The Great Depression, The Great Recession…and now The Great Resignation. Our world is constantly changing and adapting; going through ups and downs. So why do we add the words “the great” to something that is arguably not so great?
Change can be daunting, painful, shocking, and difficult. It can also be amazing, and exactly what you need. It can lead to a turning point and lessons learned. For instance, did you know that life expectancy actually increased 6.2 years during the great depression? CNN.com interpreted these findings from a study of the biggest economic crisis in our history as: “Americans appear to actually thrive on adversity.”
That’s a nice way of looking at things, don’t you think? Especially in this rollercoaster of a decade we’re in. So what does this have to do with us?
Healing Hands was born out of adversity; it was a product of the Great Recession.
Going back to our CNN article about The Great Depression: researchers speculated about the cause for the increase in life expectancy. They noted that “During recessions, with less work to do, employees may work slower, sleep longer, and spend more time with family and friends…”
Here’s why that’s so powerful: our founder Anastasia Yecke started Healing Hands when her career in advertising ended because the company she worked for was sold during The Great Recession. Thankfully, she had savings to fall back on and wasn’t in a rush to jump into another job, so she took some time off to do some self-reflection. What did she really want to do next? Here’s what she had to say about that time:
“During those 6 months, I realized how great I felt NOT sitting behind a desk. Since I love helping people (and animals!) and I enjoy working with my hands, I figured massage therapy would be a good fit for me… I graduated, got licensed, and figured I would start a combination of a housecall practice and chair massage at corporate events.”
That she did. She worked both independently and as part of several spas while quickly developing a loyal clientele. She incorporated Healing Hands in 2011 (Happy 10th birthday to us) and built up a great team of chair massage therapists. Then she ran into an opportunity with a big tech company based out of Weston, which led to the unexpected start of a corporate wellness sector in her business.
Today we continue to grow and adapt to our client’s needs. This year we added educational webinars based on popular demand!
That’s our story. More than anything, though, that is our why. We were born out of adversity, and we want to be the Healing Hands that get companies and their employees, or our massage clients, through adversity and out on the other side through our focus on whole-person wellness. After all, you never know where YOU may be in 10 years.