All or Nothing

New years is coming, and with it a flood of resolutions! Which is awesome. I love a fresh start. Motivation is up, hopes are high, and goals are set even higher. But we also know that the new years motivation often doesn’t last. This could be for several reasons, but a big one is all or nothing thinking. Now this mindset can affect us anytime of the year, but I am deciding to write about this topic in December because it is going to hit hard with new years resolutions. 

What is all or nothing thinking? 

All or nothing thinking refers to thinking in extremes. You are either a success or a failure. You must go all in, or you are not doing it at all.  

Meet Matty: Hey. Matty wants to ‘get in shape’. She decides January, she is going to join the gym, start daily workouts, download a food tracking app, and start meal prepping. Now currently Matty eats okay, never exercises, just walking here and there and has a very busy lifestyle (demanding job and a busy family). Week 1 goes well for Matty. Got up early, made it to the gym, tracked food intake and hit her calorie goals. This week was ‘perfect’. Week 2 starts well, but her daughter gets sick and must stay home. No one to watch her, so can’t go to the gym. All or nothing thinking kicks in, and Matty says, “well today is a write off”. Matty doesn’t workout and doesn’t track her food. Tomorrow comes and the little one is still sick. Another write off. The next day, back to school and Matty is back at it! Hit the gym, make breakfast, and put it in the food tracker, but work calls you must go in early. The day is busy, no time for food tracking. Matty missed her meals at work and is starving when she gets home, but no time to cook, kids have sports tonight. Another write off. Matty grabs herself and the family fast food and calls it a day. This process continues until eventually Matty writes off the whole fitness/health endeavor. She feels defeated and like she failed at yet another diet/workout program.   

Matty went all in on her fitness goals, with the best of intentions, but life had other plans! So, what do we do? Just wait until the kids are older and then I’ll have time to do it right? Wait until work settles down, it’s busy this time of year. This is all or nothing thinking and as I hope you can see from Matty’s example this type of thinking can really set you back, trapping you in an endless cycle of seemingly unachievable fitness and diet goals.  

How do we break the cycle of all or nothing thinking? 

Of course, the best way to overcome all or nothing thinking is to seek professional help from a therapist. But there are a few other things you can try in the meantime.  

Finding the gray or the middle ground. With all or nothing thinking we tend to see in black and white. Again, either everything goes perfectly, or we have failed. First you must recognize these thoughts and then find the gray area. Let’s continue to use Matty as our example. Matty saw 100% effort, hit the gym daily, food tracking, perfect clean eating and meal prep. But this was not a realistic expectation for Matty’s current lifestyle and when life hit and Matty could no longer maintain 100% effort, she dropped to 0%. Matty’s grey area would be looking at her schedule, between work and family, where could she realistically fit in exercise. Matty finds that going to the gym 2-3x/week is her grey area. Some weeks she can go more and others less. Matty decides to prep her lunches ahead of time but leaves breakfast and supper the same for now. This is Matty’s grey area. Or maybe she just starts by adding a fruit or vegetable to each meal, or a quality protein to each meal. Keep it simple and start with one thing at a time.  

Let good enough be good enough. Once and a while, everything will line up and you’ll get in a few more workouts, an extra walk or meal prep and other times you might be lucky to get to the gym once that week. Something is better then nothing. Do what you can when you can. If you are eating out because you don’t have time to cook, no problem! Do the best with what you have, instead of ordering the large fries, just go with the medium. Spring for the chicken wrap instead of the double patty burger. It doesn’t have to be perfect.  

So, this new year remember results don’t come from perfect, they come from progress! Little consistent steps.