Black and White Thinking: Reframe Your Thoughts
Black and white thinking, sometimes referred to as splitting, occurs when you cast judgment in a narrow-minded way. It can make you more susceptible to discard or accept relationships and opportunities on a whim. For instance, you may see people or situations as “perfect” or “terrible” rather than somewhere in between.
key takeaways
The Dangers of Black and White Thinking
1. Ignites Emotional Reactivity
Wild lows and wild highs as a result of black and white thinking often lead to behavior patterns incongruent with the situation at hand. For instance, if your partner is at first seen as the most wonderful person in the world, and yet one disappointment -such as forgetting to do the dishes- immediately triggers you into believing they are the worst, you may be tempted to react as if the latter has always been true.
Splitting may even cause you to lose respect for your loved one and in turn lash out or behave in a passive aggressive manner, thinking your actions are justified. As you can imagine, your reactions overtime can wear down intimacy and trust, confusing and ultimately hurting your loved one.
In this way, splitting might even dehumanize people in our eyes. By seeing your loved ones as either all good or all bad, you’re not letting yourself see them for who they are. You may forget that they are human, just like you, and capable of making mistakes.
2. Establishes a skewed self-image
Thinking in black and white terms can make you overly self-critical and hypersensitive to others’ opinions. While criticism is a healthy and inevitable thing, you may find it difficult to accept without experiencing layered insecurity. This fear of criticism and rejection can block you from self-compassion and personal growth in the long run.
On the flip side, believing you are all “good” and can do no wrong may prevent you from thinking critically about yourself at all. A balanced and more realistic perception includes shades of gray, highlighting both positive and negative components of your self-image.
Why Do We Do It?
Overall black and white thinking is a defense mechanism that allows us to subconsciously excuse ourselves from action. If you think about it, when we exaggerate how bad or good something is, it excuses us from taking accountability in that moment. A polarizing and fixed opinion can feel like the decision has already been made for us, allowing us to quickly announce whether we are “all in” or “all out”.
While justifying your thoughts and feelings through splitting may give you confidence in the moment, this cognitive distortion actually prevents you from acting with intention. If you are only looking through the lenses of black and white, you are more prone to problem solving impulsively and making decisions based on an extremely limited viewpoint.
Identifying Black and White Thinking
Be mindful of using words like “never”, “perfect”, “always”, “worst”, “best”, “nobody”, or “everyone” when describing situations. Think of these as splitting trigger words that exaggerate your perceptions.
See if you can detect how these splitting words intensify the following scenarios:
When in a depressive slump: “Nobody cares about me.”
When in a shame spiral: “I always mess everything up. I’ll never change.”
When experiencing rejection: “He never remembers to call. I guess we were always doomed from the start.”
How to Stop Splitting?
It’s important to acknowledge splitting for what it is -a primitive way of defending ourselves against the complexity of life. When you use black and white thinking, you are usually distorting nuanced reality by ignoring the good and exaggerating the bad, or vice versa. You’re not looking at the shades of gray that can provide a fuller range of context. The good news is, with enough practice, we can train our brains to catch splitting thoughts and in turn adjust our lenses to pick up on life's many shades of gray.
Identify When It’s Happening
Remember words like “always” or “never” are rarely accurate. When you find yourself using them, it’s time to pause and reflect on your emotions. When justifying your version of truth, did you notice slipping back into black and white thinking? What trigger words are you tempted to use? Observe what kind of impulses flare up. Are they extreme? Do they match the current situation?
Bonus points if you create a list of the trigger words to become more vigilant of splitting. Simply labeling splitting as a cognitive distortion when it occurs is an improvement in itself.
Reframe the situation.
Once you’ve detected black and white thinking, train yourself to find the gray. One way to reframe in gray is to use “both, and” instead of splitting trigger words. This encourages dialectical thinking, reminding you that you can have two nuanced perceptions that seem contradictory and true at the same time.
Examples:
“I always screw up. I never get things right” → “I am both smart AND I make mistakes at times.”
I feel so sad about getting laid off AND I feel relieved that I don’t have to be stuck in an office anymore.
I was anxious on that date AND I had a good time being out of my comfort zone.
Check the Facts
When you find that your black-and-white thinking causes you to ruminate on a negative or overly positive thought, challenge that thought and look for proof.
If your splitting thought is “I completely messed up on my presentation. I am the worst. I can never do anything right.", you can make a quick list of things that disprove that thought.
Feel free to start small and highlight what comes to mind first, such as “I’m a great communicator and know how to lead meetings.”
Bonus points if you can provide concrete examples for your point of proof:
“I’m a great communicator because I’m thoughtful and provide everyone with synthesized notes each morning.”
When idealizing someone, you might find yourself ruminating on how “perfect” they are. While you aren’t ruminating on the negative, here you are ruminating on an overly positive thought, which is still not a balanced viewpoint.
Your thought may be, “She is so smart and perfect. I don’t know what she’s doing talking to me! Anyone would be lucky to have her as a friend.”.
To counteract the idealization, list a few unfavorable traits. For instance, “She is so smart AND she isn’t very good at sharing her emotions. Still, I’m lucky to have her as a friend!”.
Whether you are being negative or overly positive, the idea is to invalidate the splitting thought and encourage a more balanced perspective with a point of proof.
Bottom Line
If you are used to thinking in extremes, it can be difficult to catch yourself, but black and white thinking doesn’t have to define you or your relationships. You can begin to notice and replace this cognitive distortion with thinking that is more emotionally stable by using the skills listed above. When you are able to view the world through different shades of gray, you learn to adopt flexible thinking patterns that allow for nuance rather than a polarizing and exaggerated version of the truth.
