All-Or-Nothing Thinking

Am I reducing things to opposites..?

Dichotomies or opposites are an important way of simplifying our world - black and white, good and bad, up and down, and so on. They stop being useful when we forget that they don't tell the whole story.

...instead of seeing the continuum?

Reducing things to an either-or can feel attractively "definite", but it provides a false certainty. There is usually a continuum between any opposite poles:

Exercises

• Do some detective work

  What are your most common all-or-nothing thoughts? Tune in to your internal running commentary (see challenging depressed thinking) and write down a list of any common thoughts which have an all-or-nothing flavour.

• Check for all-or-nothing words

  Watch out for all-or-nothing words like "always", "never", 'everything', and 'nothing'. Make a point of adjusting each one to more realistic words like "often", "usually", "sometimes" or whatever is appropriate.
  • An example:
    "Good things never happen to me - I'm always going to feel miserable and low," can be adjusted to "Things have been tough recently, so it's not surprising a feel low at the moment. It's hard to appreciate the good things that have happened, but I have to admit it's not been all bad..." etc.

• Practise finding the middle ground

  Using your list, draw a line and fill in some of the points on the continuum between the opposite poles. Show yourself that there is some middle ground.
  For example:

  Nobody loves me	There are people who care about me....	Everybody must love me
  I'm a total failure	I'm reasonably good at some things...	I have to be perfect.

  
  

• Think of more than one perspective on the issue

  List at least 3 different perspectives on the issue. Challenge yourself to think of even more perspectives. You don't have to believe them, just remind yourself that there are multiple ways of viewing anything.

• What would others think?

  What would others say about the issue? Consider in turn what a friend, a tutor, a parent and a stranger might say.
  
  An example:
  You might think,
  "I'm not top of the class like I was at school - I might as well give up."
  A tutor might say,
  "She's a good student and will get a solid degree".
  Your parents might say,
  "We don't need you to be top of the class to be proud of you".
  A stranger might say,
  "She needs to get used to being a small fish in a bigger pond".
  A friend might say,
  "Don't give up - work's important, but so are friends and other things".

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