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# False dichotomies
- URL: https://www.gilespcroft.com/false-dichotomies/
- Published: 2025-08-20T07:00:00.000Z
- Updated: 2026-02-24T23:22:01.000Z
- Description: The mind is an either/or machine. It doesn't do shades of grey 🪙
- Author: Giles P Croft
- Tags: Psychology, Careers, Decision-making, FOUNDATIONS, Life change, Procrastination, Real stories, Comics

I was having a coaching conversation with someone and they had a business dilemma.

They were at a fork in the road and didn’t know whether to go down Path A or Path B.

🔀

Easy enough, you might think… except that it looked like Path A *excluded* B; and conversely Path B *excluded* A.

It had become an either/or scenario, but neither felt right and they were STUCK.

😫

Minds. Absolutely brilliant at creating false dichotomies.

I remember, back in the early days of my coaching practice, I got stucker than a stuck thing on whether I was going to work with individuals ***OR*** I was going to work with groups.

> 📦🗣️: *“Because you can’t do both, Giles, obviously”*

(said the Giles Ego Construct, for reasons known only to itself)

It seems *insane* to me now, that this was even a thing, but I can assure you, this particular thought-construct stopped me from taking any concerted action on my business for about 6 months!!!

😱

There’s *always* another way. It’s just that the mind can’t see it.

And the great news is that the mind doesn’t have to come up with it… because it’s insight that does all the heavy lifting.

🔑

****Key Message**: Real change doesn't require willpower, but INSIGHT.

So you can relax. Stop trying to figure it out.

When we get (or are helped) into that space of quiet, it’s amazing what fresh perspectives we get on a situation.

Mine eventually came to me in the shower.

(Ironically, it was the same thing people had been saying to me for the whole of that 6 months—do **both!!**—but until it popped into my head as my *own* idea, it was just advice that was clearly wrong 😆)

---

The person in the coaching session saw it with fresh eyes, after we’d been speaking for a while and we got a bit quiet; questioning some of their assumptions.

There’s a path, trust me!

Anything’s better than this:

![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/9b/f3/9bf3d316-7d32-494b-814f-a7d94d6358c3/content/images/2026/02/false_dichotomy_2x-600w-564h.png)

XKCD: [False Dichotomy](https://xkcd.com/2592/?ref=gilespcroft.com)

😉

Giles

[Stepping stonesJust because you have a Big Dream, doesn’t mean you have to drop everything 🤩![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/9b/f3/9bf3d316-7d32-494b-814f-a7d94d6358c3/content/images/icon/DR_Lockup-Black-3-415.png)The Daily RemindersGiles P Croft![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/9b/f3/9bf3d316-7d32-494b-814f-a7d94d6358c3/content/images/thumbnail/photo-1464557569525-01076d9d836a.jpeg)](https://www.gilespcroft.com/stepping-stones/)

More career-path either/or mind-nonsense 🙄