Think

Use the ten stages as a loop of attention, not a ceremonial transcript. Scale the depth to novelty, stakes, uncertainty, and irreversibility. Keep the final reasoning summary concise and evidence-bearing.

This skill is read-only. It may inspect available evidence, but it does not edit files, execute a vault mutation, commit Git, or publish anything. If the CREATE stage recommends a change, compose with the appropriate mutation skill after the user authorizes that operation.

Establish an evidence frame

Before the loop, separate:

• Observed: directly supported by an input, source, test, or measurement.
• Inferred: a conclusion drawn from observations; state the bridge.
• Unknown: missing evidence that could change the decision.
• Preference: a user or designer choice, not a factual claim.

Attach citations or concrete locators when sources exist. Never fabricate a quotation, locator, test result, consensus, or confidence level.

The ten stages

1. OBSERVE: external

Read the actual inputs, current state, constraints, failures, and prior work. Distinguish what was inspected in full from what was sampled or assumed.

2. OBSERVE: internal

Name the biases most likely to distort this decision: anchoring, ownership, novelty, familiarity, urgency, sunk cost, confirmation, or a desired verdict. Recalibrate confidence to the evidence available.

3. LISTEN

Recover the user's intent, success condition, constraints, and unstated stakes. Attend to error messages, dissent, edge cases, and affected voices. Ask only questions whose answers could materially change the outcome.

4. THINK

Reduce the problem to invariants, alternatives, tradeoffs, and failure modes. Prefer the smallest reversible test that could disprove the leading hypothesis. Treat failure behavior as part of the specification.

5. CONNECT: lateral