I have
a confession to make:
“I was
bloody scared!”
All
through my life I believed in the fact that there is only two truths: BLACK OR
WHITE.
Well,
I didn’t know I believed in all-or-nothing scenarios, but my behaviour spoke
for itself.
What
is black-and-white thinking?
Apart
from it being a rash way of thinking, it mostly is a way of seeing the world
and its contents in only two ways.
I was
seeing life in good or bad, in black and white, and with a vile all-or-nothing
attitude.
Now,
that way of thinking always used to seem absolutely logic to me. To me, there
was only a YES or NO.
That
way of thinking gave me clarity, but actually, can we put and see life into a
BLACK-AND- WHITE pattern?
I’ve
come to the conclusion, that we can’t, since life is much more complex than
just black and white – its way more colourful and recently I had to realise
that it is full of grey zones.
I was
never good dealing with grey zones; they scared the living shit out of me,
because I didn’t feel save. Seeing things in black-and-white gave me a feel of security
(although true security never will be gained by using our minds!). I thought,
at least then I know with what I was dealing.
I
reckon, my all-or-nothing attitude was based on fear.
The
fear of not knowing where I am at or what to do, so I used to rush decisions, quickly made up ideas and conclusions in a Black-and-White pattern in order to gain
clarity.
I
think, that I must’ve picked that up when I was really little, because back
then, I had no choice but to develop a mistaken thinking pattern.
I had
to create a save reality in order to maintain a healthy faith, whilst the world
around me had crumbled into pieces.
It was
necessary for me to survive, to trust and find a certain kind of happiness, but
now that I’m grown up, I realise, that this kind of thinking actually doesn’t
work that well.
Life,
as it is, doesn’t reveal itself always in black-and-white, sometimes there are
moments in which nothing is clear. Neither are our feelings or people.
Life
is full of grey zones and because I had found myself in one recently, I had to
realise the destructive and unproductive way I deal with them, because in order
to reach the ‘security’ I sought I tried to alter my mind and make
black-and-white decisions.
And based
on that, with my all-or-nothing attitude I nearly destroyed a beautiful
friendship, a congruent lifestyle and my plans for my future life.
Because,
what I didn’t realise was, that there is so many more possibilities in grey
zones. When floating in a grey zone I allow a lot of things to happen and work
out the way I would like them to be, whilst when living in a black-and-white
belief I hinder a lot of possibilities from evolving.
Now, I
found the beauty in not having to have control over what happens and forcing
things to have to make sense to me and fit into a certain pattern.
Neither
for friendships, my feelings nor for the path of my life I walk on, as long as
I know WHY I walk them, everything is great as it is.
And
don’t get me wrong, only living in grey zones is not good either, because
sometimes we have to just make a choice, say YES or NO and push ourselves a bit
so we will reach what we dream of.
In the
end, it again is about the balance.
When
to accept grey zones, sit with the unsolved and unclear things, but also, when
it’s time to make things clear to ourselves, which never should be based on
fear but on the positive power of problem solving.
I
myself found the beautiful and infinite power in grey zones, which before were
a nightmare to me and let me tell you what:
I
gained more than just more possibilities in my life.
I
gained more FREEDOM, because now I don’t have the need to control and know
things anymore.
