All or Nothing Thinking

To change my lifestyle, I have to begin to learn new ways of thinking about certain things. New expectations and new beliefs needed to replace old ways of thinking and patterns that weren't conducive to a new healthy lifestyle. All or Nothing Thinking was something I did quite a bit, especially where my diet and recovery were concerned. I never really gave it any thought, I just did it. I had been so conditioned to accept certain thought patterns that they were automatic. They had become habit, just below my conscious radar.

Psychologists have long known that the way we perceive the world is the way we respond to the world. The meaning we give to an event or situation helps determine our emotional response to it. Our thinking, to a large degree, controls our feelings. We can practice identifying and challenging our distorted and unrealistic thoughts (old tapes) and replace them with logical more realistic thoughts.

In All or Nothing thinking, I would look at things in absolute, black or white categories; shades of gray did not exist. Things were either all good or all bad. I was either 100% right or completely wrong. I was either abstinent (dieting), or not—a success or a complete failure. Here on a few examples followed by more honest and undistorted ways to think about the particular situation.

Unrealistic or distorted automatic thoughts	Realistic, undistorted responses
"I slipped up and had that cookie at lunch. I've blown it for today. I might as well go ahead and binge."	"That cookie was a nice treat. I'm grateful I was able to stop at one as it won't halt my progress or cause me to gain weight."
"I can't deal with rejection."	"I don't like to be rejected, no one does, but I'll get through it."
"I binged at lunch so there's no point in having a healthy dinner.	"Yes, I binged. I can use this as a learning experience. If I do that and move on, it becomes part of my recovery process."
"I'm not an athlete. I hate exercise!"	"Increasing my activity level does not require me to be an athlete. I can do something active that I enjoy."
"I can't jump around, move fast, or keep up with my exercise video, so I can't exercise."	"Any activity can have a positive effect on my health and recovery. I can start slowly and work up over time."
"If I can't do this perfectly, I might as well not try."	"Recovery is a process that I am growing into. Mistakes are part of the process of learning."

All or Nothing Thinking stems most often from perfectionism. I would set a standard for myself that I couldn't meet or maintain. When my expectations didn't get met, I could only see absolute failure.

It's simply a fact of life—we all make mistakes. Life is a learning process and nobody is perfect. Overcoming binge eating disorder and shedding extra weight is a learning process. We learn almost everything in life by making a series of small mistakes. That's how life works.

Perhaps the most common type of All or Nothing Thinking is the problem of binging after even a small lapse or "infraction" in an eating plan. Rigid food plans and the idea of maintaining strict abstinence, often seen as the measure of success in OA, tend to trigger this phenomenon. When I'd break one of my self-imposed eating rules, I'd tell myself that since I'd already "blown it" I might as well go ahead and continue to overeat or binge. A more rational thought would be to acknowledge that one cookie can't make anyone gain weight, but the whole package sure will. I learned that it's better to just give myself permission to have a cookie or other treat once in awhile.

All or nothing goals are another common form of all or nothing thinking. When we say that we will "never" do or eat something again, or that we will "always" eat in a healthy manner, or that we will do something "from now on" we are setting ourselves up for problems. These are standards of perfection that almost no one can stick to for long. There is no room for human error. Setting these kinds of absolute goals leaves us permanently but one small step away from failure. A more rational way to set goals is to make them more flexible—to allow for gradual progress and change.

Of course, All or Nothing thinking isn't just about developing a healthy relationship with food. We may be engaging in All or Nothing thinking in the rest of our lives too. It is a type of automatic thinking that feeds low self-esteem and depression. It can lead to procrastination and indecisiveness. It can keep us from starting or completing projects. The truth is, life happens in that messy area between all or nothing, black and white. When I learned to accept the shades of gray in myself and the world, I released a huge store of energy that I could spend on my recovery and the enjoyment of life.