In this Business Blast Podcast episode, host Tyler Wagner interviews Katrina Starzhynskaya, author, entrepreneur, and founder of Grippz Mats—the world’s only acupressure yoga mat. Katrina shares a pivotal personal story of healing herself from Lyme disease after being told she was incurable, which reshaped her belief that nothing is impossible and sparked the idea for an acupressure yoga mat. She describes how she combined yoga, acupressure, and oriental medicine knowledge to create Grippz Mats, launching a successful Kickstarter campaign and building a business that helps many people. Katrina reflects on her entrepreneurial journey, emphasizing that early ventures that didn’t succeed were valuable learning experiences rather than failures. She offers health advice that most conditions are curable through self‑empowerment and research, and stresses the importance of hiring experts for marketing, funnel building, and digital ads. Her core business advice is to be resourceful, leveraging personal networks, influencers, and retailers even without large capital. She shares personal wisdom, telling her younger self that she is exactly where she needs to be, and highlights gratitude as the key to happiness. Katrina cites the book Outwitting the Devil by Napoleon Hill as a major influence on her mindset, and shares a favorite quote from The Alchemist about the universe conspiring to help those who desire something deeply. Finally, she directs listeners to find her on Facebook and Instagram under the name Katrina Starsky.
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Welcome to the Business Blast Podcast. I'm your host, Tyler Wagner. This episode is brought to you by Authors Unite. Authors Unite makes the process of becoming a published bestselling author as simple as sipping your morning cup of coffee. You can learn more about Authors Unite at authorsunite.com. Now let's jump into the episode.
Alright everyone, welcome back to another episode of the Business Blast Podcast. I'm your host Tyler Wagner. Today I have Katrina with us. She is an author, entrepreneur, and founder of GRIPS Mats, world's only acupressure yoga mat. So welcome to the show.
Thank you, Tyler. It's my pleasure to be here.
Of course, grateful to have you on. We'll jump right in, Katrina, to the first one. The first question I have for you is what is the best story from your life that has an underlying value valuable message?
Awesome. I will probably share several. So one of the stories that turned my life around was healing myself from Lyme disease. And I was called incurable and doctors told me I would be bedridden for the rest of my life. So I was able to heal myself without doctors. And that really shifted my mindset that really nothing is impossible. We can create anything in life, whether it's business, business, finances, relationship, health. It just made me more empowered. And the same healing event led me into another discovery. When I was healing myself, I was at the same time in a school for Oriental medicine. So I would get acupressure and acupuncture every single day. And I was a yoga teacher. And at that time I realized that I've done yoga and acupressure so much to heal myself that The idea for GripMat came up. I was thinking, how can I combine those amazing modalities together in one product? And I have created an acupressure yoga mat that became really successful. We had a successful Kickstarter campaign, and that's one of the main businesses I'm working on right now because it's really helping a lot of people, and I love working on on that business. And another story I would like to share that might be very valuable for listeners, that I have started several businesses. I wrote a few books and I started several businesses in health and wellness. And first few of them, I would not call fail, but they did not success. They did not succeed. And I view it as not a failure, but as a learning lesson. And if those businesses I have never started, I would not be succeeding right now with my Gripsmat. So anything we start and we have roadblocks, it's just a learning curve. So it's very important for entrepreneurs to remember that it's very hard to succeed at the first time. We need to go through those learning lessons.
Thank you for sharing this with us. I could not agree more. And the next one I have for you is, what is the most valuable piece of information we should know that's within your expertise or industry?
Ah, great question. So I believe I have expertise in health and wellness and some expertise in business. So I would give advice in health and wellness that anything is really, anything is curable. And if somebody's dealing with health condition, whether it's mild or it's very severe, It's possible to turn it around and heal ourselves. And I know that a lot of people right now struggling with autoimmune diseases and doctors tell them that their body attacking itself, which is not true because our body loves us unconditionally and our body is trying to heal itself. So it's really possible to regain health back. Just stay empowered and do your own research and find best healers and You can do it. And the second advice I would love to give in business, I feel like there are— I have strong points in business and weak ones. So I would never be able to succeed by myself. The only reason I have succeeded and was able to sell a lot of yoga mats or books is because I've hired great experts. I've hired great team that's very professional in digital marketing that helped me run my Facebook ads, or somebody who helped me build my funnels. So it's very important to remember that, um, we are not alone and we should not be trying to build a business or write a book alone. We always should seek expertise from someone who knows what they're doing.
And that could tie in, uh, but what is your best piece of overall business advice? So not necessarily industry specific.
Sure, I would say be resourceful. It doesn't matter if you have an investor or capital to start. You can always use your own resourcefulness to pitch your own business to retailers, to pitch your own books, or to find bloggers and influencers to promote your product or service. There are always opportunities, so do not get discouraged if you don't have a huge huge starting capital.
And if you could give your younger self one piece of advice, what would that be?
I love this question. So I would tell myself that I'm exactly where I am supposed to be on my life journey, and there is nothing that needs to be changed. We are always exactly where we need to be.
And in your opinion, what's the key to happiness?
In my opinion, gratitude is the key to happiness. There is always around us something to be grateful for, and do not look for external material things to make you happy. All you need is within you right now.
And what is the best book that you've read, and what was the number one thing you learned from that?
Yeah, I have a lot of books that I love, but one book that stands out for me all the time is Outwitting the Devil, and I read that book a few times, and I love listening to audiobook. It's very well narrated, and that book was actually originally written in 1938 by Napoleon Hill, and it was published only in 2011 because it was considered to be controversial. And that book, in 1938, Napoleon Hill basically described exactly our modern society today and the way conventional schooling, education, and organized religion works, the way those institutions brainwash us and the way they want us to live out of fear. And Napoleon Hill gives great suggestions how we can break through those limiting beliefs and fear and how we can Become not a drifter, but creator of our own life. And that book really influenced my mindset and I can listen to it over and over again and I always learn something new. I highly recommend that.
Yes, that is actually one of my absolute favorite audiobooks as well. Yeah. Oh man, I remember the first time I was on a road trip and I put that on because it's like 9 hours, I think, or maybe 10. And I actually listened to it all the way through. It was so entertaining because it goes back and forth between him and the devil.
Yeah, I love that conversation.
So good. And then the next one is, what's your favorite quote and why?
My favorite quote is from The Alchemist. When you want something, all the universe conspires in helping you to achieve it. I truly believe that when we are obsessed about something and we want something so bad, We will always attract people, events, uh, moments in our life that will help us manifest our dream into reality.
Thank you so much for coming on. The last one I have for you before we let you go is where's the best place for people to find you online?
Yeah, I'm active on Facebook and Instagram and they can find me by searching my name, Katrina Starsky. S-T-A-R-Z.
Perfect. Thanks again.
Of course. Thank you for having me.
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