I think viewing frameworks as metaphor is the most important point you're making here! Acolytes of any particular framework tend to bristle at this because they've invested so much in one particular metaphor, but personally I just try out various metaphors with clients and see what works for them. I don't really care what metaphor they latch onto as long as it gets results!
When it comes to "troll" parts, I tend to separate the underlying need from the impact. To me the underlying need almost always is something universal and human like safety, belonging, control, etc. You can validate and normalize the need unconsciously driving it while still being clear and direct about the harm of believing its narratives or using its strategies.
This makes sense to me basis my own anecdotal experience.
I found there's basically two ways of feeling less bad: 1. Feel the Feeling 2. Stop thinking the negative thought
Sometimes there isn't a deeper feeling behind the negative thought, it's just a maladaptive pattern picked up during trauma. Sometimes it's actively toxic like the internalised voice of another person (in my case hypercritical mom).
For me, I found that negative thought patterns persisted even after I felt the feeling and changed the emotional belief. I spent time endlessly examining the thoughts, analysing them, speaking to them which didn't work. Now I figured that the pattern was built during a very traumatic time but I was no longer in that situation and I needn't do it. I'm only partially through but just dropping the stupid pattern is way more effective.
So yes, I'm completely convinced by your article. Every school of help isn't helpful in every situation, it does require a lot of self understanding to figure out when to let go.
> The healthy response to such trolls is not to spend energy dialoguing with them; it’s to call them out, calmly and succinctly (e.g., “these aren’t real reasons, they’re just excuses”) and speak to the honest fear underneath (e.g., “I know it’s scary to put ourselves out there, but we’ve got this”), then get on with our life.
Do you view this as a kind of exposure therapy solution? I would think in many situations just saying “no you’re wrong” and/or “I’m going to ignore you now and move on with life” wouldn’t be sufficient to deal with the related feelings.
I’m assuming this is in a context where you’ve already done a lot of introspection to identify the underlying feelings, and have addressed them on their own terms rather than through the filter of this self-deceptive narrative.
Would love to talk EMDR with you on a podcast, and present some of the research including my own academic published article. Can we go live on here at a time that works for you? I’m a fan of your work.
I had not heard of IFS before today, but it strikes me as a bit wacky and neo-Freudian in the way it partitions the mind.
But wasn't stoicism all the rage in Silicon Valley circles not long ago? Is IFS the thing that replaced it, or have there been other psychological fads in the interim? (Or was stoicism never as big a thing as it seemed to this outsider?)
Stoicism has definitely been popular in SV circles, but less as a branded therapy and more as a school of thought. It definitely shows up in how the tech scene frames and interprets therapies like CBT, IFS, and mindfulness/meditation, all of which are in principle compatible with Stoicism (though not synonymous).
Looking at therapeutic intervention in the widest and most fundamental sense as a means — a technology, method, or intervention — to rewire the synaptic connections of our brains towards a positive outcome opens some interesting lines of thought about these fads, and about legitimate methods likewise.
In essence, there are different technologies for therapeutic intervention — human, technical, and biological or chemical — designed on the basis of specific architectures. While these architectures may share a common high-level function, namely the rewiring of the brain towards a better outcome, they are built on very different structures: different parts, different connections, and different interactions, each with its own strengths, weaknesses, and fault lines. There is also an elephant in the room, namely the values embedded in the architecture and applied in its Realization.
While the high-level function may be similar, the outcome of a concrete therapy — that is, the specific Realization of a therapeutic intervention — will depend on the structure of the architecture itself, on the quality of its Realization, on the patient as substrate, and on the values that steer it in practice.
A fad is a specific fault in which the function of a therapeutic intervention shifts from “rewiring the brain towards a positive outcome” to “following the method”. In other words, the means becomes the end in itself. This differs from a structural fault, where the architecture, or its fit with the patient, is inadequate, and from a value fault, where harmful or distorted values applied in the concrete Realization drive the intervention towards a harmful outcome.
One way to assess therapeutic interventions is thus to ask whether a) their function still remains the rewiring of the brain towards a positive outcome, rather than the preservation of the method for its own sake, and b) what values, hidden or visible, are embedded in the architecture and applied in its concrete Realization.
---
1. Different therapeutic interventions may be capable of rewiring a brain towards better outcomes, and this may include human-, drug-, or even machine-mediated forms. For example, IFS, CBT, psychedelic-assisted therapy, drug-assisted psychotherapy, or novel conversational technologies might all be considered, at a very basic level, and without judgment as to their fit, quality, or appropriateness, as forms of therapeutic intervention.[1]
2. Different therapeutic interventions have specific architectures, but they may still share a common high-level function.[2] It helps here to distinguish between function, structure, and values. The function concerns the objective and intended outcome of the intervention. At one level, this may refer to biological change — for example, the rewiring of synaptic connections. At another, it concerns the teleological aim: symptom reduction, improved agency, better integration, or some other positive outcome. The structure concerns how the intervention is built: what parts exist, how they are connected, and how they interact. The values concern the assumptions, goals, and steering logics embedded in the architecture and applied in its Realization.
3. Broadly speaking, a fad develops when the function is displaced. The means becomes the end in itself, and this may do more harm than good. Taking your IFS case as an example, the cure may become worse than the illness if the focus shifts away from the outcome of the therapeutic intervention and towards the “correct”, almost slavish application of the method. Similarly — but not in the same way — a therapeutic use of psychoactive substances may itself produce psychological or physical dependence, or other harms. In both cases one can observe a fault, but not necessarily the same kind of fault.
4. These functional faults differ from structural faults and value faults, and it is useful to distinguish them when thinking or speaking about therapy. A functional fault occurs when process replaces purpose. A structural fault occurs when the architecture, or its fit with the patient as substrate, cannot safely or effectively support the intended function. A value fault occurs when the intervention may function and the structure may hold, but the outcome is steered by embedded or applied values that distort it.
5. Not all technologies for therapeutic intervention are similarly effective in the sense that better outcomes are more likely than worse ones. In all cases, however, outcomes are strongly linked to the values embedded in the architecture and applied in the concrete Realization of the intervention. Human-mediated interventions may benefit greatly from the therapist’s ability to help the patient work towards a positive outcome, while avoiding methodological traps of the kind you describe, or psychological traps in which therapy drives the patient towards negative or even dangerous outcomes. Among other things, the therapist’s worldview and value framework will shape this. In a psychedelic-assisted therapy, by contrast, it may be the patient’s own deeply held values that become a strong organising force in the rewiring process. Contrast this with AI-, LLM-, or chatbot-based self-therapy, where people have been driven into self-harm or even suicide because the underlying model embeds different, conflicting, or particularly biased values that steer these exchanges.[3]
6. When looking at therapeutic interventions — the approach and its architecture — and therapy — the concrete and specific Realization of that intervention — it helps to distinguish between these fault lines when assessing risks and possible remedies. The relevant diagnostic questions are simple enough: what function is the intervention meant to serve, what structure does it rely on, what values steer its Realization, and for whom is that combination likely to help rather than harm?
[1]: To avoid any misreading, I would not count medical treatment, for example for depression or other clinical conditions, under this category in quite the same sense. And I'm not an expert here.
[2]: One way to look at this is through the architecture of the therapeutic intervention: its function, its structure, and its values. The function concerns the objective and intended outcome we seek to achieve through it. The structure concerns how the intervention is organised, what parts exist, and how they are connected. The values concern what is embedded in the design of the architecture and what is applied in its concrete Realization. While the high-level function may be similar across interventions, the structure varies greatly — conversations, psychedelics, chats — each with a different focus and operating logic. In IFS, for example, the structure centres on the “inner family system”. In psychedelic-assisted therapy, the structure centres more on specific substances and their effects on the body and brain. The often overlooked third element in this picture is the values embedded in the design and applied in the Realization of the architecture.
[3]: In a way, one could say that psychedelic-induced hallucinations are not entirely unlike AI or LLM hallucinations, in the sense that both can generate wild, divergent variations of thought, more or less released from the control mechanisms our brains — or a well-trained model — usually exhibit. One might look at hallucination as one way of opening new paths for rewiring, creating more options, but also more danger and risk, in comparison with more controlled forms of conversational exploration. There is also an argument that LLMs and humans are quite similar if we take seriously the idea that both strive for coherence and are not, in and of themselves, truth engines — see, for example, Simon Wardley’s formulation that “LLMs are coherence engines, not truth engines” (See e.g. swardley. (2026, January 8). LLMs are coherence engines, not truth engines. MapAI. https://medium.com/mapai/llms-are-coherence-engines-not-truth-engines-903f5209646f). But I digress.
This makes sense to me basis my own anecdotal experience.
I found there's basically two ways of feeling less bad: 1. Feel the Feeling 2. Stop thinking the negative thought
Sometimes there isn't a deeper feeling behind the negative thought, it's just a maladaptive pattern picked up during trauma. Sometimes it's actively toxic like the internalised voice of another person (in my case hypercritical mom).
For me, I found that negative thought patterns persisted even after I felt the feeling and changed the emotional belief. I spent time endlessly examining the thoughts, analysing them, speaking to them which didn't work. Now I figured that the pattern was built during a very traumatic time but I was no longer in that situation and I needn't do it. I'm only partially through but just dropping the stupid pattern is way more effective.
So yes, I'm completely convinced by your article. Every school of help isn't helpful in every situation, it does require a lot of self understanding to figure out when to let go.
I think viewing frameworks as metaphor is the most important point you're making here! Acolytes of any particular framework tend to bristle at this because they've invested so much in one particular metaphor, but personally I just try out various metaphors with clients and see what works for them. I don't really care what metaphor they latch onto as long as it gets results!
When it comes to "troll" parts, I tend to separate the underlying need from the impact. To me the underlying need almost always is something universal and human like safety, belonging, control, etc. You can validate and normalize the need unconsciously driving it while still being clear and direct about the harm of believing its narratives or using its strategies.
This makes sense to me basis my own anecdotal experience.
I found there's basically two ways of feeling less bad: 1. Feel the Feeling 2. Stop thinking the negative thought
Sometimes there isn't a deeper feeling behind the negative thought, it's just a maladaptive pattern picked up during trauma. Sometimes it's actively toxic like the internalised voice of another person (in my case hypercritical mom).
For me, I found that negative thought patterns persisted even after I felt the feeling and changed the emotional belief. I spent time endlessly examining the thoughts, analysing them, speaking to them which didn't work. Now I figured that the pattern was built during a very traumatic time but I was no longer in that situation and I needn't do it. I'm only partially through but just dropping the stupid pattern is way more effective.
So yes, I'm completely convinced by your article. Every school of help isn't helpful in every situation, it does require a lot of self understanding to figure out when to let go.
> The healthy response to such trolls is not to spend energy dialoguing with them; it’s to call them out, calmly and succinctly (e.g., “these aren’t real reasons, they’re just excuses”) and speak to the honest fear underneath (e.g., “I know it’s scary to put ourselves out there, but we’ve got this”), then get on with our life.
Do you view this as a kind of exposure therapy solution? I would think in many situations just saying “no you’re wrong” and/or “I’m going to ignore you now and move on with life” wouldn’t be sufficient to deal with the related feelings.
I’m assuming this is in a context where you’ve already done a lot of introspection to identify the underlying feelings, and have addressed them on their own terms rather than through the filter of this self-deceptive narrative.
Would love to talk EMDR with you on a podcast, and present some of the research including my own academic published article. Can we go live on here at a time that works for you? I’m a fan of your work.
Sure, sounds like fun! Want to DM me so we can find a time?
I had not heard of IFS before today, but it strikes me as a bit wacky and neo-Freudian in the way it partitions the mind.
But wasn't stoicism all the rage in Silicon Valley circles not long ago? Is IFS the thing that replaced it, or have there been other psychological fads in the interim? (Or was stoicism never as big a thing as it seemed to this outsider?)
Stoicism has definitely been popular in SV circles, but less as a branded therapy and more as a school of thought. It definitely shows up in how the tech scene frames and interprets therapies like CBT, IFS, and mindfulness/meditation, all of which are in principle compatible with Stoicism (though not synonymous).
This made me think. I hope you apologize.
Looking at therapeutic intervention in the widest and most fundamental sense as a means — a technology, method, or intervention — to rewire the synaptic connections of our brains towards a positive outcome opens some interesting lines of thought about these fads, and about legitimate methods likewise.
In essence, there are different technologies for therapeutic intervention — human, technical, and biological or chemical — designed on the basis of specific architectures. While these architectures may share a common high-level function, namely the rewiring of the brain towards a better outcome, they are built on very different structures: different parts, different connections, and different interactions, each with its own strengths, weaknesses, and fault lines. There is also an elephant in the room, namely the values embedded in the architecture and applied in its Realization.
While the high-level function may be similar, the outcome of a concrete therapy — that is, the specific Realization of a therapeutic intervention — will depend on the structure of the architecture itself, on the quality of its Realization, on the patient as substrate, and on the values that steer it in practice.
A fad is a specific fault in which the function of a therapeutic intervention shifts from “rewiring the brain towards a positive outcome” to “following the method”. In other words, the means becomes the end in itself. This differs from a structural fault, where the architecture, or its fit with the patient, is inadequate, and from a value fault, where harmful or distorted values applied in the concrete Realization drive the intervention towards a harmful outcome.
One way to assess therapeutic interventions is thus to ask whether a) their function still remains the rewiring of the brain towards a positive outcome, rather than the preservation of the method for its own sake, and b) what values, hidden or visible, are embedded in the architecture and applied in its concrete Realization.
---
1. Different therapeutic interventions may be capable of rewiring a brain towards better outcomes, and this may include human-, drug-, or even machine-mediated forms. For example, IFS, CBT, psychedelic-assisted therapy, drug-assisted psychotherapy, or novel conversational technologies might all be considered, at a very basic level, and without judgment as to their fit, quality, or appropriateness, as forms of therapeutic intervention.[1]
2. Different therapeutic interventions have specific architectures, but they may still share a common high-level function.[2] It helps here to distinguish between function, structure, and values. The function concerns the objective and intended outcome of the intervention. At one level, this may refer to biological change — for example, the rewiring of synaptic connections. At another, it concerns the teleological aim: symptom reduction, improved agency, better integration, or some other positive outcome. The structure concerns how the intervention is built: what parts exist, how they are connected, and how they interact. The values concern the assumptions, goals, and steering logics embedded in the architecture and applied in its Realization.
3. Broadly speaking, a fad develops when the function is displaced. The means becomes the end in itself, and this may do more harm than good. Taking your IFS case as an example, the cure may become worse than the illness if the focus shifts away from the outcome of the therapeutic intervention and towards the “correct”, almost slavish application of the method. Similarly — but not in the same way — a therapeutic use of psychoactive substances may itself produce psychological or physical dependence, or other harms. In both cases one can observe a fault, but not necessarily the same kind of fault.
4. These functional faults differ from structural faults and value faults, and it is useful to distinguish them when thinking or speaking about therapy. A functional fault occurs when process replaces purpose. A structural fault occurs when the architecture, or its fit with the patient as substrate, cannot safely or effectively support the intended function. A value fault occurs when the intervention may function and the structure may hold, but the outcome is steered by embedded or applied values that distort it.
5. Not all technologies for therapeutic intervention are similarly effective in the sense that better outcomes are more likely than worse ones. In all cases, however, outcomes are strongly linked to the values embedded in the architecture and applied in the concrete Realization of the intervention. Human-mediated interventions may benefit greatly from the therapist’s ability to help the patient work towards a positive outcome, while avoiding methodological traps of the kind you describe, or psychological traps in which therapy drives the patient towards negative or even dangerous outcomes. Among other things, the therapist’s worldview and value framework will shape this. In a psychedelic-assisted therapy, by contrast, it may be the patient’s own deeply held values that become a strong organising force in the rewiring process. Contrast this with AI-, LLM-, or chatbot-based self-therapy, where people have been driven into self-harm or even suicide because the underlying model embeds different, conflicting, or particularly biased values that steer these exchanges.[3]
6. When looking at therapeutic interventions — the approach and its architecture — and therapy — the concrete and specific Realization of that intervention — it helps to distinguish between these fault lines when assessing risks and possible remedies. The relevant diagnostic questions are simple enough: what function is the intervention meant to serve, what structure does it rely on, what values steer its Realization, and for whom is that combination likely to help rather than harm?
[1]: To avoid any misreading, I would not count medical treatment, for example for depression or other clinical conditions, under this category in quite the same sense. And I'm not an expert here.
[2]: One way to look at this is through the architecture of the therapeutic intervention: its function, its structure, and its values. The function concerns the objective and intended outcome we seek to achieve through it. The structure concerns how the intervention is organised, what parts exist, and how they are connected. The values concern what is embedded in the design of the architecture and what is applied in its concrete Realization. While the high-level function may be similar across interventions, the structure varies greatly — conversations, psychedelics, chats — each with a different focus and operating logic. In IFS, for example, the structure centres on the “inner family system”. In psychedelic-assisted therapy, the structure centres more on specific substances and their effects on the body and brain. The often overlooked third element in this picture is the values embedded in the design and applied in the Realization of the architecture.
[3]: In a way, one could say that psychedelic-induced hallucinations are not entirely unlike AI or LLM hallucinations, in the sense that both can generate wild, divergent variations of thought, more or less released from the control mechanisms our brains — or a well-trained model — usually exhibit. One might look at hallucination as one way of opening new paths for rewiring, creating more options, but also more danger and risk, in comparison with more controlled forms of conversational exploration. There is also an argument that LLMs and humans are quite similar if we take seriously the idea that both strive for coherence and are not, in and of themselves, truth engines — see, for example, Simon Wardley’s formulation that “LLMs are coherence engines, not truth engines” (See e.g. swardley. (2026, January 8). LLMs are coherence engines, not truth engines. MapAI. https://medium.com/mapai/llms-are-coherence-engines-not-truth-engines-903f5209646f). But I digress.
This makes sense to me basis my own anecdotal experience.
I found there's basically two ways of feeling less bad: 1. Feel the Feeling 2. Stop thinking the negative thought
Sometimes there isn't a deeper feeling behind the negative thought, it's just a maladaptive pattern picked up during trauma. Sometimes it's actively toxic like the internalised voice of another person (in my case hypercritical mom).
For me, I found that negative thought patterns persisted even after I felt the feeling and changed the emotional belief. I spent time endlessly examining the thoughts, analysing them, speaking to them which didn't work. Now I figured that the pattern was built during a very traumatic time but I was no longer in that situation and I needn't do it. I'm only partially through but just dropping the stupid pattern is way more effective.
So yes, I'm completely convinced by your article. Every school of help isn't helpful in every situation, it does require a lot of self understanding to figure out when to let go.
And those trolls are everywhere these days with the cause of their mental illnesses being mysticism of every type.