All-Or-Nothing Thinking: What It Is, and How to Stop It!

In this episode of the Advancing Women Podcast, we're tackling cognitive distortions. A cognitive distortion is an assumption we make based on minimal evidence, or without considering the evidence. It is an exaggerated or irrational thought pattern that causes us to perceive reality inaccurately. We all engage in cognitive distortions.

We can overgeneralize and interpret one negative event or mistake as a pattern of defeat. We can mentally filter discounting our positive qualities and accomplishments and dwelling on the negatives. We jump to conclusions “mind-reading” others’ interpretation of our actions assuming others are judging us negatively, even when there is no definitive evidence. We can magnify or minimize our experiences blowing negative experiences or mistakes out of proportion and minimizing positive experiences and contributions. We can internalize blame for things we weren’t responsible for.

AND…one of the most common and potentially hindering cognitive distortions that we engage in is the all-or-nothing distortion. Looking at things in absolutes. Black and white versus shades of gray. We are all susceptible to all-or-nothing thinking. We easily recognize this when we’re talking about food and dieting, but we don’t always see it in other areas of our lives or our work. How one mistake or misstep can lead to us harping on small mistakes or leave us feeling like we might as well just throw in the towel.

Here’s the good news though. There ARE steps we can take to combat cognitive distortions. In this episode, I talk about how we can begin to identify cognitive distortions and put ourselves in a position to shift our mindset in ways that serve our emotional happiness and advancement.

References

Bollen, J., Ten Thij, M., Breithaupt, F., Barron, A. T., Rutter, L. A., Lorenzo-Luaces, L., & Scheffer, M. (2021). Historical language records reveal a surge of cognitive distortions in recent decades. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 118(30), e2102061118.

Abatecola, G., Caputo, A., & Cristofaro, M. (2018). Reviewing cognitive distortions in managerial decision making: toward an integrative co-evolutionary framework. Journal of Management Development.

https://www.betterup.com/blog/all-or-nothing-thinking

For more about Dr. DeSimone and the Advancing Women Podcast

https://advancingwomenpodcast.com/

https://www.instagram.com/advancingwomenpodcast/

https://www.facebook.com/advancingwomenpodcast/