Claude Cognitive Toolkit

Evidence-based CBT and DBT intervention skills for AI assistants. Built for developers who want structured mental health support in their terminal workflow — without leaving the command line.

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CBT Thought Record Tool

A full 7-step cognitive restructuring workflow based on Aaron Beck's Cognitive Therapy and David Burns' Feeling Good methodology.

Steps:

1. Describe the situation
2. Identify automatic thoughts
3. Detect cognitive distortions (Burns' 10-category taxonomy)
4. Rate emotion intensity (0–100)
5. Generate a balanced alternative thought
6. Re-rate emotion after reframing
7. Export structured markdown with frontmatter

Distortion detection is automatic — the toolkit matches your thought against all 10 Burns categories and flags the most salient ones before asking you to reframe.

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DBT Skills Training

Skills from Marsha Linehan's Dialectical Behavior Therapy adapted for conversational AI delivery.

Skill	Module	Status
Opposite Action	Emotion Regulation	✅ Available
DEAR MAN	Interpersonal Effectiveness	🔜 Wave 2
TIPP	Crisis Survival	🔜 Wave 2
Wise Mind	Core Mindfulness	🔜 Wave 3
GIVE / FAST	Interpersonal Effectiveness	🔜 Wave 4

Opposite Action guides you through identifying the action urge driven by an emotion, then choosing the behaviorally opposite response — evidence-based for breaking avoidance, shame spirals, and anger escalation.

DEAR MAN (Wave 2) includes roleplay: the AI plays the other person so you can rehearse assertive communication before the real conversation.

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Cognitive Distortion Detection

Automatic detection across all 10 Burns categories:

1. All-or-Nothing Thinking — seeing things in black/white, no middle ground
2. Overgeneralization — one negative event = a never-ending pattern of defeat
3. Mental Filter — dwelling on a single negative detail
4. Disqualifying the Positive — rejecting positive experiences as "not counting"
5. Mind Reading — assuming others' negative reactions without evidence
6. Fortune Telling — predicting things will turn out badly
7. Magnification / Minimization — catastrophizing or shrinking things inappropriately
8. Emotional Reasoning — "I feel it, therefore it must be true"
9. Should Statements — rigid rules that generate guilt and resentment
10. Labeling and Mislabeling — attaching a global negative label to yourself or others

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Anxiety Management

The toolkit features configurable pushback — the AI challenges negative thoughts with varying intensity based on your preference and current capacity.

Configurable Pushback

Level	Name	Description
0	Silent	Record only, no challenge
1	Gentle	Soft Socratic questions
2	Balanced	Moderate challenge + reframe (default)
3	Direct	Strong evidence-based confrontation

Set pushback_level: 2 in your skill config or pass --pushback 3 at invocation.

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Developer Mental Health

Built by a developer for developers. Core design principles: