Positive Reframing

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Positive Reframing

Every major adventure in my life has involved positive reframing. Life threatening challenges may have higher stakes, but the reframing is the same. You get to choose the meaning of every event of your life.

GETTING RUN OVER BY THE MAC TRUCK OF LIFE.

After working for eleven years in Saudi Arabia, it was time for a sailing voyage around the world. We left Arabia on an exit only visa, hence the name for our catamaran - Exit Only. Little did I know when we set sail from Florida, that in nine months I would come close to going exit only from planet earth in a car accident in New Zealand.

Althought we knew how to sail, we were total novices to the world of offshore sailing.

It was scary at first, and I secretly wondered if we would actually sail our 39 foot catamaran around the world.

We had a massive thunderstorm on our first night at sea with lightning coming down all around, and I had more than a few doubts concerning the wisdom of this new adventure. Nevertheless, the dye was cast, the money was spent, and away we sailed into the unknown. This was the inauspicious beginning of an eleven year voyage, and we would have many opportunities to create positive reframes during the adventure.

Sailing on an unsinkable catamaran is a powerful reframe on the meaning of sailing offshore. While monohull sailors in ballasted boats worry about sinking, catamarans only worry about flipping over and becoming the most expensive life raft in the world. That's a powerful reframe that helps you sail courageously into the night, because if something bad happens, at least you won't sink.

We sailed across the Caribbean to Panama and through the Panama Canal without any major challenges. Our eight day trip out to the Galapagos and twenty-one day sail on to French Polynesia was a downwind treat.

We didn't encounter arduous conditions until we arrived in the Cook Islands far out in the Pacific. We spent one night in a perilous anchorage in Suvarov without much sleep because reinforced tradewinds made it hard for our anchor to hold in a harbor full of coral. It was unsafe to remain in Suvarov, and we set sail for Samoa the next day in thirty to forty knots of wind. This was our opportunity to see how Exit Only handled in rough conditions. That was our reframe. Instead of worrying about getting into trouble in stormy seas, we needed to know how our catamaran would behave in adverse conditions. Would the autopilot be able to handle the wind and seas? Would we have to hand steer for three days and nights without rest? We reframed this challenge into an adventure that gave us more confidence in our yacht. We survived.

Nine months after leaving Florida, we turned south to the Land of the Long White Cloud known as New Zealand. With trepidation we raced south trying to outrun the low pressure areas bearing down on us from the Tasman Sea. We made it into New Zealand just hours before strong winds thrashed the fleet of yachts heading south. That year one yacht sunk in a gale after being struck by a freighter, and another was rolled in stormy seas.

Shortly after our arrival, we started touring the North Island of New Zealand by car. Unfortunately, it was then that the Mac Truck of Life paid a visit. I rolled the car that I was driving, and immediately I had an opportunity to do the largest reframe of my life. I ended up with two broken legs, five broken ribs, a broken shoulder blade, a punctured lung and internal bleeding. I spent nine days in the ICU, I was transfused seven units of blood, and I had three operations. I spent two months in the hospital, and it took six months to learn to walk again. This had all the earmarks of a major catastrophe, after all, I had nearly died, and I was not going sailing any time soon. I spent the next year hobbling around hoping that one day I could resume my voyage.

During that year of convalescence, I had plenty of time to think about my experience and to decide upon its meaning.

I was a physician who had been practicing medicine for twenty-five years taking care of other people who had been run over by the Mac Truck of Life. Unfortunately, to me they were just patients, and I never felt their fear or pain. I never spent time considering the impact it had on all areas of their lives. In short, I did not understand what it means to go through those experiences.

But now everything was different. The Mac Truck of Life had run over me, and I had to deal with all the consequences. I felt the pain and fear, and I had no idea what the impact would be on my life. Would I ever walk normally again? Would I get hepatitis or AIDS from the blood transfusions? Would I ever go sailing again? Should I sell my catamaran and fly home? This and a thousand other questions made me understand the meaning of pain and suffering and fear. For the first time in my life I knew what my patients had been feeling for all those years. For the first time, I was one of them, and I understood how they felt.

My collison with the Mac Truck of Life created a major reframe on what it means to suffer. Now I could really tell my patients that I know how they feel, and I would be telling the truth.

It would have been easy to call the car accident in New Zealand a personal catastrophy of non-global proportions, and to a certain extent that is true.

But what really happened was that I learned the meaning of suffering and fear, and now I am a better physician because of it.

The disasters of life are your qualifiers, and they help you make powerful reframes that change how you look at life.

When disaster happens, for the first time you become truly qualified to talk about that problem. You can speak about it with authority and advise other people going through the same thing.

For some people, divorce is an unthinkable event that destroys their lives, and for others, divorce becomes their qualification to help other people going through the same problems.

People who suffer from depression are uniquely qualified to support other people struggling wtih depression.

People who have escaped the grip of drugs and alcohol are uniquely qualified to help others struggling with addictions.

When the Mac Truck of Life pays an unwelcome visit, get ready, because you are about to become qualified in a new area and to create a major reframe. You will have the opporutnity to make a positive reframe that will change the meaning of the rest of your life.

Dr. Dave