One of the benefits and perhaps one of the setbacks of being in school for years and studying human behaviors and personalities is that you see the world being less black and white than you have originally thought. Classes that shock you and challenge you to critically think can also make you able to think in the gray. This is one thing that I’ve learned to function in for the purpose of doing my job. I deal with things that are not absolutes on a daily basis because people are involved. They aren’t numbers that can easily be manipulated to get the same exact result every time. The process is often messy and involves variables that were not considered at the beginning. I’ve learned to take outside factors into consideration when making a clinical judgment on someone’s behaviors or actions and to hear both sides of the story before aligning too closely with one client. It’s not an easy task to do and sometimes involves feeling uncomfortable. However, despite my ability to function in the grey and not make rash decisions or judgment calls on behaviors without knowing as much as possible, I still like the black and white. Decisions are so much easier to make when they are clear cut. Professionally I’ve learned to work in the gray but personally, I like the black and white because it simplifies life. The “all or nothing” mentality helps me to stay focused and decreases distractions. However this makes it easy to swing to extremes without even attempting to find any middle ground. You make decisions and stick to them without being worried about repercussions. It’s easier to be assertive and attentive to what’s going on around you. But I think that it’s easier to miss nuances and smaller things because the focus is on the black and white instead of making allowances for the grey things in life. The truth of the matter is that life is about adjustment and change because our lives will almost never go exactly according to plan 100% of the time.