Metacognition

Input: $ARGUMENTS

Step 1: Observe Your Current Strategy

Before improving your thinking, notice what you’re currently doing.

What cognitive approach are you using right now?
Did you choose it deliberately, or did you default into it?
How long have you been using this approach?

CURRENT STRATEGY: [name or describe the approach you're taking]
CHOSEN OR DEFAULT: [deliberate / autopilot]
TIME INVESTED: [how long you've been at it]
WHAT TRIGGERED THIS APPROACH: [why you started thinking this way]

Step 2: Assess Whether It’s Working

Honest evaluation of your current cognitive process:

Progress check: Are you getting closer to an answer, or going in circles?
Clarity check: Is the problem getting clearer or murkier as you think?
Effort check: Does the difficulty feel productive (good struggle) or stuck (spinning wheels)?
Output check: What have you produced so far? Is it useful?

ASSESSMENT:
- Progress: [advancing / stalled / regressing]
- Clarity: [increasing / stable / decreasing]
- Effort: [productive struggle / diminishing returns / stuck]
- Output so far: [useful / partially useful / not useful]
- VERDICT: [strategy is working / strategy needs adjustment / strategy should change]

Step 3: Identify Alternative Strategies

What else could you be doing? List at least 3 alternative cognitive approaches:

Strategy	When it works best	Cost of switching
Break it down	Problem is too large to hold in mind	Low — start decomposing
Zoom out	Lost in details, missing the big picture	Low — ask “what’s the real question?”
Zoom in	Big picture is clear but details are fuzzy	Low — pick one piece to examine
Analogize	Stuck on a novel problem	Medium — need to find good analogy
Invert	Direct approach isn’t working	Medium — ask “what would make this fail?”
Simulate	Can’t reason abstractly	Medium — walk through a specific example
Abandon and restart	Deep in a wrong frame	High — lose sunk work
Ask for input	Your perspective is limited	Depends — need the right person

ALTERNATIVES CONSIDERED:
1. [strategy] — would help because [reason]. Cost: [low/medium/high]
2. [strategy] — would help because [reason]. Cost: [low/medium/high]
3. [strategy] — would help because [reason]. Cost: [low/medium/high]

Step 4: Bias Check

Scan for cognitive biases that may be active right now:

Anchoring: Am I fixated on the first piece of information I encountered?
Confirmation: Am I only looking for evidence that supports what I already think?
Sunk cost: Am I continuing this approach because I’ve already invested time?
Availability: Am I overweighting what comes to mind easily?
Dunning-Kruger: Am I more or less confident than my actual understanding warrants?
Framing: Would I think differently if this were presented another way?

ACTIVE BIASES:
- [bias name]: [how it's showing up in your current thinking]
...
CORRECTION: [what to adjust]

NO BIASES DETECTED: [if clean, note what you checked]

Step 5: Decide — Continue or Switch

Based on Steps 2-4, make a deliberate choice:

DECISION: [continue current strategy / adjust current strategy / switch to new strategy]
REASONING: [why this is the right move]

If switching:

NEW STRATEGY: [what you'll do instead]
FIRST MOVE: [concrete next step]
SUCCESS SIGNAL: [how you'll know the new strategy is working within [timeframe]]

If continuing:

ADJUSTMENT: [any tweaks to current approach]
CHECKPOINT: [when you'll reassess — e.g., "after 10 more minutes" or "after completing step X"]

Step 6: Monitor Comprehension

Final check on your understanding:

What do you understand clearly?
What do you understand partially?
What are you confused about?
What don’t you know that you don’t know? (Can you even guess?)

COMPREHENSION MAP:
- CLEAR: [what you understand well]
- PARTIAL: [what you understand roughly but couldn't explain precisely]
- CONFUSED: [what you're stuck on]
- UNKNOWN UNKNOWNS: [areas where you suspect gaps but can't specify them]

Step 7: Metacognitive Summary

WHAT I WAS DOING: [original strategy]
WHAT I FOUND: [assessment result]
WHAT I'M DOING NOW: [continue / adjust / switch]
BIASES CAUGHT: [list or "none detected"]
COMPREHENSION LEVEL: [high / medium / low / mixed]
NEXT CHECKPOINT: [when to re-run /mtcg]

Integration

Use with:

/prcp -> Improve perception as an alternative cognitive strategy
/rskl -> Check reasoning quality when metacognition reveals logical issues
/jdgm -> Apply structured judgment when metacognition says “just decide”
/sdc -> Deeper self-diagnostic if metacognition reveals persistent patterns
/ecal -> Calibrate confidence levels surfaced during bias check

mtcg - Metacognition