15. How All-Or-Nothing Thinking Is Holding You Back
Are you someone who is all in or all out? Are you on the wagon or off it? You’re winning or losing, and your life is awesome or terrible? Do you feel like you have to be a good mom OR good at the job? This silent saboteur is called all-or-nothing thinking, and it is holding you back in your journey to feeling at ease and calm in your life.
All-or-nothing thinking is believing that there are only really two options. There is no middle room. We fall into this trap to create the certainty and clarity our brains crave. But all-or-nothing thinking ignores the complexities of humans and relationships and creates unnecessary pain and suffering, affecting how you feel and show up in the world. So what can you do about it?
This week, we show you how to bring awareness to your all-or-nothing thinking, so you can stop letting it hold you back and start to transform the way you approach your goals one step at a time. Find out why you engage in all-or-nothing thinking, and learn a cool practice to help you make better decisions, feel more connected to others, and work through challenges in your life, family, and work.
Want more live access to us? Get on our email list where you can ask us questions, get coached, and be the first to know about trainings, events, and free coaching. Click here to sign up now!
What You’ll Learn from this Episode:
The key to stopping your all-or-nothing thinking and starting to feel better in your life.
Some examples of all-or-nothing thinking.
Why you may have a tendency to slip into all-or-nothing thinking.
The best way to overcome all-or-nothing thinking.
The importance of living in the gray, and how to get curious about what other options exist for you.
Why you’re either winning or you’re learning, not losing.
The concept of failing forward and how this can help you if you engage in all-or-nothing thinking.
A byproduct of all-or-nothing thinking and how this interferes with your goals.
Listen to the Full Episode:
Featured on the Show:
Click here to follow, rate, and review the show. And if you love the show, don’t forget to share with someone you think will benefit!
If you want to shift out of disempowered thinking and feel more calm, balanced, and capable from the inside out, get our 5-step Empowered Mindset Guide here!
Want to start ramping up your self-awareness so you’re on to yourself before Burnout fully takes over? Click here to get your free Burnout Alarm Bell Study Guide!
Let us know what you think of the show so far and what you’d like to hear more of or less of over on Instagram!
Full Episode Transcript:
Kelle: Tell us, are you one of those people who is either all in or all out, you’re on the wagon or off?
Nina: Or the way you talk about your life is everything’s either awesome or terrible. Your food is either healthy or unhealthy. You’re either winning or losing.
Kelle: Well, in today’s episode we’re tackling a silent saboteur in your journey to feel more ease and calm. It’s called all or nothing thinking.
Nina: Yeah. Let us show you how this mindset is secretly holding you back. How to fail forward as we like to say and how to transform the way you approach your goals one step at a time.
Kelle: Alright, let’s get going. This is Ambitious-Ish.
Burnout? Check. Daily overwhelm? Check. Resentment rash, stress, and a complete lack of well-being? Check, check, check! You’re not alone. We’re your hosts, Kelle & Nina, and we are here to help you feel calm, balanced, and empowered so you can redefine success, make choices that feel authentic, and ACTUALLY enjoy the life you work so hard to create. You ready? Let’s go.
Kelle: Hey, I’m Kelle.
Nina: And I’m Nina. Afternoon thunderstorms here. Thunderstorms in the mountains are so gorgeous, super dramatic.
Kelle: Totally. I’m snuggled up with a blankie and a sweater. And they’re lovely and we hope the storm doesn’t interfere with our recording here, so let’s see.
Nina: Yeah, let’s see how this goes. Today we’re talking about all or nothing thinking. Are you familiar with this kind of thinking? So many clients come to coaching, describing themselves as all or nothing people, they’re either all in or all out. And this is something we coach clients on a lot, even today, Kel.
Kelle: Yeah. So today, we’ll talk you through a cool tool or practice to help you make better decisions, to feel more connected to other people and work through challenges in life and family and work and through our own development and the goals we want to set. All or nothing thinking is thinking that there’s really only two options. It’s a spectrum, there’s just two choices on either end and no middle room. It’s either everything’s amazing or everything is freaking terrible.
Nina: It’s also known as black or white thinking. Maybe you’ve heard it that way. It’s a super common cognitive distortion. So, seeing your world in black or white or in complete opposites. These thoughts affect how you feel and show up in the world, but they’re often not based on evidence, they’re not based on reality.
Kelle: Yes. What happens here is your brain wants to create certainty, so it feels better and good to feel certain, to create certainty when things feel complex. But this way of thinking can really create a lot of unnecessary pain, unnecessary suffering for ourselves.
Nina: Let’s go through a few examples here. Life is either perfect or a disaster, that might go for your home too. Behaviors are right or wrong. People are nice or mean. What you did was good or bad, amazing, or horrible, fair, or unfair.
Kelle: Yeah, people are either for you or they’re against you. What you do is moral or immoral. You’re smart or you’re stupid. Food is healthy, or it’s unhealthy. I either have to stay in this relationship or I go.
Nina: Yeah, see how there’s no gray here. It’s just a quick way for your brain to create certainty and ignores the complexities of life.
Kina: This kind of thinking is sort of drama making too. Are we right? They seem like the only options though, it feels true. I think, especially with fair and unfair, they seem pretty clear but when you take a closer look, you realize these are just two extremes of the spectrum. So, take this example. Generally speaking, work right now is either good or bad. Maybe it’s the same with your in-laws, are they either amazing or they’re horrible, generous, or selfish?
Nina: Yeah. Sometimes we do this with our kids. One is extroverted and one is introverted. Or for me, growing up, my sister was the smart one, and I wasn’t. I was the athlete, and she wasn’t, which is total BS, by the way, when I look back and really examine it.
Kelle: Totally for sure. Think about how you plan and manage your time. You either plan everything or you don’t plan anything, So many clients come to coaching like this. I’m either all in or I’m all out. So, the same with your nutrition and maybe even exercise, you’re really healthy or you’re just a dumpster fire and not at all. You stick to the diet or you just binge.
Nina: Yeah. You have the belief that you have to be a good mom or good at your job. These are all examples of all or nothing, or black and white thinking. And they ignore the complexities of relationships, of humans and of the world. And again, we do this, we fall into this trap to create certainty. Our brains do not want to spend a lot of energy thinking things through. They want to be efficient, create certainty quickly so we lump everything into one category.
Kelle: Yeah, everything is good and bad. She is right or wrong. She is selfish or generous. It’s a fast way to categorize what’s happening and gives our brain clarity and certainty. And our brains, they love certainty. This is a core function of the brain, and it’s useful when we’re learning new things, like the rules of pickleball or our way around a new city.
Nina: Yeah, we don’t want to slow down and think about every little thing all the time, it would be too overwhelming and exhausting.
Kelle: But when we fall into this tendency to lump things together to make sense of the world, when we apply it to our decision making and judgments about people and our beliefs about the world. When we give ourselves only two options, we limit ourselves, we limit our relationships, and we disconnect from them, and we disconnect from the world.
Nina: Yeah. So, if you believe you’re right and your colleague is wrong, for example, you’ll disconnect from that person because your brain will want to protect what it believes is important for your survival, which is that you’re right.
Kelle: Yeah. This is where we get really defensive. And when we slow it down and look at the details, there’s probably a little bit of truth and right and wrong in you and in the other person.
Nina: Yeah, this reminds me of that prompt that we offer or suggest to clients like do you want to be right, or do you want to be happy?
Kelle: Totally.
Nina: All of this just takes more energy from your prefrontal cortex, your executive functioning, the CEO part of your brain, which on default isn’t the part of the brain we use. This takes present moment awareness, something we can do with a mindfulness practice to notice and then spread out, question, and then move forward on purpose.
So, to bring awareness to what’s actually happening instead of blaming someone, that there aren’t just two sides, which we talked about last week in episode 14, by the way. Check out how blame can be really disempowering. But Kelle and I started as health coaches, and we saw this a lot with clients when it comes to health. You’re either healthy or unhealthy. And when you think about that, what does it even mean?
Kelle: Yeah, get on social media or walk into the grocery store right now and there’s so much gray in the health messaging about food and drink. And the way you incorporate this black and white thinking into your life will create a certain definition of health for you. And from there you inevitably interpret your body as healthy or unhealthy, which won’t really serve you, there’s no real test for that.
It’s really subjective and it’s just how your brain is interpreting the options. Are you at a good weight or overweight? Are you healthy or unhealthy? When you go to change your body, are you all in and do everything all the time or do you make one bad choice, you eat a cookie when you weren’t trying to eat any sugar and then all bets are off? You already screwed up, so you might as well just go for it. And you give up and you say, “I’ll try again tomorrow or Monday or next week or next month.”
Nina: Yeah. It’s thinking I’ll be able to do it, or I can’t do it. This is going to work or it’s not going to work. This way of thinking again, a cognitive distortion can set you up to ‘win or lose, succeed or fail.’ All or nothing thinking perpetuates itself and can be very limiting, it can hold you back big time.
Kelle: Yeah. It can also create a lot of shame, so more on this in a sec. Your brain doesn’t like to find the gray because it takes more effort. That prefrontal cortex needs to come online and think slowly about things, to evaluate what’s working and what isn’t, to decide what to try next and evaluate again. This complexity is too much for the brain to handle on default. Your brain doesn’t want to do this. It wants to be fast and efficient and certain, because that’s what’s best for your survival long term.
Nina: But when we’re out living in the modern world, we can identify this pattern or tendency and notice it and go, “Oh, there I go again, my brain’s serving me just two options. I’m thinking all or nothing again.” And decide to slow down and use that prefrontal brain and live in the gray, which is where change actually happens. This makes you so much more likely to succeed because you’re not going to those extremes.
Kelle: We were coaching a client recently who leads a very large team for a Fortune 500 company, NPR. And she was explaining that a lot of the time she feels like she needs to do everything for her direct reports. It’s just easier that way as she explained. Especially during high stress times, she is chasing them down for every detail, micromanaging, and she’s hypervigilant. And she went on to say that her only other option was to be hands off, to do nothing and to just completely back off.
Nina: She didn’t like either option because she felt anxious and stressed on the one hand when she was doing everything for everyone all the time, and overwhelmed and tired too, let’s be real. And when she was doing nothing, she felt disconnected and mad and responsible if they screwed up or didn’t do it, right. So, we helped her see this was just all or nothing thinking and that there were so many other possibilities here in between. There are always more options than just two.
Kelle: Always. Your brain wants to give you only two options, and when it does that all you have to do is notice that first. And then look for the gray, look for other possibilities. So, what other options exist? We like to call it the third option or the fourth, fifth or tenth. There are always way more options than your brain is offering.
Nina: This is going to feel harder, right, Kel?
Kelle: Oh, yeah.
Nina: Our clients this morning were like, “It just feels hard.” This is going to feel harder and that makes perfect sense. It takes more effort and imagination but there are so many more possibilities to help you show up as the person you want to be. But as the client in this example, we showed her how to live in the gray, to get curious about what other options existed and shift into her executive functioning, her prefrontal cortex. And then to look at, where do I feel I need or want to be more hands on? Maybe looking at the big picture. And what areas make sense for me to back off? Allow them to execute and see what they come up with on their own.
Kelle: No. So, the first way to notice the all or nothing thinking is when your brain offers just two options. That you’re quick to go to extremes or that there’s just one or the other, huge red flag.
Nina: Another sign you’re in all or nothing thinking, you kind of hate it when people disagree with you. Or you don’t want to be around people who have different beliefs or opinions than yours. So, take politics, our favorite subject. Is it difficult for you to be in the same room as someone, to be friends with someone or even love someone who has different political views than you do? And why is that?
Kelle: We’re not saying you’re supposed to go make friends with people who disagree with you, but do you really struggle with people who have different beliefs than you? This can be a sign of all, or nothing thinking and can create a lot of disconnection. You’ll disconnect and alienate other people and make it hard for you to stay close to people. If you’re in all or nothing, thinking you’ll be second guessing yourself and questioning other people within the group. It’s just so interesting to watch your brain in these circumstances.
Nina: Yeah, when I notice this, I just slow down and check-in. There’s a thought error somewhere in there, and there’s got to be some nuance here. This is a complex issue, and I can take another look here. My brain just wants to create some certainty and I give more attention to it. And this is when I notice a lot of shame too, because I interpret mistakes or fails as ‘bad’, instead of seeing the grayness in them.
Kelle: Yeah. When people set goals in all or nothing thinking, there’s often a lot of self-sabotage. They take breaks or quit because there’s no room for mistakes. You’re either on the wagon or you’re off. You’re writing the novel or you’re not.
Nina: You’re at the gym every day or not going at all. You eat super healthy, or you give up altogether. So self-sabotage is a byproduct of all or nothing thinking, like when setting goals, it can prevent you from setting goals at all because you don’t want to put yourself outside of your comfort zone because you’ll either win or lose.
Kelle: Who wants to set goals? Winning or losing sounds too risky and terrible, but we could really see it as gray, as growth, as opportunity, as a way for you to evolve to take you out of winning or losing. We like to say you’re either winning or you’re learning. There is actually no losing unless of course, you just quit.
Nina: We like to talk about goal setting in coaching, of course. But the bigger focus for us is who you become in the process of achieving your goals, in pursuit of your big dreams and goals. We have this concept we call failing forward that we use with clients who have all or nothing tendencies and perfectionist tendencies too. We kind of practice on repeat, well, failing every week, a few times a week to show the client that they can not only survive failure, but that failure is part of the process. It’s part of success, not the opposite.
Kelle: Yeah. There’s a saying, success is built on a mountain of fails. And sometimes a mountain seems really big. You have to be willing to feel uncomfortable feelings that go along with fails. It’s a big part of what we teach our clients, this emotional resilience. Practicing feeling uncomfortable emotions on purpose so much so that it becomes who you are, you become someone who can feel the uncomfortable feelings on purpose in pursuit of what you want, really, anything you want.
Nina: Yeah, all or nothing thinking keeps you kind of stuck in problems longer because you don’t come up with new solutions. If there’s only two choices, what if you don’t like either choice? You stay stuck in the problem. You stay in your current job, which feels terrible, or you look for another job which feels like a full-time job in and of itself. These are just two of many, many other options when you use your prefrontal cortex and imagination and do some exploring here, when you get curious about the gray, the in between.
Kelle: Yes. So, you stay in a relationship that isn’t working or you leave. When really there are so many other options like changing how you’re showing up, setting boundaries that work for you, changing up how you two interact together, maybe interrupting un-useful patterns. There are so many other options.
Nina: Yeah. Your brain won’t go to the gray here automatically, though. So, the best way to overcome all or nothing thinking is simply just to notice it. Notice when your brain offers just two choices, either or. You’re either behind or ahead, winning or losing. Notice that it’s just a thought pattern and not a useful one.
Kelle: Yeah. And notice when you see things that are either right or wrong, there’s only one answer. And then shift into the gray. We do this a lot with physical pain or health. We either have a headache or maybe it’s a brain tumor. But instead, we can go to our prefrontal cortex and get curious. So, my head hurts. Let me check this out. Am I dehydrated? Have I eaten? Did I fall? Let me loop my doc in, in the morning if it’s still bothering me. I’ll take some Advil or whatever and check back later. You’re just exploring and using your imagination.
Nina: Noticing this thought pattern is the key to unwinding it and feeling better in your life. It doesn’t feel good to be in all or nothing thinking. You don’t show up in the best way when you’re in this pattern, it’s like a scarcity mindset, almost.
Kelle: Yeah, the gray is where change happens like that all or nothing gym scenario. The lifestyle changes happen in the gray and making peace with being in the gray, but you have to notice that all or nothing thinking first.
Nina: So, take some time to notice this, this week. Notice how it feels and how you act, and then ask, “Does this feel good? Are there other options here? Is this helpful?” Bring that prefrontal cortex online and think about things slowly so you can show up as the person you want to be with connection, with respect for others, with finding the lessons and failing forward. So, if you’re thinking, I have to choose to be a good mom or good at my job, check-in on that.
Kelle: Yeah. Sometimes it’s going to be hard to say no to a sick child and that’s your priority. And sometimes it’s hard to say no to work and it’s all okay. You can be a good mom and good at your job and sometimes priorities shift. Sometimes you miss a deadline and that’s part of being human, about having relationships, about having a job. And it doesn’t have to mean you’re doing a good or bad job either way.
Nina: Yeah, you’ll stop bouncing between extremes and you’ll start to poke holes in the unattainable standards you have for yourself, the unreasonable expectations you don’t really even realize you have until you do this work. It’s so powerful and so helpful. Give it a try and just start to notice. Alright, that’s all for today. We’ll see you next time.
Nina: Yeah. Bye for now.
Nina: Hey, everyone, if you want more live access to me and Kelle, you have to join our email list.
Kelle: Yes, we’ll come to your email box every Tuesday and Thursday.
Nina: You can ask us questions, get clarity, and get coached.
Kelle: We offer monthly free email coaching when you’re on our list. And you’re the first to know about trainings, events and other free coaching opportunities.
Nina: Just go to kelleandnina.com. That’s K-E-L-L-E and nina.com to sign up.
Kelle: Thank you so much for listening to today’s episode of Ambitious-Ish.
Nina: If you’re ready to align your ambitions with your heart and feel more calm, balanced, and connected, visit https://www.kelleandnina.com/ for more information about how to work with us and make sure you get on our list.
Kelle: See you in the next episode!
Nina: Or the way you talk about your life is everything’s either awesome or terrible. Your food is either healthy or unhealthy. You’re either winning or losing.
Kelle: Well, in today’s episode we’re tackling a silent saboteur in your journey to feel more ease and calm. It’s called all or nothing thinking.
Nina: Yeah. Let us show you how this mindset is secretly holding you back. How to fail forward as we like to say and how to transform the way you approach your goals one step at a time.
Kelle: Alright, let’s get going. This is Ambitious-Ish.
Burnout? Check. Daily overwhelm? Check. Resentment rash, stress, and a complete lack of well-being? Check, check, check! You’re not alone. We’re your hosts, Kelle & Nina, and we are here to help you feel calm, balanced, and empowered so you can redefine success, make choices that feel authentic, and ACTUALLY enjoy the life you work so hard to create. You ready? Let’s go.
Kelle: Hey, I’m Kelle.
Nina: And I’m Nina. Afternoon thunderstorms here. Thunderstorms in the mountains are so gorgeous, super dramatic.
Kelle: Totally. I’m snuggled up with a blankie and a sweater. And they’re lovely and we hope the storm doesn’t interfere with our recording here, so let’s see.
Nina: Yeah, let’s see how this goes. Today we’re talking about all or nothing thinking. Are you familiar with this kind of thinking? So many clients come to coaching, describing themselves as all or nothing people, they’re either all in or all out. And this is something we coach clients on a lot, even today, Kel.
Kelle: Yeah. So today, we’ll talk you through a cool tool or practice to help you make better decisions, to feel more connected to other people and work through challenges in life and family and work and through our own development and the goals we want to set. All or nothing thinking is thinking that there’s really only two options. It’s a spectrum, there’s just two choices on either end and no middle room. It’s either everything’s amazing or everything is freaking terrible.
Nina: It’s also known as black or white thinking. Maybe you’ve heard it that way. It’s a super common cognitive distortion. So, seeing your world in black or white or in complete opposites. These thoughts affect how you feel and show up in the world, but they’re often not based on evidence, they’re not based on reality.
Kelle: Yes. What happens here is your brain wants to create certainty, so it feels better and good to feel certain, to create certainty when things feel complex. But this way of thinking can really create a lot of unnecessary pain, unnecessary suffering for ourselves.
Nina: Let’s go through a few examples here. Life is either perfect or a disaster, that might go for your home too. Behaviors are right or wrong. People are nice or mean. What you did was good or bad, amazing, or horrible, fair, or unfair.
Kelle: Yeah, people are either for you or they’re against you. What you do is moral or immoral. You’re smart or you’re stupid. Food is healthy, or it’s unhealthy. I either have to stay in this relationship or I go.
Nina: Yeah, see how there’s no gray here. It’s just a quick way for your brain to create certainty and ignores the complexities of life.
Kina: This kind of thinking is sort of drama making too. Are we right? They seem like the only options though, it feels true. I think, especially with fair and unfair, they seem pretty clear but when you take a closer look, you realize these are just two extremes of the spectrum. So, take this example. Generally speaking, work right now is either good or bad. Maybe it’s the same with your in-laws, are they either amazing or they’re horrible, generous, or selfish?
Nina: Yeah. Sometimes we do this with our kids. One is extroverted and one is introverted. Or for me, growing up, my sister was the smart one, and I wasn’t. I was the athlete, and she wasn’t, which is total BS, by the way, when I look back and really examine it.
Kelle: Totally for sure. Think about how you plan and manage your time. You either plan everything or you don’t plan anything, So many clients come to coaching like this. I’m either all in or I’m all out. So, the same with your nutrition and maybe even exercise, you’re really healthy or you’re just a dumpster fire and not at all. You stick to the diet or you just binge.
Nina: Yeah. You have the belief that you have to be a good mom or good at your job. These are all examples of all or nothing, or black and white thinking. And they ignore the complexities of relationships, of humans and of the world. And again, we do this, we fall into this trap to create certainty. Our brains do not want to spend a lot of energy thinking things through. They want to be efficient, create certainty quickly so we lump everything into one category.
Kelle: Yeah, everything is good and bad. She is right or wrong. She is selfish or generous. It’s a fast way to categorize what’s happening and gives our brain clarity and certainty. And our brains, they love certainty. This is a core function of the brain, and it’s useful when we’re learning new things, like the rules of pickleball or our way around a new city.
Nina: Yeah, we don’t want to slow down and think about every little thing all the time, it would be too overwhelming and exhausting.
Kelle: But when we fall into this tendency to lump things together to make sense of the world, when we apply it to our decision making and judgments about people and our beliefs about the world. When we give ourselves only two options, we limit ourselves, we limit our relationships, and we disconnect from them, and we disconnect from the world.
Nina: Yeah. So, if you believe you’re right and your colleague is wrong, for example, you’ll disconnect from that person because your brain will want to protect what it believes is important for your survival, which is that you’re right.
Kelle: Yeah. This is where we get really defensive. And when we slow it down and look at the details, there’s probably a little bit of truth and right and wrong in you and in the other person.
Nina: Yeah, this reminds me of that prompt that we offer or suggest to clients like do you want to be right, or do you want to be happy?
Kelle: Totally.
Nina: All of this just takes more energy from your prefrontal cortex, your executive functioning, the CEO part of your brain, which on default isn’t the part of the brain we use. This takes present moment awareness, something we can do with a mindfulness practice to notice and then spread out, question, and then move forward on purpose.
So, to bring awareness to what’s actually happening instead of blaming someone, that there aren’t just two sides, which we talked about last week in episode 14, by the way. Check out how blame can be really disempowering. But Kelle and I started as health coaches, and we saw this a lot with clients when it comes to health. You’re either healthy or unhealthy. And when you think about that, what does it even mean?
Kelle: Yeah, get on social media or walk into the grocery store right now and there’s so much gray in the health messaging about food and drink. And the way you incorporate this black and white thinking into your life will create a certain definition of health for you. And from there you inevitably interpret your body as healthy or unhealthy, which won’t really serve you, there’s no real test for that.
It’s really subjective and it’s just how your brain is interpreting the options. Are you at a good weight or overweight? Are you healthy or unhealthy? When you go to change your body, are you all in and do everything all the time or do you make one bad choice, you eat a cookie when you weren’t trying to eat any sugar and then all bets are off? You already screwed up, so you might as well just go for it. And you give up and you say, “I’ll try again tomorrow or Monday or next week or next month.”
Nina: Yeah. It’s thinking I’ll be able to do it, or I can’t do it. This is going to work or it’s not going to work. This way of thinking again, a cognitive distortion can set you up to ‘win or lose, succeed or fail.’ All or nothing thinking perpetuates itself and can be very limiting, it can hold you back big time.
Kelle: Yeah. It can also create a lot of shame, so more on this in a sec. Your brain doesn’t like to find the gray because it takes more effort. That prefrontal cortex needs to come online and think slowly about things, to evaluate what’s working and what isn’t, to decide what to try next and evaluate again. This complexity is too much for the brain to handle on default. Your brain doesn’t want to do this. It wants to be fast and efficient and certain, because that’s what’s best for your survival long term.
Nina: But when we’re out living in the modern world, we can identify this pattern or tendency and notice it and go, “Oh, there I go again, my brain’s serving me just two options. I’m thinking all or nothing again.” And decide to slow down and use that prefrontal brain and live in the gray, which is where change actually happens. This makes you so much more likely to succeed because you’re not going to those extremes.
Kelle: We were coaching a client recently who leads a very large team for a Fortune 500 company, NPR. And she was explaining that a lot of the time she feels like she needs to do everything for her direct reports. It’s just easier that way as she explained. Especially during high stress times, she is chasing them down for every detail, micromanaging, and she’s hypervigilant. And she went on to say that her only other option was to be hands off, to do nothing and to just completely back off.
Nina: She didn’t like either option because she felt anxious and stressed on the one hand when she was doing everything for everyone all the time, and overwhelmed and tired too, let’s be real. And when she was doing nothing, she felt disconnected and mad and responsible if they screwed up or didn’t do it, right. So, we helped her see this was just all or nothing thinking and that there were so many other possibilities here in between. There are always more options than just two.
Kelle: Always. Your brain wants to give you only two options, and when it does that all you have to do is notice that first. And then look for the gray, look for other possibilities. So, what other options exist? We like to call it the third option or the fourth, fifth or tenth. There are always way more options than your brain is offering.
Nina: This is going to feel harder, right, Kel?
Kelle: Oh, yeah.
Nina: Our clients this morning were like, “It just feels hard.” This is going to feel harder and that makes perfect sense. It takes more effort and imagination but there are so many more possibilities to help you show up as the person you want to be. But as the client in this example, we showed her how to live in the gray, to get curious about what other options existed and shift into her executive functioning, her prefrontal cortex. And then to look at, where do I feel I need or want to be more hands on? Maybe looking at the big picture. And what areas make sense for me to back off? Allow them to execute and see what they come up with on their own.
Kelle: No. So, the first way to notice the all or nothing thinking is when your brain offers just two options. That you’re quick to go to extremes or that there’s just one or the other, huge red flag.
Nina: Another sign you’re in all or nothing thinking, you kind of hate it when people disagree with you. Or you don’t want to be around people who have different beliefs or opinions than yours. So, take politics, our favorite subject. Is it difficult for you to be in the same room as someone, to be friends with someone or even love someone who has different political views than you do? And why is that?
Kelle: We’re not saying you’re supposed to go make friends with people who disagree with you, but do you really struggle with people who have different beliefs than you? This can be a sign of all, or nothing thinking and can create a lot of disconnection. You’ll disconnect and alienate other people and make it hard for you to stay close to people. If you’re in all or nothing, thinking you’ll be second guessing yourself and questioning other people within the group. It’s just so interesting to watch your brain in these circumstances.
Nina: Yeah, when I notice this, I just slow down and check-in. There’s a thought error somewhere in there, and there’s got to be some nuance here. This is a complex issue, and I can take another look here. My brain just wants to create some certainty and I give more attention to it. And this is when I notice a lot of shame too, because I interpret mistakes or fails as ‘bad’, instead of seeing the grayness in them.
Kelle: Yeah. When people set goals in all or nothing thinking, there’s often a lot of self-sabotage. They take breaks or quit because there’s no room for mistakes. You’re either on the wagon or you’re off. You’re writing the novel or you’re not.
Nina: You’re at the gym every day or not going at all. You eat super healthy, or you give up altogether. So self-sabotage is a byproduct of all or nothing thinking, like when setting goals, it can prevent you from setting goals at all because you don’t want to put yourself outside of your comfort zone because you’ll either win or lose.
Kelle: Who wants to set goals? Winning or losing sounds too risky and terrible, but we could really see it as gray, as growth, as opportunity, as a way for you to evolve to take you out of winning or losing. We like to say you’re either winning or you’re learning. There is actually no losing unless of course, you just quit.
Nina: We like to talk about goal setting in coaching, of course. But the bigger focus for us is who you become in the process of achieving your goals, in pursuit of your big dreams and goals. We have this concept we call failing forward that we use with clients who have all or nothing tendencies and perfectionist tendencies too. We kind of practice on repeat, well, failing every week, a few times a week to show the client that they can not only survive failure, but that failure is part of the process. It’s part of success, not the opposite.
Kelle: Yeah. There’s a saying, success is built on a mountain of fails. And sometimes a mountain seems really big. You have to be willing to feel uncomfortable feelings that go along with fails. It’s a big part of what we teach our clients, this emotional resilience. Practicing feeling uncomfortable emotions on purpose so much so that it becomes who you are, you become someone who can feel the uncomfortable feelings on purpose in pursuit of what you want, really, anything you want.
Nina: Yeah, all or nothing thinking keeps you kind of stuck in problems longer because you don’t come up with new solutions. If there’s only two choices, what if you don’t like either choice? You stay stuck in the problem. You stay in your current job, which feels terrible, or you look for another job which feels like a full-time job in and of itself. These are just two of many, many other options when you use your prefrontal cortex and imagination and do some exploring here, when you get curious about the gray, the in between.
Kelle: Yes. So, you stay in a relationship that isn’t working or you leave. When really there are so many other options like changing how you’re showing up, setting boundaries that work for you, changing up how you two interact together, maybe interrupting un-useful patterns. There are so many other options.
Nina: Yeah. Your brain won’t go to the gray here automatically, though. So, the best way to overcome all or nothing thinking is simply just to notice it. Notice when your brain offers just two choices, either or. You’re either behind or ahead, winning or losing. Notice that it’s just a thought pattern and not a useful one.
Kelle: Yeah. And notice when you see things that are either right or wrong, there’s only one answer. And then shift into the gray. We do this a lot with physical pain or health. We either have a headache or maybe it’s a brain tumor. But instead, we can go to our prefrontal cortex and get curious. So, my head hurts. Let me check this out. Am I dehydrated? Have I eaten? Did I fall? Let me loop my doc in, in the morning if it’s still bothering me. I’ll take some Advil or whatever and check back later. You’re just exploring and using your imagination.
Nina: Noticing this thought pattern is the key to unwinding it and feeling better in your life. It doesn’t feel good to be in all or nothing thinking. You don’t show up in the best way when you’re in this pattern, it’s like a scarcity mindset, almost.
Kelle: Yeah, the gray is where change happens like that all or nothing gym scenario. The lifestyle changes happen in the gray and making peace with being in the gray, but you have to notice that all or nothing thinking first.
Nina: So, take some time to notice this, this week. Notice how it feels and how you act, and then ask, “Does this feel good? Are there other options here? Is this helpful?” Bring that prefrontal cortex online and think about things slowly so you can show up as the person you want to be with connection, with respect for others, with finding the lessons and failing forward. So, if you’re thinking, I have to choose to be a good mom or good at my job, check-in on that.
Kelle: Yeah. Sometimes it’s going to be hard to say no to a sick child and that’s your priority. And sometimes it’s hard to say no to work and it’s all okay. You can be a good mom and good at your job and sometimes priorities shift. Sometimes you miss a deadline and that’s part of being human, about having relationships, about having a job. And it doesn’t have to mean you’re doing a good or bad job either way.
Nina: Yeah, you’ll stop bouncing between extremes and you’ll start to poke holes in the unattainable standards you have for yourself, the unreasonable expectations you don’t really even realize you have until you do this work. It’s so powerful and so helpful. Give it a try and just start to notice. Alright, that’s all for today. We’ll see you next time.
Nina: Yeah. Bye for now.
Nina: Hey, everyone, if you want more live access to me and Kelle, you have to join our email list.
Kelle: Yes, we’ll come to your email box every Tuesday and Thursday.
Nina: You can ask us questions, get clarity, and get coached.
Kelle: We offer monthly free email coaching when you’re on our list. And you’re the first to know about trainings, events and other free coaching opportunities.
Nina: Just go to kelleandnina.com. That’s K-E-L-L-E and nina.com to sign up.
Kelle: Thank you so much for listening to today’s episode of Ambitious-Ish.
Nina: If you’re ready to align your ambitions with your heart and feel more calm, balanced, and connected, visit https://www.kelleandnina.com/ for more information about how to work with us and make sure you get on our list.
Kelle: See you in the next episode!
Enjoy the Show?
Don’t miss an episode, follow the podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts!