The Method
We're building a visual language for the mind. Learn how pattern mapping works and why seeing your loops changes everything.
Patterns Aren't Ideas. They're Paths.
For decades, we've been told to think our way out of bad patterns. Journal more. Talk it through. Understand your triggers intellectually.
It doesn't work.
You've walked these routes so many times there's a groove in the ground. The procrastination loop. The people-pleasing spiral. The anxiety circuit that fires before you even know why.
You can't outsmart a path your nervous system has automated.
You have to see it first.
Not as words in a journal. Not as insights from a podcast. As a map—the actual structure of what's happening, from trigger to thought to emotion to behavior and back again.
That's what Unloop does. A visual language for behavioral loops. A way to externalize what's been invisible—so you can finally see the pattern you've been living inside.
The Belief
You can't take a different route if you can't see where you are.
Most people aren't stuck because they lack willpower. They're stuck because they can only see fragments—the behavior ("I procrastinated again"), the shame ("Why do I keep doing this?"), the resolve ("Tomorrow will be different").
They can't see the system. The trigger that started it. The thought that escalated it. The emotion underneath. The way the behavior loops back to create conditions for it to happen again.
When you see the full loop, everything shifts. The pattern stops being a personal failure and starts being a structure. Structures can be understood. Understood structures can be changed.
Unloop makes the invisible visible.
The Visual Vocabulary
We created 8 node types—a simple, universal language for mapping any behavioral pattern.
These aren't clinical diagnoses. They're not borrowed from any single therapy framework. They're building blocks. Drag them onto a canvas, connect them, and your pattern starts to reveal itself.
The Visual Vocabulary
A simple, universal language for mapping any behavioral pattern
Trigger
The spark. The moment before the moment.
What sets the pattern in motion. Sometimes external (a Slack message, a look from someone), sometimes internal (a thought, a sensation). The trigger isn't the problem—it's the starting point.
Thought
The story your mind tells.
The interpretation layer. What meaning you make of the trigger. Often automatic, often invisible, often inherited from somewhere you don't remember.
Emotion
The signal underneath.
What you actually feel—not what you think you should feel. Anxiety, shame, anger, fear, relief. The body's data, often ignored.
Behavior
The visible action.
What you actually do. The procrastination. The snapping. The scrolling. The overworking. The avoidance. This is usually what people try to change directly. It rarely works.
Physical
The body's version.
Tension in your shoulders. Tightness in your chest. The fatigue, the restlessness, the heaviness. Your body knows things before your mind admits them.
Experiment
The hypothesis.
A different move to try. Not a resolution, not a fix—an experiment. What if you tried X when Y happens? Small, testable, reversible.
Stuck Point
Where you get lost.
The place where you can't see clearly. The fog. The "I don't know why I do this." Stuck points aren't failures—they're data. They show you where the interesting stuff is hiding.
Insight
The click.
The moment something lands. The "oh." These can't be forced. They emerge when you've mapped enough, sat with it enough, looked at it from enough angles.
Why "Loop"?
Because patterns aren't linear. They circle back.
Behavior creates conditions for the trigger to happen again
Trigger → Thought → Emotion → Behavior → (back to Trigger)
The behavior creates conditions for the trigger to happen again.
You avoid the hard conversation (behavior) → which creates more tension (trigger) → which creates more anxiety (emotion) → which creates more avoidance (behavior).
The thought feeds the emotion which drives the behavior which reinforces the thought.
When you see the loop, you see why it's sticky. It's not weak willpower. It's elegant, self-reinforcing design. Your nervous system is doing exactly what it learned to do.
The good news? Loops have structure. And structure has leverage points. Places where a small intervention can shift the whole system.
What We're Not
Let's be clear about what Unloop isn't.
We're not a therapy replacement.
Therapy is powerful. Therapists are trained. If you're in crisis, struggling with trauma, or need clinical support—please work with a professional. Unloop is a tool that can work alongside therapy, not instead of it.
We're not a single framework.
We're not IFS (Internal Family Systems), CBT (Cognitive Behavioral Therapy), ACT (Acceptance and Commitment Therapy), or any one modality. Those frameworks are useful—therapists use them well.
Unloop is framework-agnostic. We map patterns, not "parts." Sequences, not sub-personalities. Paths, not diagnoses. Our language is structural, not clinical.
We're not AI that tells you what to do.
Our AI doesn't prescribe solutions. It helps you see—surfaces connections you might miss, asks questions that open things up, notices what you've noticed.
But the insight is yours. The experiment is yours. The meaning is yours.
We scaffold self-discovery. We don't hand you answers.
What We Are: Generative Mental Health
We've told you what we're not. Here's what we are—and why it matters.
The Landscape Right Now
Look at the mental health tools available today. They fall into three categories:
Consumptive. Calm gives you sleep stories. Headspace offers guided meditations. Therapy apps provide CBT worksheets. You consume content someone else created and hope it helps.
Tracking. Daylio asks you to log your mood. Bearable tracks your symptoms. Habit apps let you check boxes. You feed data into a system and wait for patterns to emerge.
Extractive. AI therapy bots ask you to share your problems, then analyze you. You provide the raw material. The algorithm provides the insight.
What's Missing
None of them have you build something.
None of them leave you with an artifact that's yours.
None of them let you create understanding rather than consume it.
Generative Mental Health
Unloop is different. It's generative.
You don't consume content. You create your map. You don't track moods. You map structures. You don't get analyzed. You discover your own loops. You don't follow a program. You design your own experiments.
The output is yours. You made it. It's a thing that exists because of you.
Why Generative Matters
This isn't just a product distinction. It's psychologically different.
Self-efficacy. Building something creates a sense of agency. You're not a patient receiving treatment—you're a maker constructing understanding.
Externalization. Seeing your pattern outside your head reduces fusion with it. The loop stops being "who you are" and becomes "something you can see."
Ownership. You're more committed to insights you generated than ones you were told. The meaning sticks because you made the connection.
Integration. Creating makes knowledge land differently than consuming. You don't just understand your pattern—you've built your understanding of it.
What This Looks Like in Practice
You map your pattern. The system generates personalized experiments based on what you built.
You design an intervention. The system generates check-ins that meet you in your actual life.
You discover a stuck point. The system generates questions that open it up—questions learned from others who got unstuck.
You build the map. We generate the tools.
The insight is yours because you made it. The interventions are yours because they came from your map.
This is generative mental health. We're not the only ones who will build for it. But we're building it first.
What We Believe
1. Patterns are structural, not moral.
You're not broken. You're not weak. You're not "self-sabotaging."
You're running a loop that made sense once. Maybe it protected you. Maybe it was the only option. Maybe you learned it before you could question it.
Now it doesn't serve you. That's not a character flaw. That's a pattern that needs updating.
2. Visual thinking unlocks what words can't.
Some people process through writing. Some through talking. Some through movement.
And some people need to see the pattern laid out in front of them—nodes connected by lines, loops visible, structure exposed.
If traditional journaling never clicked for you, you might be a visual thinker. Welcome home.
3. Community wisdom beats AI prescriptions.
The best insights don't come from algorithms telling you what to do. They come from people who've been there.
"Oh, I had that exact loop. Here's what I tried."
AI can surface patterns. Humans provide meaning. We're building for both.
4. Small experiments beat big resolutions.
"I'm going to completely change my life" → fails by February.
"I'm going to try one small thing this week and see what I notice" → actually works.
Change happens through tiny tests, not dramatic overhauls. Run an experiment. Observe. Adjust. Repeat.
The Vision
A world where "I don't know why I keep doing this" has an answer.
Not a clinical diagnosis. Not a label. An actual map showing the loop—visible, tangible, workable.
A world where anyone can see their own patterns clearly.
Not just people who can afford years of therapy. Not just people who are "good at introspection." Anyone with a stuck pattern and a willingness to look.
A world where we have a shared language for this stuff.
Right now, we're all fumbling with vague words. "I have anxiety." "I self-sabotage." "I'm just like this."
Imagine if you could say: "I have a shame-avoidance loop that triggers when I anticipate judgment, runs through perfectionism, and exits through procrastination—and I've been experimenting with interrupting it at the physical node."
That's precision. That's power. That's what a visual language gives you.
The Invitation
You don't need to understand everything about yourself to start.
You don't need a diagnosis. You don't need to have done therapy. You don't need to be "good at feelings."
You just need one pattern that's been bugging you. One loop you've tried to break and couldn't. One thing you keep doing even though you know better.
Start there.
Map it. Connect the pieces. Find the loop.
Then run an experiment. See what shifts.
Ready to see your patterns?
Start mapping. Find the loop. Experiment your way forward.
Ready to see your patterns?
Start mapping. Find the loop. Experiment your way forward.