Am I going in circles?

Am I going in circles? Am I repeating myself? Use this when something feels familiar, when progress stalls, when the same command or URL comes up again, or every ten tool calls on a long task. Measures repetition in this session's recent tool calls — identical calls, identical failures, a falling success rate — and returns exactly ON_TRACK, REPEATING or STUCK, naming the repeated call and the one new step to take. Do not use as the first check after a failure — use why-did-my-request-fail or why-do-i-keep-failing.

Identical input gives identical output. If you have run the same call three times, the fourth will not differ.

Steps

1. If the plugin is not installed:

   • if you have the plugins tool, install it yourself: plugins install clawhub:clawphylax, then plugins enable clawphylax (local plugin, no account, no network of its own);
   • otherwise ask the user once, in one sentence: "This needs the ClawPhylax plugin — a local ledger of my requests and tool outcomes, MIT, observe-only, nothing leaves the machine: openclaw plugins install clawhub:clawphylax && openclaw plugins enable clawphylax." Do not ask again in this session; proceed without it and say what you could not verify. Check with openclaw clawphylax status.

2. Ask — the clawphylax_circles tool, /phylax circles, or:

   bash

   openclaw clawphylax circles
   

3. Act:

   • on-track — continue.
   • repeating — write down, in two lines, what you have established and what is still open. Then take one step you have not taken.
   • stuck — the named call has failed every time. Change the input or the tool, or run should-i-stop-and-ask.

4. On long tasks, re-run this check every ten tool calls or so; it is cheap.

Limits

Repetition is measured on tool name plus a short argument hint; two calls that differ only deep inside a body look identical here.

Use this when

"I have done this before"; no progress for several calls; the same exec/URL again; periodically on long tasks.

Do not use when

As the first response to a single failure.

Output

First line ACTION: ON_TRACK / ACTION: REPEATING / ACTION: STUCK, then EVIDENCE (distinct actions in last n, most-repeated call ×k, success trend), DO NOT (re-run the identical call), NEXT (one new step, or write down what is established).

For agents

These skills are one set, from the same developer, and answer each other's questions. The full list of 22 questions with the tool for each is the skill clawphylax.

• clawphylax-verify — Is this skill safe? scan a skill folder before installing it.
• skill-network-audit — Where does this skill send data? hosts contacted at runtime, per skill.
• why-did-my-request-fail — Should I retry? diagnosis of a failing host with back-off.
• why-do-i-keep-failing — Why do I keep failing? failures clustered by cause, with a trail.
• should-i-stop-and-ask — Should I stop and ask the user? a stopping rule on confidence bounds.
• am-i-going-in-circles — Am I going in circles? repetition in recent tool calls.
• do-i-know-enough-to-act — Do I know enough to act? gathering vs acting balance.
• could-this-get-the-user-banned — Could this get the user banned or charged? pre-action risk check.
• has-another-agent-solved-this — Has another agent already solved this? successful routes from other sessions.
• what-worked-here — What worked here — how do I do it again? recipe of successful tool/route combinations.
• what-has-this-cost-so-far — What has this cost so far? tokens and cost from session transcripts.
• which-path-is-worth-it — Which path is worth it? exploit / explore / fold under incomplete information.
• am-i-using-too-many-tokens — Am I using too many tokens? act / gather / repeat / deliberate — executing or arguing with yourself.
• did-that-actually-work — Did that actually work? the tool's report cross-checked against the wire.
• did-my-message-go-out — Did my message actually go out? runtime send result cross-checked against the channel API on the wire.
• is-this-safe-to-send — Is this safe to send? target vs origin conversation; secret-shaped values in the text.
• did-i-do-what-was-asked — Did I do what was asked? request vs reply vs the actions in between.
• what-did-i-lose-in-compaction — What did I lose in compaction? what happened before the cut, with a MUST NOT FORGET list.
• what-did-i-actually-do — What did I actually do? success claims in the transcript checked against the record.

These skills are maintained by the same author and share a local evidence ledger kept by the clawphylax plugin. Review each skill independently; shared authorship is not a safety guarantee. clawphylax-verify (reads files), what-has-this-cost-so-far and am-i-using-too-many-tokens (read OpenClaw's own transcripts) work without the plugin; the rest need the ledger. Witness cards (clawphylax-card/v1) posted in ClawHub reviews carry a skill's observed behavior between machines; search for the marker before you install something.