to tap them for a few of their go-to tips and tools. It’s time to get inspired by the innovators who are making moves in the physical and mental health space, with passion and balance at the forefront.
How did Claire Siegel, RD go from passion to project to profession? “The most succinct version of my background is: chronic dieter turned registered dietitian turned startup CEO,” she says. That startup is Flourish, the nutrition and body-image support digital platform Siegel founded to help people experience both physical and mental health while celebrating their inherent self worth.
“I spent years restricting calories and trying every fad diet or lifestyle,” Siegel says. “Eventually, I hit my goal weight—and I was miserable. Oh, and all the food rules and restriction? They’d wrecked my metabolism, mental health, and social life, too. That experience, and the realization that weight alone doesn’t determine health or happiness, is exactly why I founded Flourish.”
Upon downloading Flourish, the app matches you with an expert for a 30-minute session that’s private and totally free. From there, the program encourages members to eat veggies, channel intuitive eating, and move regularly—but that’s just the beginning. “My real passion is supporting the mindset shift that underlies these positive changes,” Siegel says.
Flourish is all about letting go of expectations and welcoming growth. That’s the vision powering Total by Verizon, too, which offers the freedom of a no-contract plan with the benefit of the most reliable 5G network in America.* Because feeling restricted is seriously outdated.
Get Connected
Thinking about turning your passion into an entrepreneurial project? The first step is validating your idea, Siegel says. Make sure the problem you’ve identified—and the solution you’re offering—resonates
with others.
Project Passion Tip:
— Claire Siegel, RD
How did Claire Siegel, RD go from passion to project to profession? “The most succinct version of my background is: chronic dieter turned registered dietitian turned startup CEO,” she says. That startup is Flourish, the nutrition and body-image support digital platform Siegel founded to help people experience both physical and mental health while celebrating their inherent self worth.
“I spent years restricting calories and trying every fad diet or lifestyle,” Siegel says. “Eventually, I hit my goal weight—and I was miserable. Oh, and all the food rules and restriction? They’d wrecked my metabolism, mental health, and social life, too. That experience, and the realization that weight alone doesn’t determine health or happiness, is exactly why I founded Flourish.”
Upon downloading Flourish, the app matches you with an expert for a 30-minute session that’s private and totally free. From there, the program encourages members to eat veggies, channel intuitive eating, and move regularly—but that’s just the beginning. “My real passion is supporting the mindset shift that underlies these positive changes,” Siegel says.
And Flourish’s innovative technology encourages those shifts. Siegel remembers her first post-college job at a consumer-packaged-goods startup, where she witnessed the impact of tech on the industry. “I started imagining it applied to nutrition and habit formation,” she says. “Now, fast forward to founding Flourish, and our core offering is elegant technology that enables human experts to support our end users with behavior change,” she says. “With that, we really believe we can change the world.”
Claire Siegel
*Most reliable 5G: based on most first place rankings
in RootMetrics® 1H 2022 assessments of 125 metros. Experiences vary. Not an endorsement.
