25. 5 Tips To Improve All Or Nothing Thinking
You’ll understand why we’re sharing our sweet puppies once you listen to the episode! From left to right: Finnley, Samantha, Mabel, and Luna. Feel free to share you fur children with us!
In our latest podcast episode, we delved into the topic of all-or-nothing thinking, a pervasive mindset that often leads to an unattainable quest for perfection. Our conversation highlighted the negative impacts this way of thinking can have on mental resilience, body image, and self-confidence. We started by exploring how all-or-nothing thinking can undermine our successes and magnify our failures, leading to a distorted view of our abilities and accomplishments.
As we shared personal anecdotes and professional insights, we shed light on how to identify signs of all-or-nothing thinking in our lives. We talked about the tendency to use absolute terms like "always" and "never," and how these can signal a rigid, inflexible approach to life's challenges. Through these discussions, we emphasized the importance of cognitive flexibility, a skill that allows us to navigate the complexities of life with a more nuanced perspective.
Our conversation transitioned into the benefits of cultivating cognitive flexibility. We provided listeners with practical tips for breaking free from the all-or-nothing mindset, such as relabeling thoughts and fostering curiosity. These strategies help to question the validity of our absolute beliefs and open up the possibility for a range of outcomes. By practicing these techniques, we can learn to approach setbacks and successes with a balanced view, rather than a binary one.
We also addressed the concept of redefining success and failure, advocating for a more compassionate self-assessment that recognizes effort and growth over a strict win-lose dichotomy. We explored the empowering notion that recognizing our options, including the option to quit, can lead to a greater sense of control and satisfaction in life. Our discussion underscored the idea that by integrating self-compassion into our daily thought processes, we pave the way for a more fulfilling and resilient existence.
As we wrapped up the episode, we encouraged our listeners to reflect on their relationship with perfectionism and how it might be holding them back from experiencing a richer, more varied life. By embracing the imperfect journey and celebrating progress over perfection, we can transform our all-or-nothing blind spots into opportunities for personal growth and enhanced well-being.
In summary, this podcast episode serves as a call to action for anyone looking to break free from the confines of all-or-nothing thinking. It's a reminder that life is not about maintaining a perfect record, but about making informed, adaptable choices that lead to a big, rad life. The strategies and anecdotes we shared aim to inspire and empower listeners to foster resilience, redefine success, and cultivate a compassionate relationship with themselves.
-
Jess: 0:04
Hello friends and welcome to Sturdy Girl, a podcast focused on strength, not size, where you'll hear conversations around healthy body image, cultivating confidence and being a resilient human in both body and mind. Sturdy Girl is a podcast where we shift the focus away from your appearance and on to living the big, rad life you deserve parents and on to living the big rad life you deserve.
Jess: 0:35
Hello friends, and welcome to episode 25 of Sturdy Girl. I am amazed that this is where we're at. 2-5 is wild. I feel like we just started and we're almost done with our second season. Crazy. So Megan and I are here and back together. She did not get to take part in my super sweet bunk bed podcast studio last week.
Megan: 0:52
I wish I could have though.
Jess: 0:54
I mean, honestly, it was pretty awesome. I was trying to figure out last minute where we were going to record the week's podcast episode, because I'd been sick all week long and I didn't really have much of a voice and I was trying like, oh my gosh, how are we going to make this happen? Started feeling better and we're at my niece's down in California and I'm like, ok, blake, am I going to go in a closet? Like where are we going to make this work? And he's like the bunk bed, there's all those stuffed animals and we can put blankets around it. And I mean there, home from school. And they were like, and Jess, this is so cool. So I got anti points. It was fun.
Megan: 1:24
You turned our whole bed into a studio.
Jess: 1:34
Yeah right, soundproof and everything, oh my gosh. But no, we want to talk about all or nothing thinking today, and it's one of those things where, when I started putting together this episode at first, I'm like I really want to talk about this. But how does this relate to body image, how does this relate to self-confidence? And I realized it really relates a lot more to that mental resiliency piece, because this all or nothing thinking actually impairs mental resilience. So bear with us, because we'll tie it all together into, like the actual sturdy girl theme.
Megan: 1:58
I think it all honestly ties in.
Jess: 2:00
I mean it's your relationship with yourself. Yeah, I would say that that's part of it. It's the way that you think, right? So, exactly, it all ties together. Okay so, with the all or nothing thinking, it's a conversation. I have a lot with clients and I feel like a lot of times I get these coaching clients that come to me that are, maybe, maybe it's my personality too. You just attract them, yeah, that label themselves as very type A People who call themselves a perfectionist and say it like it's a good thing, and those words are what are used to describe all or nothing thinking, and it's something that, like, I'm sitting here talking to you about clients that are like this, but I think back to job interviews, and I would try to use the word perfectionist as if it was a good thing in interviews, as if it was a strength, and, as we'll see when we get into this episode, this all or nothing thinking really is not serving us well, yeah, okay.
Jess: 2:50
So let's define all or nothing thinking and then let's talk about some signs that you're an all or nothing thinker, talk about a certain type of thinking that will help it, and then we've got, and then we have, five tips for you to help. I'm laughing. I said the word got and my mom is visiting right now and she thinks that the word get and got are slang. Also, oddly, my grandpa does as well, and they're not slang, but she's like it's just a lazy way of speaking. How is get a lazy way of you know, I'm not entirely sure I need to have a conversation with you. Well, I suppose I was raised with that thinking as well, and I also realized that I curse like a sailor because my parents like slapped my arm every time. I'm like dropping an f-bomb and I'm like sorry.
Megan: 3:35
I realized that when we were just on our beginning of our call, catching up. I was like man megan calm down.
Jess: 3:40
No, you were in good company, chill language okay and aside and then we'll actually talk about what we're here to talk about. So growing up at jahawa's witness, where there were so many things that were off limits, right, holidays and birthdays and playing team sports and every bit of fun in your life, you know, profanity was something really, really frowned upon, oh gosh. And I remember having a crush on this boy in my early teens and we used to like talk on the phone and you'd call and be like hi, is Zach there, can I talk to him? Cause you're, you know, calling a landline, and we get on the phone and like sometimes you see, to use profanity, and I was like do you realize that profanity is just because you don't have a big enough vocabulary or a creative enough vocabulary? And I was so judgy of like.
Megan: 4:28
I would argue that it means I have a very creative vocabulary. Do you know how?
Jess: 4:32
colorful. My vocabulary is no, but that was like such. The belief at the time was that you were lazy if you couldn't think of a better word to use besides a four-letter word well, they had to convince you it was bad somehow.
Jess: 4:45
I don't think that was a religion. Honestly, I think that was just like my nerdy word, loving self. That was like, yeah, use better words, use more descriptives. And now I, 16 year old Jess, was like, oh my goodness, your mouth or in this, in this moment, it's my parents. They're like giving me a hard time. It's fine, I put my how I talk at work hat on. Yes, and that's how I talk around my parents. They don't want to hear that.
Jess: 5:06
They don't know me, it's okay, oh my gosh, okay.
Jess: 5:09
So all or nothing thinking yes, it's essentially thinking. In extremes, it's either black or white. Preface we are not therapists. We are not providing therapy. If this is something you are really wanting to work on, please go see a therapist.
Jess: 5:20
But this comes from cognitive behavioral therapy and it's one of the 10 common types of cognitive distortions and it's defined as an assumption we make based on minimal evidence or without evaluating the validity of the assumption. So it causes us to stop challenging our thought processes and look for evidence to the contrary or alternative solutions, like we stop thinking about anything outside of this line of thought that we're in. It undermines our confidence, our self-efficacy, our ability to problem solve and our mental resilience. So this is where this ties in. Is it's just thinking it's either this or it's nothing? It's not recognizing that a lot of times, the choices that we make have a spectrum of options available to us.
Jess: 6:00
Your performance was either amazing or it was terrible. You either the winner or lost. This speaks to me all growing up. If you get anything less than an a, you failed. Yeah, but on your report cards, if you came home with anything less than an a, you were sat down and asked to explain why. What happened? Why did you fail? What went wrong? What didn't you learn? And we were very different. It was like such achievement focus. It was all black and white instead of realizing. You know, as an adult, learning more and more, how much of our life has lived in that gray area.
Megan: 6:31
Yeah, I mean, when you're talking about like that win or lose or like it was I did, amazing or terrible, it's funny because we talked about like racing and stuff, I feel like so many people that you talk to like athletes get kind of stuck in that if I didn't do this, which is what my expectation was, it was not good enough and even though you did your best, 100%.
Jess: 6:49
I mean that's working with recreational athletes. Yeah, and I'm going to think more in context of running and races. Oftentimes with my athletes, I have them set a, b and C goals, because if you set one single goal and you don't achieve in your mind you've failed, when then you can't give any weight to the effort that you made and the effort you put in. And it's so hard. I also think about marathon runners. Most people who run marathons aren't going to run it to win. Most aren't elite.
Jess: 7:17
I'm not going to discredit, there are elite runners out there, but you're gen pop. We're running them because you have a masochistic sense of fun. Exactly, we type too fun. So then you're often comparing to, like, your previous performances and your previous PRs, and it's so hard to give any weight to any of the effort. It's like I think about projects in school, right, you get all this praise for your effort and the things you did well. And then there's that one negative comment one and what do you focus on? What do you dwell on if you have your performance review at work? Let's say it's time management. You prioritize getting your Starbucks every morning and sometimes come in right at eight o'clock and you're like, oh my God, I'm a failure. Instead of I have great customer service reviews, I have stellar this. I have still no. You're gonna dwell on poor time management and that's it.
Megan: 8:04
This makes me think about. At my last job not at this job they had performance reviews and one of my coworkers did totally fine for her performance reviews. But it was like one thing that it was like you really need to work on this and I remember her just being so devastated and like seeing it from the outside and you're like, but you did good, but there was one thing that wasn't yeah, and it was just that one thing that you get hung up on and that just destroyed everything good that you've been doing in your work this all or nothing thinking.
Jess: 8:32
Is that perfectionism? And it's also it's creating rigid boundaries. It can feel good. I think that's one thing I really want to acknowledge here is we're like shitting on all or nothing thinking. But it feels good when you give yourself rigid boundaries and structure and you can say this is right and this is wrong, this is good and this is bad. Here's how I eat, here's what I don't eat, here's how I exercise. Anything less than that is not good. It is a failure. It feels efficient. It's way less decision fatigue because the decisions already made for you. This is what I do, this is, this is what I eat, this is how I move, these are how I make my choices. But does life ever really work out the way we plan it to?
Megan: 9:12
No, I liked how you mentioned the ABC goals because I feel like that just directly plays into this and bringing it into my own experience not being able to do activities I can do normally, or just a different mentality of like I can't do anything that I want to do at the gym or that is set in my brain, but those are the things that I need to do to gain strength, to be strong, to keep my body looking a certain way, and all of that has to shift. If you only have those very rigid goals and very rigid mentality and you can't shift that thinking into more flexible thinking, then you're just sad.
Jess: 9:45
You're a sad failure all the time You're living this right now Just sad?
Jess: 9:47
No, I'm just kidding.
Jess: 9:48
You can be sad. You can be sad while also flexing this mental muscle. I'm overplaying it. How the hell do I do these things in a way that is going to satisfy my brain and body when I can't do the things I actually want to do? It's that all or nothing thinking and having to work around that. Yeah, so we mentioned the rigid boundaries and how good they can feel. I just think about dieting.
Jess: 10:11
My first thought with all or nothing thinking a lot of times goes to the dieting piece, because the fewer options you have, the less brain power you need to make that decision. So, like processed food is bad, vegetables are good. And then it leads me to I think it was weight watchers for a while, or maybe it still is, I don't know. I've lost touch with all of their stuff, but for the longest time, like there were so many vegetables that were worth zero points, so then you could eat unlimited amounts of vegetables and the amount of like gi distress people were giving themselves eating like this is insane, because then you're labeling like vegetables are good, because they're worth zero points, and I just think about, like pooping your pants so much fiber okay.
Jess: 10:48
So next thing I wanted to mention was like signs. You might be an all or nothing thinker and we've touched on a lot of this, but let's just kind of give some validity to it. It's using words like always, never should, shouldn't good bad giving to things. You have a hard time seeing the positives in a situation. You won't try something unless you're confident you can do it perfectly, which this speaks. So much to trying new things. As an adult, we don't do things. We're like, oh crap, I'm gonna be bad at that. No, I don't wanna try it. You have a hard time receiving feedback and small mistakes can cause you to feel like a total failure. So, and small mistakes can cause you to feel like a total failure. So those are kind of some of those signs like start ruminating around. I'm like, do any of these resonate? If you identify with one, it's not saying like, oh yeah, you've got all or nothing thinking problem, we got things to work on. It's just more like, get your brain to start thinking about this, because one of those we talked about diet.
Jess: 11:45
You can see this all or nothing thinking manifesting in, maybe, foods that are, like, I'm going to say, problematic to you foods in your diet. So we all know my favorite food on the planet is cookies and I would eat them every meal of the day, every day, for the rest of my life and never get tired of them. And in some context, for people cookies can be a problematic to you food where one of those foods where you say I can't have this, remember, said like the words in the if it's a perfect, if it's all or nothing thinking I can't have this food in the house because if I do, I will eat all of it until it is gone. I won't be able to control myself. And so when you look at these problematic to you foods, it's like are there other options if you feel like you can't make progress when you can't have them in the house and we'll get to other options and kind of the whole spectrum of thinking. It relates exactly to those ABC goals. But that's another way to start thinking about how you view food, because a lot of times that all or nothing thinking plays out in that really strongly.
Jess: 12:32
It also plays out in exercise. You miss one day of exercise, one day that's on the schedule and well, I've lost all fitness. I'm a failure. I clearly can't stick to a plan. I can't do this anymore. A lot of runners struggle with that. If they have a plan, I can't do this anymore. A lot of runners struggle with that. If they have a plan and that plan is four days a week and running on these days and you miss a run because life happened, and then suddenly you're like every subsequent run is gonna suck. I've lost all my fitness, I'm not gonna be ready for this race. That's in five months and it sounds funny to say, but it is such an easy mindset to fall into.
Megan: 12:59
I laugh because I've done that. You talk to yourself like that, you know, but it sounds stupid when you say it out loud.
Jess: 13:06
Yeah, yeah, that's not how it works and another piece of this all or nothing thinking is when you believe that lapses shouldn't have a part to play, or struggling with any kind of like self-control failures. Like we think that if we set a goal for something let's say like eating vegetables with two or three meals a day and we miss eating veggies in one of our meals and I'm like, oh my god, I'm a failure, I just may as well stop. That's all or nothing thinking when there are other options available to us because we're human. Is it really realistic of us to think that we're not ever going to fail when we're trying to do something that we haven't done before? Or trying to, let's say, you're wanting to work on body recomp and so you're adjusting your diet.
Jess: 13:47
Some you're adjusting your movement. Do you expect to be perfect out the gate forever and always? Not at all. So these are kind of ways that we see all or nothing thinking coming up. And then, lastly I just wanted to mention, all or nothing thinking can exist in certain domains and not in others. You could have an all or nothing mindset around food and be totally fine around exercise. A lot of times we see them all kind of come together similarly, but you can start flexing this muscle of other options besides all or nothing thinking with specific domains as you build the skill, and then you'll see a kind of flow outwards to the other areas, if that makes sense.
Megan: 14:21
Yeah, I can think of things where it's very specific, like I am all or nothing thinking in this kind of situation. But I like a lot of other things. I'm very just like whatever.
Jess: 14:29
Yeah, it's a mental muscle which I guess I kind of alluded to saying flexing mental muscles. So the polar opposite of all or nothing thinking is cognitive flexibility, and so this is a skill and it's such an important skill where we talk about kind of our I'm going to say favorite kind of body image being body image flexibility. Cognitive flexibility is like our favorite mental skill, like, if you're going to talk about the biggest tool in your tool belt for managing your thoughts and your beliefs and your actions, managing your self-talk, managing the choices you make, this cognitive flexibility is the best. It's essentially the ability to switch between thinking about more than one concept at a time. It's being able to adjust your behavior given the environment that you're in.
Jess: 15:12
Can you consider that there might be other options than the one your brain is stuck on?
Jess: 15:17
When you go out to dinner and your parents are the one that pick the place that you are going to eat, and maybe you had in your mind you were going to a certain restaurant and choosing a certain food.
Jess: 15:22
And you go out to dinner and your parents are the one that pick the place that you are going to eat and maybe you had in your mind you were going to a certain restaurant and choosing a certain food and you go somewhere different and suddenly your brain is stuck on like but I wanted that grilled chicken with veggies and no butter. That's what I feel like my brain needed, like I'm stuck on that because I got to stick to my macros and I got to do all these things. And instead you're like how can I practice this level of flexibility in this situation to say there are other options, let's look at this menu. Is there something that I can build from here? Yeah, one piece of this cognitive flexibility that I think is really comical is all of the research articles I read about cognitive flexibility as a skill mentioned doing new things as a way to build it.
Megan: 15:56
I would believe that 100%, because if you're doing new things, you're pushing yourself out of your own belief system and like out of your your own way.
Jess: 16:04
Yeah, and you're learning to manage that self talk of like oh crap, I don't know how to ballroom dance and I have got two left feet, but I'm trying this new thing.
Megan: 16:13
Yeah, and it comes with an understanding that you're not going to be the best when you start that new thing. I think most of the time when you have that flexibility, you're like all right, well, this is working in progress.
Jess: 16:22
I think it's hard to. This might be a whole separate tangent that I'll try not to get into, but it comes into play of like, when you're growing up and how much weight was put on people with innate talent at things innate talent at sports, the innate skill to be able to be an amazing speller or to write good papers or do research or whatever. It is like you have these innate skills, like that was weighed so heavily. And then you get to be an adult and you're like shit, dude, I gotta try it. All of these things, this stuff doesn't come naturally.
Megan: 16:49
That weight really shifts and you're like, oh man, this is reality okay I was actually just talking to my nephew about this because we were talking about things that he likes to do in school and he was like I like to do to do these things. I'm really good at this and he's really good at math. I was never good at math. I liked creative things, but I always wanted to be good at math, like I like it. I actually enjoyed doing all of my math classes. I just was awful. It took so much work. Yeah, you're having that conversation. I was like I really like math and it was funny to see a little kid be like yeah, you like something that you're not good at. But also, being honest, like it doesn't come naturally, like I have to work very hard to like those things.
Jess: 17:28
Yeah, I fell into that in school. I was always really good at writing and spelling. So what did I like in school writing and spelling? Math didn't come easily to me, but I weirdly really liked stats in college and it was I had to reach out to the professor and be like, can we meet in person Because I need help? And we had like a half hour meeting at Starbucks and all of these concepts just clicked and after that I was like, oh, this actually makes sense.
Megan: 17:54
I like this, See, but I think that's why it's a fun math, because it is very applicable to like real life. You're like oh, I know how to do that and I don't know how to do any of that anymore, so don't ask me to do statistics. This was 10 years ago, guys. Go on.
Jess: 18:09
Most of you listeners are probably dog fans and unfortunately, both Megan and I are, I would say fortunately. Both Megan and I have multiple dogs and we love them with all of our hearts, but they always seem to love to play when we hit record. So if you hear rustling in the background that we literally cannot edit out, they're the dogs playing, and you know how much we love dogs and we hope you do too we should just post pictures of the dogs in all of our they should honestly be the cover of the podcast.
Jess: 18:35
I mean, they're all so cute they should all of them.
Jess: 18:37
it would get us more likes. We're just gonna put Girl shirts on the dogs. Mabel would look so cute, I know she would be adorable. My stepdad spilled coffee on a sweatshirt this morning and so I put him in a Sturdy Girl sweatshirt and he's like, oh yeah, I'll rock this, this is great. So he's like in Home Depot with me this morning like rocking Sturdy Girl and I'm like, yes, this is awesome. Okay, redirecting from our whole dog tangent and everything else. One more point I want to make. Then we'll get into two tips to improve this, this thinking.
Jess: 19:04
we gotta think of a shorter way to say all or nothing thinking aon, you're way faster than I am at trying to do abbreviations but just thinking like when we consider our future favorite self, something we talk about all the time, especially listen to last week's episode it was like one of the big tips on improving body image is envisioning this favorite self and like who are they? What do they think about, what kind of qualities they display, how do they spend their time, what are they like? Does the favorite version of yourself, the future version of you that you want to be? Do they want rigid structures or do they want to have the skills to be able to be flexible and to have that freedom of choice and knowing that they have the skills to be able to make the and to have that freedom of choice, and knowing that they have the skills to be able to make the best choices for them in any given situation? I think that's what I like to come back to with this of like well, this perfectionist tendency has served me well to this point in my life. Why would I change? Is it gonna forever serve you well? Could you serve yourself better by learning this cognitive flexibility, by learning some of these other skills we're going to talk about? Probably, keep, keep listening. Okay, tips to improve.
Jess: 20:04
The first one is relabel. So this is going to be familiar territory if you are a continuous listener of Sturdy Girl. We talk about relabeling your thoughts. Again, if you listen to last week's episode, this was mentioned in it in context of like, challenging your thoughts. First, before we can relabel anything is to have awareness around our thoughts in the first place. Can you notice them? Can you develop awareness around your thoughts, your thought patterns? Notice when that good, bad mentality starts popping up and simply name it without judgment? You're not trying to shame, you're not trying to change. Can you acknowledge what it is? Hey, super judgmental voice, who's kind of a dick. I see you and I'm gonna choose how I want to respond to you if you just label it. This is actually something too in acceptance and commitment therapy and I'm blanking on one of the books. I read about it, but they talk really heavily in a couple of chapters about using this kind of reframe of relabeling your thoughts of like, letting them come up and be like.
Jess: 20:56
That was a really negative voice that came up. That was a judgmental voice. That was a rude voice. That was a all or nothing thinking voice that came up. That was a judgmental voice. That was a rude voice. That was a all or nothing thinking voice that came up. How do I want to handle that? And so it's another skill around that awareness piece.
Jess: 21:07
And then second tip is to be curious. If you've been around my Instagram for any length of time, you will know that Everwild, my coaching company's slogan is stay curious, get gritty. And this curiosity piece is so important? I'm actually reading a book called Seek about all the research around curiosity and how good it is for us, so this had to be in here. That sounds really familiar. It's super good. But it's when those thoughts come up asking yourself is this true? What are you making this thought mean about you? Where's the proof? Can you prove it? I think that that's one that I forget to think about a lot of times. But if you can catch yourself in that oh my god, I ate a third cookie today, can you believe you ate that? That was so much sugar and so many carbs and so much fat. You're never gonna reach your body comp goals. If you're like, then you start like hearing that spiral and you're like yeah, is that really true? Where's my proof? Proof that that's true? Because in the past, cookies have fueled every one of my favorite races.
Megan: 22:04
Yeah, I feel like I relate to this one really heavy, just because these are all questions. As someone who has dealt with anxiety for a long time, I feel like these are questions that you kind of have to ask your anxious thought, otherwise, you know, you're spiraling into that unknown, yeah, and you kind of have to stop yourself and be like is this reality that I'm telling myself actually true? If this does happen, what is it going to actually affect? And I don't know. I really relate to that one because I feel like I do it a lot just in myself and in my own thought process and how I'm approaching things.
Jess: 22:31
Or you're like am I being too hard on myself?
Megan: 22:33
Am.
Jess: 22:33
I spiraling, yeah, which I mean, depending on how far into the spiral you are. It's hard to come out of that and be like is there another option here that would work? But that's really the flex on the curiosity piece of like with the cookies. Instead of for my diet, I can't have cookies ever. Can you find a way to incorporate them? Isn't there another option that exists?
Jess: 22:51
Or like running with that thought for a second of just your experience, I'll have athletes who will miss a run and they're really worried about, like I have a really busy week coming up and I might have to make the choice to miss a run. What run should I miss? And, if so, is that gonna set me back? And I was like, let's play this scenario out. You miss this three mile run on Tuesday and you get everyone, every other one of your runs done and your lifts. Then what happens? What happens to your running? Does anything actually happen? Does anything happen to your life? How do you feel if you miss that run?
Jess: 23:19
Like, play it out in your mind. What was there? Anything catastrophic? No, not on your fitness level. Cognitively you might have beat yourself up a little bit, but when you can pull back and be like there's other options here? Because if I were to get that three mile run in on that day, I would have had to have woken up in the middle of the night to get it done because I had so much on my schedule that day. Right, so that piece of like. Are there other options? So that goes right into our third tip, which I labeled as 50 shades.
Megan: 23:44
I still can't get over the label.
Jess: 23:47
If you have black or white, all or nothing thinking and you realize that the majority of your life is lived in the gray, there's probably more than 50 shades of gray, right. So what are you missing in this situation? If you're assessing the situation and you're saying I always, I never should, always, I never should must good, bad, those words we mentioned earlier can we contemplate other solutions in that gray area? And that's something that, if you find yourself in this situation of like catching yourself in the all or nothing thinking, can you actually brainstorm those other possible solutions or reasons or explanations. We know that that all or nothing thinking feels good. But even just starting to acknowledge that life is lived in the gray, that starts to give you some of that grace in that. So maybe you can't think of another solution or another explanation in that moment. But if you recognize like there's got to be some gray here I recognize these thoughts that are coming up, but there is some sort of gray you're giving yourself a little bit of leeway there to be like, okay, there's work here to do, I'm imperfect, but I'm trying, and so that's again. All of these points just feed into each other. So the fourth one being reframing and giving options, reminding yourself of those options that exist on the spectrum between absolute failure and absolute success.
Jess: 24:57
And I wanted to read this quote from a book called Do Hard Things by Steve Magnus. I have read this book three times now, I think, and have used his notes for building our episode about mental resilience. He does a phenomenal job, having done tons of research, but this quote is All or nothing often leaves you with nothing. Giving yourself a choice sometimes means entertaining the idea of quitting, slowing down or even giving up. It's not that I want you to do so, but by having a choice, by needing to make a decision, you are developing a sense of control. By considering quitting as an option, you now have influence over the outcome, even if one result is negative. By actively considering quitting instead of seeing it as something to avoid and never let cross your mind, you are now training toughness. Consider what it would be like to abandon your goal or quit your job. You always have the choice to quit. Even just the simple thought exercise of contemplating quitting gives your brain a skill to say there is another option. That's it. There's always an option.
Megan: 25:58
I feel like I adapted this with work I used to be. I stayed at a job that I really did not like for eight years and I remember I was an okay job but it just was not good for my mental health. But after moving jobs a couple times and just realizing that like yeah, it's stressful and it's something that you kind of have to work through, but realizing that you can do it, and two jobs down the road you know I'm sure that you're familiar with this it's just like, oh, this is fine, like there are other options out there. And just because I'm here and I'm unhappy right now does not mean that I'm going to be way more unhappy at the next place I go.
Jess: 26:33
And even if I am, guess what you can move on you know, it's your mental perspective on it and I like to say it's every job has its shit. What kind of shit are you willing to put up with?
Megan: 26:43
Yeah, 100% the reality. Shit with good benefits, yes, exactly.
Jess: 26:54
Our last tip for this black and white thinking is practicing self-compassion. So now again, we have talked about self-compassion so many times on this podcast and we will probably never stop talking about the importance of self-compassion, because so many of us are way too hard on ourselves and if we can recognize that self-compassion is something that can help you do more and go further without being a dick to yourself, because when we get trapped in that all or nothing thinking, we're essentially saying that anything less than perfection is failure. And when are we ever perfect? Ever? Have you ever been perfect at something? I mean sure you can get like an A plus on an assignment. Is that perfect, I guess? But in general, in your exercise routine and your eating and your relationships and the choices that you make and the skills that you build, are you ever perfect? It's a very hard goal. Yeah, exactly.
Jess: 27:39
For example, with our all or nothing brain. Let's say we've decided we're taking a workout class before work, we're gonna get our butts out of bed and we are gonna get our leggings on and we're gonna go to a cycling class, but unfortunately we hit this news button too many times and we decided to actually fully make the cold foam for our coffee and you missed the class start time. Your all or nothing brain is going to be like well, it's too late now. I guess I don't get to work out today and you start out the window, but your self-compassionate brain says you still have time for something. You still have time for a 20 minute lift, a short run. Something is better than nothing.
Jess: 28:12
For me in in this current season that I feel like I'm finally coming out of mentally, my struggle was, if I didn't have the full hour and a half that I wanted or needed for a full workout, I wasn't gonna do it at all because I wanted it to be done and I wanted to get every set of squats and deads and accessories and everything, or didn't want to do it at all and it was such an all-or-nothing pattern kept falling into. So it was working on that cognitive flexibility of where, what, what are my other options? I can go out there and I can get the main part of my squats done and get my deadlifts done, and then maybe tomorrow I'll just do the accessories. I can break it up. That is completely allowed.
Megan: 28:48
Or maybe by the time you get out there you'll feel like you want to do the rest of it. I mean, that's kind of the grace that I've been not in this season, but generally I'm saying that in terms of my own experience. Sometimes I can't even get myself to the gym. Or I mean yesterday I went to the gym and all I did was I just sat on the freaking stair stepper for 40 minutes, just because I was like it's something like sat on the steps of the stair stepper, or you got on the stairs, I got on, I was on the stairs.
Jess: 29:16
You're like I walked in the gym and that was enough. I sat down, I went to Planet Fitness.
Megan: 29:20
Okay, they gave me some cookies. Well, that's okay.
Jess: 29:25
But that's also another skill building, for if you want to increase your frequency of a habit is starting out with those just manageable pieces and maybe that beginning of your just manageable building that habit is literally walking in the gym and sitting on the stair stepper sitting on the steps of the stair stepper. What feels accessible Five minutes on the treadmill, and then it's 10. And then it's maybe you touch a barbell or a dumbbell or whatever you know, and you work up to that and then fully building that skill.
Megan: 29:48
I talked to my therapist recently about this because I was in a very all or nothing mindset with working out. And just if I can't go and be there, like you're saying, for the whole hour and a half two hours that it should take me to do a normal workout yeah, what's the point?
Jess: 30:01
Or like if you can't touch the barbell and do Olympic lifts like you love.
Megan: 30:05
Yeah, what's the point? I'll just sit down and eat cookies on the couch all day, which is also very fun.
Jess: 30:11
That is such a better alternative.
Megan: 30:12
But it does not make me feel good, not just mentally, but physically. I feel like, yeah, but no, it's one of those things where, like I've really tried to like adapting that mindset, where you can just be like, okay, I'm just gonna go, we'll see what happens, I'm gonna go into my garage and I'll sit on my assault bike for five minutes and then, if I want to do something else, if I want to keep going, I'll do something else. But usually I find that if I can at least get there and at least start, usually it turns into a little bit more than what I expected.
Jess: 30:38
That's the power of self-compassion. Though, like people think about, self-compassion is like being nice to yourself and just coddling yourself and letting yourself just like give up and let yourself go or whatever. No, it's not. It is that piece of like. How can I practice a way that is still honoring the goals that I've set for myself? It's showing up and saying I don't have the hour and a half that I want for this workout, but what do I have time for? How do I still show up for myself, even when my capacity has changed? And that's all or nothing. Thinking doesn't let you do that. It's a success or failure thing. When life has lived in the gray, it's lived in that messy middle and yeah, that's in the 50 shades of gray, exactly.
Jess: 31:20
I mean, maybe this episode's just called 50 shades of gray. And then people are like what the hell, sturdy girl, what's going on like?
Megan: 31:26
heck, yeah, I want to listen what is this about?
Jess: 31:29
is there an explicit reading on this one?
Megan: 31:32
okay, we're actually just gonna talk about our fairy books, our smutty fairy fantasy, romanticy heck, yeah, I love it.
Jess: 31:42
Okay, can we just have like a whole side niche of story girl? That's like book reviews? I would love that. I'm sure there's a whole separate section of the podcasting world and youtube and book talk and whatever that's already covered this you would be so proud of me.
Megan: 31:55
I finished an entire book yesterday, like start to finish. Well, I listened to it. It was entertaining. That is amazing. I just had to say that I'm proud of you. Yeah, I feel like be proud of yourself, proud of me for that, and now I actually will have read the book when I go to book club.
Jess: 32:12
So you can't like skirt around answering any of the questions I know, oh my gosh, okay. So, wrapping this up, the five tips for improving our all or nothing thinking, mainly cognitive flexibility. I mean, that's not part of the official five tips, but that is the biggest skill here of being able to adapt and know that there's a spectrum of options. There's A, b and C goals available to you at all times, and one of those options is forever and always giving up or quitting, and even just contemplating that as an option. But mainly these tips are relabeling, being curious, recognizing that there are those 50 shades of gray, reframing and giving options, that option of quitting, and practicing self-compassion.
Jess: 32:50
And remembering two things Our brains naturally have a negativity bias. We attribute a lot more weight to negative experiences and interactions and positive ones. Like we said, you get that performance review and you get hung up on the single negative thing and so much less weight on all the positive things they said about you. So just remember that when you get caught in the spirals can you think about some positive outcome, because it's usually there. And then the second thing which I first heard from my dear friend, coach Allie, and that is that a belief is nothing more than a thought.
Jess: 33:18
We keep thinking until we believe it to be true. So when we think about our self-talk, when we think about the way we think, when this all or nothing thinking, if you continually think a certain way, it's going to become a belief. And if you've never sat down to think about what your beliefs actually are, it's kind of an interesting exercise to realize how many things were just ingrained in you because of how you were raised or the people that you were around. And then you start challenging those beliefs and you're like actually that's bullshit. Okay, so no, that is all or nothing thinking. Do you have anything else to add?
Megan: 33:49
Just read more books Agreed.
Jess: 33:50
I know we listened to audiobooks on our like epic family road trip last week and I just loved it. It made the time go by so much faster.
Megan: 33:56
The one I did yesterday was when Breath Becomes Air, so good it is. I actually really liked how much he went into the technical stuff of the medical stuff. But I love medical stuff, Like if you have anything that's happening, tell me all about it. I'm that weird person that's like go on.
Jess: 34:13
Tell me all the nasty, gory details. I want to hear it. I would love to hear it. No, it did. Okay, friends, thank you so much for listening to another episode of Sturdy Girl. If you enjoyed this episode, please follow us, like us, subscribe Apple Podcasts, spotify wherever you're listening to this podcast, we are really trying to grow our reach, so having those reviews mean the world to us. We are actually making Sturdy Girl Podcast shirts to do a series of giveaways soon, so start making those reviews, because that's how we're picking our winners. But again, thanks, friends. That was such a sad. Yay, yay.
Megan: 34:48
I'm trying to be quiet.
Jess: 34:50
Yay, okay, friends, we will talk to you next Friday. We have two more episodes of this season after this, and then we're going to take a shorty couple week break before we recommence. Yay, talk to you next Friday, friends.
Megan: 35:03
Bye.