Lavie attended the Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design well as the Sam Spiegel Film and Television School in Jerusalem. Lavie was inspired to write Zero Motivation based on her own experience serving in the Israel Defense Forces. In 2006 she created a short called The Substitute which played at the Tribeca Film Festival about a young woman working for the IDF. This short was later developed into Zero Motivation. The film premiered at the 2014 Tribeca Film Festival where it won Best Narrative Feature in the World Narrative Competition. It was given a limited release in the U.S. by Zeitgeist Films.