All-or-Nothing Thinking
…is seeing something or someone as all good, or all bad.
Look for phrases and words like “always, never, everything/one, or nothing.”
These are absolutes and leave no wiggle room for the possibility of the opposite to be true.
They shut the brain down, and cut off critical or creative thinking (which is crucial for an ever changing world).
“Everything he does is a disaster,” isn’t necessarily true, even if it seems to be. This is a judgment that may or may not be true, and Satan wants us to judge wrongfully to distract us.
“I never do anything right,” shuts down your confidence, and causes you to want to give up. Wouldn’t Satan like it if we just gave up and gave in to his plan.
“Everyone is against me,” causes you to feel lonely and alone, so you don’t show up to the meeting or social event. Satan would like us to feel this way, because we don’t make choices and just go along with the crowd.
“They always lie,” causes us to miss possible truths. Satan likes to mix truth and lies to confuse and mislead. Use discernment to know which is which.
“Nothing is working,” causes us to feel powerless, and causes us to want to give up –wouldn’t Satan like this.
Watch for “all or nothing” phrases and words in what you say and what others say…
And ask yourself, “Is that really true?”
You might see something you may have missed otherwise.
Overgeneralization
…is when you take an isolated negative event and turn it into a never-ending pattern of loss and defeat.
For example, you may have had a bad experience with a family member, and decide that “everyone in that family is rude.” Is that really true though? Or did you shut off the possibility of finding a wonderful friend in another family member.
Another idea is by over generalizing a group of people as being “bad in some way.”
Is that really true though? Is the entire apple tree bad, because one apple spoiled?
Sure there may be some bad people in the collective group of people, but not everyone is.
There may even be lots of bad apples, but I bet there are at least a few good ones – seek those out.
The scriptures tell us to “know them by their fruits,” and “discern the good from the bad by the Holy Ghost.”
Clearly, Heavenly Father doesn’t want us to misjudge groups of people, by ONE person’s actions.
Each person will be judged individually, and based upon their OWN experience.
We are not punished for Adams’ transgression, but for our own.
Yes, past generations influence our thoughts…
That is why we are also judged based on our OWN experience, not someone else’s experience.
This could get complicated and messy, and I’m so glad that the Savior is charge of it – not me.
My job is to love everyone, and let Christ worry about the justice and mercy.
This keeps me in a place of service, joy, and kindness. I feel better and I show up more loving to those around me.
Overgeneralization is an “extreme” way of thinking, and distracts us from the good that is around us.
It keeps our focus on the negative.
Filtering out the Positive
…is focusing on the negative details and dwelling on it.
One bad event during that day, doesn’t make a “bad day.” Our focus on the negative parts of the day, causes us to call the day “a bad day.” The reality is, both good and bad probably happened – so choose to practice focusing on the good and you will be happier and show up more loving in your life.
This will cause you to be more emotionally resilient – a skill that I believe is a must for a Zion people to survive.
We see another example is news outlets – they tend to go overboard on filtering out the positive.
Their job is to bring us pressing events, that will cause us to act (which isn’t a bad thing- we may need to be aware of these things in order to take action)…
However, it seems to be a never ending stream of negative events.
More than once I’ve thought, “I wish they’d report on all the good that was going on in the world occasionally)…”
But, by their nature, that’s not their job.
So we get to choose, how much time and attention we are willing to spend in that environment.
A good rule of thumb I’ve adopted is…
Whatever amount of time I spend considering world issues, I also spend that much time (or more) in the scriptures or other good, uplifting sources.
Aim for a healthy balance; let the spirit guide you in this.
We need time to know the issues and ponder our belief and response to them, and we need to feed our spirits love and light.
–If you’d like help learning any of these, message me. I’ve got some great tools to help you!