← Living Your Legacy
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One summer day in Chicago, I was walking with my family and was struck by somebody who was speeding. And in the blink of an eye, within 30 seconds, my life changed drastically.
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Rebecca Tenzer is a fearless, innovative and purpose driven leader transforming mental health care as the founder of Astute Counseling and Wellness Services. From trauma informed therapy to restorative yoga and energy work, she's built a holistic space where people are seen, supported and empowered.
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What in your mindset got you into this positive place? When I used it for good, my.
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Reason for choosing to put in the work despite it being really painful is that I had a practice I was just building. I wasn't ready to give up on that. I have a son, I'm a single parent. If I were to give up, what does that look like for them? I owe it to all of us to do something with this experience and not just heal, like take it and go somewhere with it. Right? So I did.
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It spans the globe like a super high cold Internet Elvis Rent a Prime for free. Today Apple is going to reinvent the model.
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It's not over until I win. The Living youg Legacy podcast. For those who live to leave a legacy that's extraordinary. The impossible has happened. Oh, that is sensational. Jordan Open Chicago with the lead you said is the fastest man on the planet. You can live your dream.
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C
Hello and welcome back to another episode of Legacy Makers. Joining me today is Rebecca and we're going to hear her story how her life drastically changed in 2018. And like many of you, that life changing moment created the catalyst for change to help more people. She has a big wellness center and helping thousands of people with mental health and overall health. So excited to dive in today. Welcome to the show.
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A
Thank you so much for having me.
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C
My pleasure. So tell everyone what, tell us about 2018 and how this all started.
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A
Yeah. So I was a therapist up in 2018 and I was just kind of getting started with my practice and on one summer day in Chicago, I was walking with my family and was struck by somebody who was speeding and blew a red light and he hit me with his car and in the blink of an eye, within 30 seconds, my life changed drastically. The book of my old life closed and the first chapter of my new story began.
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C
It's funny because I, I meet a lot of people through this TV show and just in life from speaking around the world and they have these life changing moments and near death experiences often but they never like, they don't regret it because it was like this catalyst for like this whole big Next thing, it's really fascinating.
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A
I think I said in my earlier interview, this traumatic experience that I had led to something very beautiful. I hated every minute of the healing process. It was horrible. It was life changing, but it really did.
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C
How long was that just for the audience to have somebody?
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A
Yeah, I mean, I was in the trauma unit for a while. I had to move in with my parents at the age of 38 to help me take care of my son. That was the agreement. And it was chronic pain for years. I had to have massive spinal reconstructive surgery. But before that, I mean, it was literally a full time job to go to therapy appointments, go to speech appointments, trauma appointments, physical therapy appointments, mental health appointments. And those were just the things to make my body better. There was so much more impact that took place, like feeling really depressed. I was in a dark, isolated room. I felt like horrible every single day. I had my son who I had to worry about. You know, he saw the, literally saw the entire thing. So the experience itself was horrible. And in that moment, I wouldn't have thought that I would have at some point been grateful, but I do feel that way now.
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C
Well, and that's interesting because I again, I meet people that have been, you know, through these life changing episodes. But it's really the mindset, right, that dictates how you come out of it on the other end. Cause there are some people that it does happen to and they stay depressed forever and things get worse. And then some people that use it to create great things off the back of it. So what in your mindset got you into this positive place when I used it for good?
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A
Well, I always say you can choose your hard, right? Choose your hard in that moment. It can be very difficult to heal. It's also really difficult to stay in that dark place. You have to make a decision. My reason for choosing to put in the work despite it being really painful is that I had a practice I was just building. I wasn't ready to give up on that. I have a son, I'm a single parent. If I were to give up, what does that look like for him? A depressed mom who sits in her room all day in chronic pain. I'm athletic, we played basketball up until this point. I coached him, I trained him. Life didn't only drastically change for me, but this poor 7 year old kid has gone through so much. I owe it to all of us to do something with this experience and not just heal, like take it and go somewhere with it. Right. So I did.
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C
So let's Fast forward just for everyone listening. What do you do now?
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A
Well, so after the accident, it was really an eye opening experience that this is a nightmare. Trying to get help. Like going to downtown Chicago to the Shirley Ryan rehab center, then back over to the north side for speech therapy, out to the suburbs to get ac. Literally. It was a full time job. There's no way you could do anything else, so there has to be a better way. And then there was. I'm going to build a wellness center that incorporates what I've always done and what I have a degree in, which is mental health. But I'm going to add all of these different things, these components to make people have the best opportunity they can to heal. So I added tons of holistic things. Look, after an accident, I couldn't work out, I couldn't do triathlons afterwards. Like my spine was. I had massive issues, you know, physically. So I tried to create something that I would have wanted, that I would have needed. And that's what I did. I created this wellness center and it's been a place where people can really heal.
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C
So let's talk about what that looks like. Just help someone visualize. How is it different? Right. Can you give a few examples? Oh, yeah. Someone comes to me and they get this, this, this and this.
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A
Sure. It's different because you won't see it anywhere else. There is no other place that I've ever seen that has therapy plus a wellness center, plus a retail, plus an outdoor green space, plus a yoga studio in one place. It's like 8,000 square feet. It's a brand new facility I built. Every single detail in mind was Zen. Dignity, respect, luxury. So all of the things there, you just won't see it. Mental health historically has been something we shove in the basement of a building.
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C
Sure.
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A
It is a place where people who are depressed are scary and dangerous. And we don't want to mix folks who are not well with the general population.
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C
Yeah, yeah. I always imagine like therapy for that. Yeah. You're in this random blank room and office, someone with a clipboard.
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A
That was me, my first office. You know, as an entrepreneur. Starting off, I had to be careful with budgeting. I got that space. Basement of a medical building. No windows, sometimes smelled like sewage, sometimes didn't. I did the best I could, but it wasn't what I wanted.
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C
Well, but also it's interesting because we know as you know, I know as an entrepreneur and someone very cognitive with my mental health and performance, to be a high performer that your energy and environment Dictates a lot of your mental health and mood and energy and creativity and positiveness. Right. And that's why I left England and I moved to America and live on the beach. Because those little things you're happy place. Yeah. Make. Make a big difference in quality of life. So it's kind of just ironic that someone that already has a bad mental health state, some sort of depression or something is. Is often treated in a place that gloomy. Doesn't promote the opposite. Right.
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A
We don't, we don't have enough money.
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C
Invested in it's budget. Yeah.
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A
So for me, I started off so small and so slow to be able to. If I had built this wellness center off the bat, there's no way I would have been able to do that.
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C
You can't fund it.
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A
Yeah, no, I mean I had to work my way up, grind, hustle, choose my hard.
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C
So this just for visual. This sounds more like a spa now. Right. I'm visualizing this. That's a good high end gym spa, sort of nice lobby, is that.
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A
It's beautiful. You walk in, there's a live green wall. As soon as you walk in, the receptionists are sitting there and they're handing you tea and cookies. Go to the other side. And fresh pressed juice if you'd like it. Full retail shop everywhere. Everywhere you look is a retail.
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C
So it's more like a hotel sort of vibe by the sounds of it.
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A
Definitely spotlight. And that was the goal because I had had my original place where I'm trying to instill hope and light in these people in a dark space now. We did the best we could. I did good work. That was never where I wanted it to end. I had such a bigger vision for this, but I didn't know what that vision was until my life changed.
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C
Well, and it's smart too because. Yeah, I mean you, you should. It's kind of like going to the dentist. You want to create somewhere people want to go versus dread. Right, Exactly. What's got depression, anxiety or anger issues or whatever, the worst thing you can do is send them somewhere miserable. Right. So if you have somewhere they look forward to, then they might, you know adherence in any sort of treatment, whether it's weight loss or mental or whatever, adherence is probably one of the number one factors. So just increase in adherence alone helps.
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A
When they walk through the door, my goal was for them to exhale, literally exhale the outside, come in and be like, I can be me. Whatever that looks like, whatever walk of life, whatever you identify with, you can walk in and it does not matter anymore. We will take care. We even set up all of the yoga mats and blankets for people to come in. They literally don't have to do a single thing besides just relax and heal. And that was the ultimate idea.
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C
Well, and do you see the adherence increase a lot?
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A
Oh, for sure. People walk through the space. They're. They're sold on it because it feels good.
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C
Yeah.
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We also obviously have really good therapy clinicians. And the idea was, is that when you come in for therapy, they would say, look, you're anxious. Have you tried the yoga for anxiety class? There's like a yoga instructor who has his therapist credentials. That's a great one. Have you tried sound bath? Sound Sound bath does a, B and C. So it was supposed to be a prescribed thing, but the community is coming in without therapy, and they're like, sound bath.
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C
That's great.
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A
Yes. Sign me up. So, you know, the only thing you're.
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C
Missing is puppies now. Puppy yoga or something.
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A
They did reach out to us for puppy yoga a few weeks ago, and I actually work a lot in animal rights, so I was like, absolutely, sign me up. And we missed the opportunity. But I did find out that the little. You know, obviously the puppies are going to destroy your place, but it's for a good cause. It's to get them adopted. So it's in the works.
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C
They started it here on Miami beach, actually. Puppy yogurt big in Chicago. It's getting big. Huge. It's a smart idea to help find an adoption.
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A
It's beautiful. It's beautiful. So it's in the works. We'll check that box, too. We have a beautiful outdoor green space where we do yoga. People sit out there and journal. They eat their overnight oats, they drink. There's nothing about astute that when you walk in, you can't find something that makes you feel good. I think, you know, one of the big misconceptions in life is that you're just supposed to be happy. You're supposed to wake up every day, Rudy, and be like, yes, I'm training today. I love my job. I want. Some people feel that more often than others. Most of us have to work at being happy.
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C
Yeah.
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A
Yeah. What are you doing besides going to therapy or besides you know, training for your triathlon? What are you doing all throughout the week for positive mental health? It's hard.
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C
Yeah. I mean, I feel chasing happiness is like chasing a six pack. It's like, you can't. It's constant, you know, Like I would say, I'M like, probably in the top 1%, 1% percentile of happiness. Like, I'm generally always happy. Right. But it's like really hard work to stay there.
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A
Let's talk about all the things you're doing to be.
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C
Yeah, that's what I mean. It's like having a six pack. Yeah. You know, you're having to, you know, whether you're training two times a day and eating healthy all the time or for happiness, you're constantly blocking out all these, like, negative people, negative thoughts, these problems in life and business that you could perceive in the wrong way that lowers happiness, increases anxiety. It's like a constant battle to, to maintain that positive state.
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A
It's amazing that you have figured out what works for you. I know that for you, you kind of figured out at a young age that being an athlete was something that was super important to you. I always talk about mental health and wellness as being like a puzzle. You have all these pieces. So for you, being an athlete is like a huge, you know, amount of your, your puzzle. Eating healthy, you said you also do a lot to help people. That goes a long way for helping people.
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C
Fulfillment is a massive drive.
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Huge. The talks you do, traveling around, helping people. So, like, you know, you have to find what works for you. And it's not easy.
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C
Well, and the biggest thing I think people miss that, I realized, is it's a moving target every few months, like, I'm resetting to stay aligned to it because it's like a boat in the river. Right. Like, you can start it here, but it drifts and you have to keep pulling it back or paddling to get back into that original spot. Because, you know, for me in business, for example, I can add a couple of weekly calls here and there and a new commitment before you know it. I'm like losing happiness in my day now because I'm doing these things. I don't want to be doing it. So it's like you got to paddle back to the original spot. And for a normal person, people that you see, I'm sure it's the same, right? Like, they, I mean, a lot of people are unhappy because they stay in the job, they hate, the toxic relationship they hate. They stay financially insecure and broke for a long time. And those things compound into why they end up probably coming to see you.
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A
I mean, you nailed it completely. You have to notice the signs. You have to find when you are unhappy or you are anxious. And again, therapy is a great place to start to figure it out. But you really need to work on making changes because no one else is going to make you happy. Either you find it yourself or you get the help that you need. But it's really not as simple as social media.
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C
No.
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A
Everyone's houses are so clean, their kids are happy. You're, you know, running to. It's tough.
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C
Well, it's like, it's hard. It's like, it's kind of like the Alcoholic Anonymous. The first stage is acceptance or knowing where you're at. But then that's like 5%. The 95% is like, okay, I'm 50 pounds overweight. The 95% is now losing the weight and then keeping it off. That's the hard.
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A
How defeating does it feel to look at these huge goals of like, what do I want to do? I can't imagine how you got from where you started to here. Wasn't envisioning this, right? Like you took these little baby steps and that's key. And mental health, entrepreneurship, whatever area you want to look at, those baby steps are what really get people moving in the right direction. And we have at astute tons of baby steps for you to take to try and start your mental health and wellness journey.
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C
So let's stay on that for a second. We talked about, you know, this pursuit of happiness and great mental health. You're obviously a mental health expert and author. Give some tips for people out there generally say, let's assume everyone listening is generally maybe happier than the average person. Let's assume, okay, how do they maximize mental health and happiness? Take it from maybe above average to like exceptional. And if some people are listening and they're not happy and aligned right now, what's the first step for them? So two part question.
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A
Sure. I would say if you are not feeling your best, your first step should be therapy. It's hard to gather up a plan when you yourself aren't feeling great. So having someone like me or a different, you know, clinician help you figure out where to go is key. So that's number one.
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C
So that's like hiring a personal trainer if you're trying to lose weight.
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A
I mean, if you want to get in shape. Do you go to the gym once per month? No.
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C
You go, sure.
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A
Every single, you know.
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C
But I do think therapy, maybe not in America these days as much, but at least for me in England, where I came from, and, and in some place in America still, I think, or some groups, therapy has a worse wrap than personal training. Like if someone's like, oh, I've got a personal trainer, that's Seen as like a more upper class. Oh, great. Whereas therapy is like, what's wrong with you? Right.
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A
The stigma. Yeah, Stigma of going to therapy. And I will tell you, the younger generations in social media have made it.
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C
It's much different now.
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A
Much.
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C
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
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A
And what's interesting is no one talked about going to therapy. It was a hush thing.
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C
Yeah, yeah.
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A
Never before. And now look at Tik tok type in mental health, everyone.
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C
That's right. That's great.
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A
We're changing the stigma. There's, you know, I spoke earlier about this. Mental health. Looks like you, it looks like me, it looks like everybody in this studio. We're all going to go through.
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C
It's just personal development. Right. There's literally what it is.
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A
And sometimes it's more dramatic and sometimes it's more severe and sometimes it's life. Life. It can be really, really hard. So for the person who's not feeling well, therapy is great. For the person who is maybe happier than the average person, finding a routine and sticking with it. Just like you mentioned, with training and those kinds of things, you can add things to your routine which will make your day, kind of set you up for success. There are little tiny things you can do that are what we consider cognitive behavioral therapy techniques. They rewire the neurotransmitters in your brain just by doing things like a gratitude journal, daily affirmations in the morning, having your like. What does your morning look like? I know you're very regimented. Do you get up? That's me, yeah. Do you have a cup of tea in the morning? Are you silent?
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C
I'm pretty fast to get going because I'm like at a type. So I get up. I don't check my phone right away. Well, I get up, hang out with my dogs for a bit, and then when I do get up, I go straight onto my balcony. I live on the beach, so I get the sun and I sit on my balcony. No phone. My phone's still shut. I don't sleep with the phone near me. It's locked in the kitchen. I have a lot of resilience to pass the kitchen without getting my phone every morning.
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A
This is why you are in the 1%, my friend. You already listed seven things I would tell people to do one of that. You already do every day.
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C
And then I sit on my balcony in the sun and then I have a journal. So I write my goals for the day, my quarterly goals, my action plan for the day, and then when that's done, then that's when I Generally start my day. So I walk into the office, along the beach, do my morning cool and work out. So that's my first hour.
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A
Poster child, literally, for mental health. So you're starting your day off with success. You're starting your day positive, you're getting sunshine, you're writing down positive, you're even starting with your dogs. Like that is a moment of happiness. So you're doing all the things right. It is no wonder why you say, I'm probably in the top 1%. I do feel happy a lot. You have a routine and you stick with it. Is that every day?
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C
Yeah. And I don't set an alarm, which is one of my life goals. So I wake up naturally to the sun, which I think is a big one, too, because the days I do have alarms or I travel, my energy is down all day because I mess up my circadian rhythm and wait, you know, wake myself.
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A
You know a lot about this stuff.
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C
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
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A
I'm very, very impressed. So you're setting yourself up for the entire day for sleep. Right. Is basically the goal of the day. Right. So you're doing all of these things. You're getting sunshine, you're making sure that.
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C
You'Re grounding on the beach, brown on the beach.
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A
Not a lot of coffee. So you get the whole idea. Most people don't do those things. So they're waking up and checking their phone. Right. First thing in the morning, they're not getting the vitamin D that they need the sunlight to reset their sleep patterns. They're going downstairs and maybe grabbing a donut as opposed to, you know, and we're. We're all guilty. We're all guilty of that. Right. But if it's consistently you're off, you need something to start your day off that says, like, today is going to be a good day.
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C
Well, yeah, and it's cheesy. But, you know, I'm very fortunate. I built this perfect life for myself. Right. But it is harder if you're a normal, quote unquote, normal person, because your reality is you're chasing two kids around the house. You've got five letters on your kitchen table, which is your credit cards that are overdue. You're then rushing the kids to school, grabbing the donor as you drive to the job you don't like.
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A
Yep.
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C
And you wonder why half America is depressed because that, that's the reality. Right. I'm the exception. But that's the sad reality of what most people battle. I think.
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A
I think that you're right. And I also think that even for that person who has the two kids and the bills and the things that are piling up has a way to try and make changes for the better.
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C
Yeah.
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A
Getting up. So I'm going to talk to them. I'm a mom, I'm a single mom, so I'm busy. I always say we're all busy. Everyone's busy. Like what are you doing that makes you so busy that you're putting ahead of things? She's putting her kids ahead. And I get that waking up 20 minutes earlier, just 20 minutes earlier is one lifestyle change. Moms and dads, dog parents, whatever. Just that little bit of extra time so you can sit down and have a cup of coffee by yourself. Journal. Open up the, open up the blinds. It takes two seconds to get that sunlight in. So I think that yes, life can be very difficult, especially financially struggling. There are so many things that are affordable and things that we can do for mental health and wellness that we just have to find the right thing that fills our cup each day. Does that make sense?
- [21:05]
C
No. It does. Yeah. Yeah. And I mean a whole conversation for a different day. But once you know what you have to do, that's where discipline comes in. You have to do it right. Yeah.
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A
Choose your hard. Do you want to, do you want to struggle, struggle financially and struggle with where you're going or do you want to struggle with like making major sacrifices to do something?
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C
But that's why I think generally entrepreneurs have higher happiness because A, they have better fulfillment in what they do, but they're also more likely statistically to suffer adversity in the short term for success in the long term than that person.
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A
Yeah.
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C
Right. So they are willing to get up the 20 minutes earlier or hour hour to go to the gym to have the healthier body and all those benefits or take, you know, more time so they're not rushing the kids or whatever.
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A
Right. I wonder too, like if the stress levels are similar between the mom we talked about earlier with two kids and the bills piling up. As to somebody who runs multi million.
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C
Dollars, I mean, I would argue for a lot of entrepreneurs the stress technically is higher because a lot of them also have the kids and they still have bill. You know, you can have a 20 million dollar company and have big bills still and invoices and risk. Yeah. And you can be in the red. You know, I don't think lot of people assume if you have a business, you've got a ton of money. It's like no. Half the time it can be unprofitable. So. So I think entrepreneurs can technically have even more stress because they have still the kids plus that. But they fight through it and optimize it and then eventually when they get enough success, they can actually get beyond it because now they have money. And I say money equals freedom. Like one thing I didn't mention in my morning routine, that's maybe a small thing, but big thing to me is I need a clean environment. So actually before I wake up at 6:45am, my assistant come. My clean, my maid house assistant comes. So actually when I walk out my bedroom door, the house is perfectly clean because anxiety environment's massive. Yeah. And I used to, before she could came early, I would come out and the house would be a little messy. Not like crazy, but just from the night before. We have three dogs messing up the couches. Yeah, yeah. And now I come out and you know, my fridge is stacked full of my drinks and my couches, all the, you know, all the blankets are folded perfect. There's weird things, but that's what I was trying to say as an example of the pro of an entrepreneur is you can start to really do these smaller optimizations that can really get you in that top percentile.
- [23:21]
A
And I think the bottom line is, is no matter who you are, we just listed off like four different kinds of people. They all have stress.
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C
Yeah.
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A
They're all busy. Nobody is not able to have mental health.
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C
It's how you deal with it.
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A
It's how you deal with it. And what sacrifices are you willing to make? 2. I mean, it's the struggle that I went through to heal through all this. It was not a walk in the park and it didn't happen overnight, but I was committed to making myself better. And it was painful and it was a struggle, but I was not about to give up. And I think that the idea of not giving up is so important in mental health, physical health, spiritual health. You have to stick with it. And every time you fall, get back up.
- [23:58]
C
Yeah. And I'll end with this. Like you can say it way better than I can, but all the great people I've met that have built great things off the back of a life changing moment like you, they will give them a choice. And that's the defining moment that they were given a choice and they had a fork in the road and they had two paths to take. And ultimately it's up to you which path you take. And you obviously took a great one. And now you're able to help lots of great, you know, people through the great path you took. So that's awesome. And that leads me to my last question, the legacy side. What does legacy mean to you?
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A
Legacy to me is about what you're leaving behind for your loved ones. And for me, legacy is really about not what I'm leaving behind, but what I did yesterday, what I did a year ago, what I plan to do five years from now. Because I want my legacy to be something that is now. It's present, it's making changes, and I want people to see it because I want to inspire folks to make differences. My hope is that at some point, all of the things we've been doing now, you know, really make an impact. But I want my son, my family, my friends, my patients, my employees to see that legacy is about what you're doing and how you're making the world a better place. And I know that sounds cheesy, but that's really how I feel. Yeah, that's really how I feel.
- [25:09]
C
Good. Well, thanks, guys. That's a wrap. Hopefully this was an insightful little session on how to optimize your happiness, mental health, and work towards a goal that I think the whole world is aligned towards, which is building the best life for them and making an impact and living a healthy and happy life, which is what we will try and do. So I hope you enjoyed today. Of course, go check out the full episode and learn more tips, tricks, and of course, the full story. And as always, keep having an impact and build a legacy. I'll see you soon.