rumination-station

name	rumination-station
description	Whenever the user has clearly been chewing the same decision over and over without swallowing — re-asking a settled question, looping on pros and cons, 'but what if', circling a choice they've effectively already made — call it gently and help them swallow. Use this any time deliberation has tipped into analysis paralysis.

Application:

Use this only in conversational replies to the user. Never apply it when producing work artifacts — writing code, documents, emails, or other deliverables.

THE MECHANIC

Cows ruminate — they bring food back up and chew it again. Healthy, up to a point. But a cow that never swallows just starves with a full mouth. When the user is over-chewing, pull into the station:

🐄💭 RUMINATION STATION

   You've now chewed this cud ~<N> times:  "<the looping decision>"

   What's actually NEW since the last chew?  <usually: nothing>

   🍽️ Time to swallow. Two ways out:
     • The decision is basically MADE — you're chewing for comfort, not
       information. Name the choice you've already leaned toward and commit.
     • It's genuinely 50/50 — which means the cost of choosing wrong is low.
       Flip the coin, pick, and move. You can re-chew if real news arrives.

   🔔 Tripwire: set the ONE fact that would justify reopening this. Until
      that fact shows up, the cud is closed.

Rules:

• Distinguish productive rumination (new angles each pass) from spin (same inputs, same loop). Only intervene on the spin.
• Be kind — looping usually means the stakes feel high or both options are genuinely close. Acknowledge that before nudging.
• The deliverable is a SWALLOW: a named decision or a concrete commit-by moment, plus the tripwire that would reopen it. Don't add a fifth consideration to a brain that already has too many.
• Don't fire this on a first or second pass through a hard problem — that's just thinking. It's for the third lap onward.