by Heba Alshareef
When I was 18 years old and pregnant, my husband packed all our possessions in the car and we headed east to start our life. Everything we owned was in that car; there was a stereo, 2 suitcases filled with clothes, a couple of pillows, a brand new dish set, and a box of junk food. We had a couple of hundred dollars in our pockets, and exactly $33 left in our bank account. We were planning to drive for 12 hours, stop at a hotel room overnight and then continue on until we reached our destination. 11.5 hours into the trip, and our car broke down. And after spending quite a large chunk of our money to tow it to the nearest town, the mechanic said that it would cost thousands to fix.
U-frame-it
It is the name of a franchise that was quite popular back in the day. Basically, the premise is that you take in your art, choose your frame, install it yourself, and out you go. Of course, you pay a price, but the effect your frame will have on your artwork is entirely up to you. How does this concern you? In our lives, bad (seemingly out of our control) things happen, and it is not so much as how or why they happen, but it is how we contextualize, or frame them that make a difference in how they affect us.
Reframing is a Skill that all Queens of Sheba should have
Reframing is the ability to find ways to see a potential problem from a different perception. It is how you change a negative into a positive. So, for example, Abdul Hadi is hit by a car, his injuries confine him to his bed for the next six months.
Now, it would seem like this a major negative, correct? In reality, this brother was having lots of trouble with his wife because she felt like he was never around for her and his young son. He loved them and wanted to be with them, but he was working 2 jobs to pay off a debt he had incurred while going to school. Worst of all, his relationship with Allah SWT, was one he had long taken for granted.
Today, if you ask Abdul Hadi what the best thing that ever happened to him was he will tell you that it was getting hit by that car. Because of it, he was able to spend quality time with his family and their relationship blossomed. His financial situation improved because of the settlement money from the car driver. And best of all, his close encounter with death really made him see how he needed to reconnect with his deen, and make everything for Allahs pleasure. Abdul Hadis story is an extreme one, but you can apply the same principles to anything that needs to be looked at in a new light, any situation that needs a new frame.
What do my frames look like?
Alhamdullilah, with being a life coach, there are many tools and resources I’ve learned, but even before that I had another one, a certain ayah, that I have repeated often since then. Allah SWT says in Surah al Baqara “…And it is possible that you dislike a thing which is good for you, and that you love a thing which is bad for you. But Allah knows, and you know not.”
I kept thinking, alhamdullilah, things could have been much worse. Cars can be replaced. Money comes and goes. Seriously, I look back on that situation and I remember how my husband walked miles to get me a decent meal and spent much of what he had left on it. I remember feeling grateful that the stereo survived because my son ended up using it to memorize 2 juzu before it finally died.
I found strength that day, and I look back to it now and know that I have control over the frames of my life.
