Are you an all-or-nothing person?

If you have ever binged on food, Netflix or shopping this episode might be for you. Maybe you have experienced grief and been scared to open the floodgates of tears so tried not to cry.

In this episode we discuss the difficulties of all-or-nothing thinking patterns, and how they manifest in striving towards unattainable goals while failing to be grateful or present in our current successes.

We share how to start to start to pace ourselves with food, Netflix, shopping and rewire your brain to enjoy them more in small quantities.

We discuss how uncomfortable it is to stop all-or-nothing thinking and how good it feels on the other side. You can feel light and free, there is nothing better than the feeling of trusting yourself to take small achievable steps.

We share the importance of granting full, authentic permission to have the things you go all in on, in order to shift the desire and make clear choices free from restriction.

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We often think of wellbeing as one-dimensional. What if we look at it from a different perspective?

The possibilities are endless. All we have to do is step outside the square.

Let's walk this walk together and hold on tight for the ride.

My name is Fiona. I'm a corporate wellness facilitator, body image and eating psychology coach and a lover of joyful experiences.

And I'm Josephine, a dietitian, somatic release therapist and a recovering people pleaser and perfectionist.

Welcome to Outside the Square.

Good morning.

Hi, hi.

Oh, we're back. I'm so loving getting back into the groove of podcasting and so excited to share this week all about all or nothing thinking.

I've had lots of conversations this week with people and in fact in the last few weeks where this has kind of come up with if I don't do this then I can't do that or I either have to be in or I have to be out and I feel like this is going to resonate with so many of you are as you listen today.

Hmm, that's come up for me this week too. Personally, I felt like I've been trying to just race ahead on my healing journey.

You know like I want to be ten steps ahead and I'm looking into the future and completely beginning to be grateful about where I am right now.

Oh, such a common thing isn't it? It's we want all the things at once, I think because that feels tangible, it feels more tangible or it feels like there'll be a big shift or big change and that can mean that we miss out on celebrating the little things and the things that actually help us to get there.

Josephine 1:58

Yeah, you completely, and I can speak from experience this week and that my desire to get out of pain, the pain of not being good enough, was so great that I completely could not be grateful for the incredible things that were happening this week and there were so many reasons to be grateful.

My work, I’ve just book into two sets of international travel, yet I found myself looking at the next one and I'm like, I actually want to go to Costa Rica.

Did I stop to say, oh my gosh, I'm going to Greece and Australia this year? No, I wanted to go fucking Costa Rica.

Like what is wrong with me?

Nothing. Nothing is wrong with you.

I know. I do know that. It’s one of those moments of all or nothing. It's like you lose all perspective. Your desire is your drive. Your drive to get out of pain is so great that you're going to throw everything at it.

Absolutely

And caution to the wind, you forget your rational take small more steps brain, it just disappears.

That's a key thing to remind you all who are listening that this way of thinking, this thought of we either need to be all or nothing or we need to get more than further than where we are on the journey or we need to be considering the next thing and the next thing and the next thing - is a normal thing.

So there is nothing wrong with you for being in that space. It is something that, I think can be a bit of a protection. It sits there for that emotional safety as well, I think.

Yeah, I believe that. I think this is a protective mechanism for me because if I'm always striving for something and can always be better and making things my fault, then I have some semblance of control over the pain that I'm feeling.

The pain I'm feeling is I'm not good enough, but if I can get myself out of that by doing something, I don't have to sit here and feel not good enough, you know, that's ultimately what I'm trying to do is not feel.

I think it's, I used to refer to it as almost a better the devil you know, that what you know is the pain that you're currently in, which is the pain of not feeling good enough.

But that's a pain that you're used to and so you can work with it. It's not, it's not pleasant because it's still painful and you still think that you're not good enough, but there's a familiarity and a comfort to that. And I remember in some of my journeys, I remember actually saying to one of my therapists at the time, if I'm not feeling like this, what's the other feeling?

Like, I don't know what that is. I don't know if I'm going be opening floodgates and it's actually going be worse than what I'm feeling right now. So I'm going stick with the pain and the devil that I know because I know how to manage it.

But actually, when we think about trying to, you know, build a life for ourselves and our families and our friends and for ourselves. Is that, do we really want be living in that discomfort and that pain, even if it feels somewhat comfortable when the opportunity to feel so much better is actually there. So I think it is that better the devil you know we stick in that comfort zone because we can often manage it to a point.

Thank you. That was really cool to talk through because I worked through this alone but it's so amazing because yeah I can fully recognise that it's easier for me to be busy and planning the next thing and feeling chaotic than to actually stop to stop this protective pattern.

Yeah.

And it's a whole new way of wiring my brain that I'm consistently working on and I'm going to flux in and out of it, whereby I have to consciously make space in my life to do nothing and be happy with where I'm at and celebrate what I have and be grateful and just yeah have time to be.

Yeah and giving time and space to those feelings. I think that's another thing that comes up in that protectiveness as well, is that, you know, if it is going to be new and it's a different feeling or if I am opening a floodgate, do I have the time and the capacity to actually feel that and work through it and bring that in?

And quite often when we're in the chaos and we're in all of the things, we don't feel like we have that capacity but as you say it's about making the choice to have some time to feel the feelings, to celebrate the small steps, to bring that gratitude in.

One of the great things about gratitude and I think we spoke about it in a lot about gratitude in season one was that when you're feeling grateful, you can't be feeling anything else.

Gratitude really fills and is you can only focus on that when you're sitting in that gratitude space. All the other emotions sort of disappear and you just feel grateful. So, making time in the small moments to have those moments of feeling grateful, of celebrating, but also taking time to feel the fears and the worries and opening the floodgates.

And this is why lots of people get sick on holiday, because they finally stop and the floodgates open, like, yeah, why not do it consciously? And in little bits.

Yeah. I remember and anybody on who's listening who has experienced grief will probably resonate. After my mother passed away 15 years ago and when, I sort of got, I was very, I got straight into all the busyness around everything and kind of held everything in to kind of go right, I now need to be in action mode, because I was actually overseas at the time.

So I I wasn't letting any of the emotion come through. I was on right, I need to pack my house and I need to book a flight and I need to get on a plane and I need to get home. And there was processes that I had to do and I caught myself all up in that. And I remember saying to someone after I got back a few weeks later, if I start to cry, if I let myself cry about this, I will never stop. I feel like I will never be able to stop. And I think that is something that we all feel at times in this all or nothing space. for whatever emotion it might be and for a lot of our clients, Josephine, yours and mine, that links into, you know, sometimes their behavior with food, that binging space. If I start eating that thing or if I allow myself to eat the bad food, I'm never going to be able to stop.

And that's the mindset that is worth challenging because it keeps us stuck in this space where we don't go anywhere because we fear that it's never going to end if we move there but actually, we can physically, we can only cry for so long. Physically, we only have so many tears. Physically, our stomach is only as big as it can be. There is a point where you will need to stop. But that fear that it's never going to happen is really, I think, a big barrier and is really the core of all-nothing thinking.

Yeah, so true. So true. And if it's there in one area of your life, it's going to be there in many areas of your life.

So yes, I've been there with food. Yes, I've been there with emotions. I've also been there with Netflix. I've been there with shopping. I usually shop for clothes once every four years and I, you know, I drop a bomb on the wardrobe. And then I can't go there again for another four years because I've been all the money but you know, I don't necessarily always want to do that.

Yeah, I think you're so right. It comes up in so many different ways. Where it's if I do this one thing, it's actually going to be all the things and then I have to restrict.

And if we go back to the episode from season one, where we were talking about the diet cycle, it can be like that. Right, I've watched three seasons of this show. Right, I'm never watching this show. I cannot watch this show again. I just need to restrict my Netflix or restrict myself from going back to that shop to buy more because I've bombed out on the wardrobe.

But that restriction piece starts that desire piece where we actually crave that thing and then we dive straight back in again at the deep end and then find ourselves wanting to scramble back out again. So it's this sort of pendulum, I guess, that sort of we go all in and then we crave it. We go all, we regret, we restrict, and then we crave and we want it all again.

And it can come up in all different aspects and areas in our lives.

And the only way to break it is to bring in a little more permission, like a little more permission to have the foods you restrict, a little more permission to shop as part of your normal monthly holiday supermarket, you know, to start to let yourself spend a little more at those times of your normal spending, buy the nice chocolate for the supermarket and really enjoy them.

Instead of never bringing them into the house because that would be terrifying and then... I will be in all one nothing.

That permission piece is so important and it's important to give yourself full permission because I've had the experience and I don't know if you have Josephine where I have told myself that I'm giving myself permission.

Yes! I'm going fully allow myself to do that but it hasn't actually been authentic, so it's fake permission. I'm still in the mindset of the diet culture or the restrictive culture so I'm saying to myself yes I want to give myself permission so I'm going buy that chocolate or whatever it is and then I sort of say well that's going last me for two weeks before next payday. Right, so this is so I'm only going to have a little bit. That is still a restriction mindset.

And then what happens is that I have the first row go, I can't have any more. And I have the next row and I get myself that into the binge and then I've eaten the whole thing on day one.

And then I said, well, I said that this was only this was going to last me the full two weeks till my next payday.

So now I can't have anything until then. So it feeds that restriction. And I think if we give ourselves full permission, an authentic permission to actually be eat the whole bar of chocolate, right, don't.

It brings a sense of freedom that allows you to make a choice yourself about actually whether you want it or not.

Because when you're in that all or nothing mindset, you're actually not making clear choices for yourself.

Yeah, absolutely. The only way you can build that muscle of permission, which is like trust that you can do this, is to take small steps to make it easy to start with.

So in the instance of chocolate, have more chocolate in the house and allow yourself to have as much as you want. And then once you've got used to having that chocolate around the house, you'll start to notice that being more and more comfortable to choose when you actually want to have it and when you're having it, because you think it's going to be, your so used to it not being there.

And the same with money, like if say you don't trust yourself that you, if you start spending, you'll never stop, well choose something that feels a at t little bit stretchy to purchase, is it that really nice chocolate at the supermarket that you'd like to have?

Or is it some beautiful paper and pens that you want to do your work on each day? Then pick that small thing and commit to it for a couple of months.

And, the wheels don't fall off, you don't spend all your money. And then you can start to trust yourself that actually, these are the small steps I'm taking to get more and more comfortable with living in that little bit more luxury without splurging on everything all of a sudden. Or living in that I'm going to indulge in chocolate when I want to without feeling like I'm going to always eat the whole block of chocolate.

It takes evidence, we need to build it.

Yeah. It's a little bit around that, even when you said that, giving yourself that permission to, you know, have as much chocolate in the house as you want, my body kind of recoiled a little still because this is one of the areas that I used to struggle.

And so I'm sure... you know, for those of you who are listening, if any of you had that reaction where you went, I could never do that.

I'd never just have as much chocolate as I want in the house because it just, you know, then I would just eat so much.

And whether it's then that you, your fear is well, I'll eat so much that I'll gain weight or I, or it might be that I will eat so much that I'll feel sick.

It might be that I feel like I'm never going to stop. There's an aspect there of can you sit a little bit in that discomfort and how can you help yourself to manage that fear?

Because you're absolutely right. When we do give ourselves that full permission and we say, we'll have as much that in the house as you want for a couple of weeks or a couple of months, eat as much as you like, that can actually be quite scary.

Yeah.

So, how can you hold yourself in that fear, knowing that on the other side of that fear or on the other side of that couple of weeks where you do give yourself that full permission, maybe you eat you know 10 bars of chocolate in the next you know however many days. There will be a point on the other side of that where it does start to change but I think that can be hard to know without knowing.

Yeah yeah and it does take as you say it takes sitting with those feelings and for anyone who is thinking like how the heck do you do that? Then and it's about food in particular then I'd take a look at the masterclass we filmed in December, it's still available at the early bird price and we'll put a link in the show notes it's called “Eat, Drink and Be Merry” and that shows you what is at the core and it might be all in nothing thinking but what is at the core? Where does that behaviour start? Probably earlier in your life.

How does this pattern feel in your body and how to shift that pattern into a feeling that gives you more freedom?

So it's actually a transformational body experience we go through because you're not going to get there through thinking this through.

As you say your body is going to respond in fear, you're going to go back to protection, you're going to do what I did this week and go into full-on panic and strive for the next thing.

Go to Costa Rica

Right, exactly. I actually looked at the cost of the cost Costa Rica. You know I don’t even have time to go to Costa Rica this year, but you know.

Because this is where our brain wants to go, we want to get busy in fixing the problem rather than actually being present and the horrible feeling that we need to shift.

And like what you get on the other side of it, the lightness, the freedom, the ability to feel all this new presence in what you do have.

And I'm getting there this week, I'm feeling present in the gratitude of all I do have, which is a lot.

Yeah, to actually be present in the luxury that we already do have. And that small steps of working towards the food freedom or working towards more confidence or working towards building your income to have the wardrobe you want.

Like those small steps without blowing up without going into these patterns.

I remember the first time, I still remember it. The first time I sat down at a cafe with a piece of cake and I ate, I think maybe two or three forkfuls of the cake. And suddenly went that's enough, I don't want anymore.

And I remember thinking to myself, what? How? Like, how are you done with three forkfuls of cake?

But it was, I wanted to taste it. And actually, I was able to say, I don't, I don't want any more. That enjoyed and satisfied me in a way that I never expected to be able to actually, you know, say, I'm done because that would never have happened before in my all or nothing, thinking it would have been, I had ordered this, I want it either I'm going to eat it really fast and not really taste it because I feel bad because it's cake and it's not good for me.

Or I would have just felt bad about leaving something from waste, food waste, big issue for me. I feel, you know, the all or nothing again, you know, either, you know, can't leave anything behind.

But the moment I really gave myself full, full permission and allowed myself to go you can have some cake later again if you want it.

Like, if you want some more in half an hour, you can have some more. That's okay. Cool. Because actually, I don't want to eat it all now.

Where, when it, when, when we're in that space of, well, I'm going to start the diet tomorrow. So this is going to be my last piece of cake for, you know, who knows how long I'm eating every single piece of that cake because I'm, I'm already getting ready for, for restriction mindset.

So the freedom and the discovery that comes from understanding that when you give yourself, when you open those floodgates, you know, when I think about the moment where I did let go with my grief around my mother, it didn't, I mean, it didn't last that particular session, there was lots of different sessions of grief that continued to come, obviously, and continue to now. Even 15 years later. But that first moment where I thought I'm never going to stop, when I let go anyway and just surrendered, the freedom that was there was amazing.

And that happened in my relationship with food. It happened in my relationship with alcohol, and it happens in my relationship with my emotions.

And as you say for you, that travel, it might be your wardrobe, it might be the Netflix, it might be being able to just watch one episode and then go to bed and enjoy a nice night of sleep instead of binging till three o'clock in the morning and then feeling terrible and tired the next day.

So that piece around, caring and holding yourself in the fear and that word surrender, I think, a really valuable one.

Yeah, I love that. And surrender is easier if you do it in small steps. And I'm even thinking with the food, lots of my clients don't start with chocolate.

Like for me chocolate is the ultimate binge food. So, yeah, you could start with chips. You could start with cake.

You could start with chocolate coated peanuts. Things that are things you would want more and more of. But, you know, if it feels too scary to give yourself a full permission with a certain food, build the evidence with foods which feel a little bit stretchy.

This is the only way to build self-worth is to commit and actually be able to follow through. So, choose to build that self-worth with things you can be more sure that you can do first.

Yeah, enjoy each process. Celebrate each time you get used to one of those foods in the house. The chocolate coated peanuts deserves celebration, like to actually feel what success feels like in your body. Like, oh, I can breathe easier. I can feel lightness in all of my body without tension all the way to my fingers and toes, my aura feels bigger, like just to achieved that thing.

And then you don't need to stretch for the all or nothing anymore, because you're just present in that beautiful moment of what you have achieved already.

And that celebration piece is, as you say, gathering that evidence. So finding the evidence for you rather than against you, because I think we often look for that evidence, well, you know, last time I wasn't able to sustain it, or, you know, this time, or that time it didn't work, or, you know, whatever that might be.

So having that space where you record and you celebrate is giving you that bank of evidence, which you can then continue to refer back to when you are in that fear again, because it doesn't just go away. It is something that you need to continue to work with.

So building that bank of evidence is going to be really, really important.

Yeah, and even writing it down, like, this isn't going to go away. The human brain is designed to look for faults at risk.

Like, that is how we survive. This is so deeply wired in all of us that it needs to be consciously done, celebration, gratitude, taking that moment each day to actually take note of the wins you have had.

And yeah, it's so not innate, this process. It's so not

No, and yet there is when we can do that and we can do it again and again, the freedom and the joy that comes from that is such a driver and will give you that push and that motivation and that reminder to do it again and to repeat it.

And to give you a space to share, we're going to pop up, pop up after this episode goes live a little post with the word surrender in it on our Instagram grid, come over and share some of the things that you are celebrating, some of the things that you have shifted in your all or nothing thinking whether it's about food, whether it's about Netflix, whether it's about your wardrobe, whatever it might be in your space.

And let's build a little area where we can all comment and build a little bank of evidence for each other to remind ourselves when we're moving into this space.

Yeah, I love that

And as you say, we've got the masterclass as well. So many of you might have seen it if you're already following us over on our Instagram page.

It was a really wonderful masterclass that we ran live just before Christmas. So if you are interested in really diving deep in your relationship with food and alcohol in particular and shifting maybe some of that all or nothing thinking in that space, that's going to be available or continues to be available as an instant download for you to watch.

And so you get to see us as well as just listen to us. And you can purchase that through.

We'll put a link in the show notes here. And that is on sale at our discounted price until the 10th of February where we're going to be increasing that.

Yeah. And they're designed to be a once-off experience, like a real deep dive into the core of the fear or the not-enoughness or whatever it is for you under all-or-nothing thinking.

And then you've just got that head start on starting to learn how to feel into this.

Yeah, absolutely. And if you're all-or-nothing thinking isn't around food and alcohol, I encourage you to sit in that emotion.

Go back to season one where we did an episode around getting out of your head and into your body and Josephine lead us through an amazing exercise to really feel a discomfort in our bodies and work through that emotion. That's going to be a really helpful one in this space of allowing yourself to sit in the fear of opening those floodgates might feel like.

Yeah, I’ve used both those practices this week to get me through my little Costa Rica blip and come back to that innate confidence that, you know, I'm going to get there eventually.

That, the life of the dream that I see on Instagram is, it's just that carrot calling me, it's not actually the reality of what I actually want to be celebrating, which is where I am.

Yeah, celebrate those moments and yeah open the floodgates, give yourself the permission to do it. It's worth it.

So liberating, so empowering. Yeah, let us know, let us know what you've achieved on a surrender post we can't wait to hear from you.

See you next week.

Bye.

Before we finish up for today, we would like to acknowledge the original custodians of the lands on which our podcast is created, the Ngāi Tahu people of Aotearoa New Zealand,

and the Cammeraygal people of the Eora Nation Australia. We pay our respects to elders past, present and emerging and to all our listeners who identify as Aboriginal, Torres Straight Islander, or Maori.

We love connecting with you, our listeners and talking about the topics that mean the most to you. Reach out to us on Instagram at Outside the Square Podcast and let us know what you want to hear more of.

Until next week, keep stepping outside your square.