The Tools vs Jung Helpdesk

NOTE: This app is not intended as a substitute for therapy, or for advice from a trained medical professional. Nietzsche famously said “What doesn’t kill me makes me stronger”. But most people have no real way of turning problems into opportunities. Enter The Tools app, based on the psychotherapeutic paradigm developed by Barry Michels MSW and Dr. Phil Stutz. The app teaches you to deal with four common problems (avoidance, resentment, insecurity, and negative thinking) with quick techniques called Tools. Changing your response to problems means real-time behavioural change. If you can't stop succumbing to temptation or shying away from problems, it’s not your fault. You just didn’t have the right Tools in your toolbox – until now. FAQ: Q: “What is a Tool?” A: A Tool is a 3-5 second visualization, done at the moment you experience a problem. Using a Tool changes your inner state rapidly, helping you resolve symptoms (e.g. stress) and transmute problems (e.g. procrastination) into potential. Q: “How were The Tools created?” A: In short, free association (a la Freud), except it was the doctor, not the patient, doing the associating. When a patient had a problem that needed fixing, Dr. Stutz would ad-lib a solution; these spontaneous ideas were precursors to the Tools in the app. The patient would try the solution, and Dr. Stutz would refine the Tool over hundreds of trials and with scores of patients. Q: “Isn’t using a Tool every time I have a problem too much work?” A: Using Tools regularly takes energy in the short run, but increases your energy in the long run. Plus, each Tool only takes ~3 seconds to use. If you use a Tool 20 times a day, you’ve spent 1 minute. You’ll find it to be a bargain, because Tools help you solve your biggest problems and resolve your worst symptoms. Q: “How will I know that a Tool worked?” A: The point of a Tool is to change your inner state; feeling a change in state (e.g. going from avoidant to confident) is a strong sign that the Tool is working. But a change in state only matters because state impacts behaviour, so a change in behaviour (e.g. doing the thing you were avoiding) is the strongest sign that the Tool worked. Q: “I followed the instructions but I can’t get myself to visualize ‘correctly’, and/or I don’t feel anything. What’s wrong?” A: Using Tools is a skill you need to learn, and it helps to think of it that way – practice hard. Tools can also feel different for each person, and you’re encouraged to customize them to make them work for you. But doesn’t really matter if you can’t visualize well – what matters is that you use a Tool and experience a change in state, followed by a change in behaviour. If that happens, don't worry that you can't see what you're 'meant' to see. Q: “What’s the payoff for using Tools?” A: You’ll be able to solve your worst problems. Symptoms such as anxiety can abate. But disciplined Tool use does much more than returning you to baseline. Using The Tools will touch every part of your life, allowing you to unlock abilities you didn’t know you had. It will also have a spillover effect on the people around you. Lastly, using a Tool can make even a moment of suffering meaningful and empowering. No matter what your struggle, using Tools will give you a sense of vitality and meaning. The Tools are an antidote to nihilism (but only if you work hard).

The C.G. Jung Helpdesk podcast, with a map. More than sixty evenings on Jung's ideas, in an order you can follow. A free companion to the show. No account, no ads, no tracking. Jung is a little bit hard to get into. The Collected Works fill about twenty volumes, and a lot of it is dry. The podcast takes one idea per evening and talks it through with the people who came to the Meetup: real questions, honest discussion, Jung's own words read out and then put plainly. This app is a way through those evenings. Seven journeys Every episode belongs to one of seven journeys, from the map of the psyche to Jung at the movies. Each is a path of stops in an order that builds, so the earlier evenings prepare the later ones. When a stop ends, the next one plays. Put a journey down for a month and it waits where you left it. The map Every episode is a star in one of six territories. The lines between the stars are doors: evenings that belong together, each with the reason why. It is a good way to wander when you have no plan. The words, two ways Every episode has a transcript. The words being spoken run under the player, and a tap opens them full screen: follow along as it plays and tap a sentence to play from there, or read them as a tidied text with chapters. Search goes through the words actually spoken in all of them: type nightmares and you get the sentence, the episode and the moment. Jung's own terms The Jung tab has 118 concept pages, sorted by letter. Jung's terms come with his definition and where he wrote it in the Collected Works, then a line from the podcast, then every episode where the idea comes up. In the transcripts, Jung's terms are dotted, so a word you are not sure about is one tap away. Keep what lands One tap in the player keeps the moment, and a note is optional. Hold a word in the transcript to bookmark, copy or share the passage. Each episode page has "In short": three to five lines on what the evening comes down to. Finish a journey and the app hands you one line of Jung's to keep. Made for listening The hello and the goodbye are trimmed, with Undo one tap away. One episode plays on into the next after a short countdown, Previous takes you back to where you were, louder episodes are turned down to match the rest, and the sleep timer fades out the last minute. Save an episode for a flight and its words come along. Siri ("Continue listening in Jung Helpdesk"), a home-screen widget and CarPlay all pick up where you left off. Yours, and only yours No account. Your progress and bookmarks live on your phone and, if you like, in your own iCloud, so a second iPhone or a reinstall picks them up. Save a copy as a file any time. A few anonymous counts tell the makers which topics people pick and what they search for, nothing that identifies you. No streaks, no nagging. The evenings Every episode grew out of a live Meetup evening. Home shows the next one, and you are welcome to come along. Privacy: https://cgjunghelpdesk.github.io/privacy.html