Reframing

The summer I was twenty-one, I was living in British Columbia with friends, trying to figure out what I wanted to do with my life. It was an intense few months of meeting new people and trying new things—stretching myself emotionally and trying to get over a very difficult year at university. I learned a lot that has stuck with me.

I found myself in many situations that made me think about how much power there is in how we view our stories, and how reframing a situation can affect our reactions to it—sometimes enough to make an experience feel lighter, even when it isn’t easy. At the time, I didn’t have language for this. I just knew that some ways of thinking made life heavier than it already was.

I’m going to talk in this blog about a few examples that are never far from my thoughts. I’ll start with the first one today, which involves bears.

Bears?

Now, don’t get me wrong—I love bears. The bear has been my favourite animal for as long as I can remember.

But I’ve also always preferred some distance or a protective barrier between us, especially when my family used to camp in Western Canada, where there were grizzlies as well as the black bears we had back home. My parents taught me about securing food and keeping a campsite clean so that bears wouldn’t be interested in it. So when I went camping with friends that summer in BC, I was a little nervous when they didn’t show the same concern.

When we went to bed, the dishes from dinner were piled unwashed by the riverside, and food was being stored in tents.

A man in the group was a professional trapper and hunter. “It’ll be okay,” he said when I asked if our food smells might attract animals. “We’ve been way too noisy for anything around here to want to stick around for long.”

What could I say? The expert wasn’t worried. I couldn’t say that I was reassured, though, as I lay awake in my tent, considering my options. I didn’t want to stay, but the cars were a mile’s walk through the dark forest. I wasn’t going to do that alone, and I wasn’t going to wake anyone to come with me or help secure the food.

I couldn't sleep. I was listening for activity in the campsite, thinking about a story my mother had once told me. Not long after they were married, my grandparents had gone camping with my Grandpa's brothers. In the middle of the night, Grandpa heard shuffling outside the tent, right by his head. Assuming his brothers were trying to prank him, he reached out and walloped the tent wall. The roar from the other side told him he’d connected—not with a brother, but with a bear. They were lucky; the bear was so shocked that it ran.

Eventually, something occurred to me.

Reframing the situation

I realized that staying awake worrying wasn’t going to decrease the chances of a bear visiting in the night. I had no control over the campsite setup or the decisions already made—but I did have some control over how I spent the hours ahead of me. The night would feel a lot shorter if I could calm myself enough to sleep. With that reframing, and a bit of effort, I did.

And if a bear did visit that night, I didn’t hear it. No one mentioned it in the morning.

Looking back now, this is the kind of moment I often think about when I work with people who are facing change they didn’t choose—illness, loss, uncertainty, transitions where there is no clearly “right” option. Coaching doesn’t remove the bear from the campsite. But it can help you notice where you still have choice, especially when fear is loud and your body is already tired.

TL;DR: Reframing helps. Sometimes it helps you sleep. Sweet dreams!