We engage in all-or-nothing thinking when we accept automatic thoughts which describe
events in black-and-white categories, with no shades of gray. It is a more extreme form of
magnification and minimization in which we minimize to the point that many positive
aspects of life completely disappear from sight. Such automatic thoughts lead to a kind of
perfectionism that defines everything short of 100% success as a failure. To a point, such
perfectionism can lead us to try harder; but in the long run, inevitably, it tends to
discourage us from trying at all. Since we encounter very little black or white in the
real world, this kind of thinking squeezes much of the brightness out of our view of the
world: all the shades of gray come to look as black as night.
A few years ago I was teaching a class in which several standardized tests were
required. One semester, a woman took the class who got the highest total score on the
standardized tests that I've ever recorded in that class. Out of a possible 200 points on
the four tests, she missed five. But when this woman got her first essay back, she found
several criticisms and suggestions for improvement. (The essay was not graded.) She seemed
depressed and irritable in class for several days after getting the essay back. Finally, I
persuaded her to come in and talk to me about it, and I asked her what she was so
concerned about.
"Well," she said hopelessly, "I guess I'm just going to get an 'F' in
this class." From her point of view, her essay wasn't perfect, so it was worthless.
Her automatic thoughts on receiving the essay back were probably something like this:
"There are flaws in this essay, even after I worked hard on it, so I wasted my time.
I produced nothing of value." That's all-or-nothing thinking.
This cognitive distortion can be devastating when you are trying to learn a new skill
or improve your performance in an old one. A sculptor who thinks in terms of
all-or-nothing will never finish a statue because the first stages of the work will always
be rough. A writer who sees her rough draft as either finished or failed will never really
finish an essay. You must accept your first draft as potentially good, but unfinished, in
order to improve it. Many students fail to produce good essays not because they produce
bad ones, but because they never finish the good ones they start.
