What a concept story is
A concept story explains one idea, like an algorithm, a process in the body or an argument, as a story. The concepts are the characters. Each part is one thing that happens to them or between them: a concept arrives, gets a property, is related to another, changes, or causes something.
The app reads one part, then waits. You build what you heard, then ask for the next part. The waiting is the point: you decide when you’re ready, so nothing goes by before you’ve got it.
Building a part in thoughtfeel
When a part names a concept, bring it up in thoughtfeel: imagine it directly as a concept, the way you can imagine the economy, not as a picture and not as words.
Say the new thing out loud while you hold the concept, and notice it change. You can tell when a concept has a new property, the way you can tell a friend has had a haircut.
When a part relates two concepts, bring up both and say the relation out loud while you hold them. Each concept is one thing you’d recognize: a dog and a cat are two concepts, linked; a white cat with a dog’s tail is one.
The full method, with three complete walkthroughs (an algorithm, a process in biology, an economics argument): How to Learn Anything Complicated by Building a Concept Story (58 minutes).
Controls
- Your voice
- “Go” (or “next”) plays the next part, “repeat” (or “again”) plays the part again, and “back” goes back one. Say the word on its own, after the part has finished. Everyday words like “okay”, “yeah” and “so” don’t count, so you can think out loud freely.
- AirPods
- Press the stem twice for the next part, three times to hear the part again. Three presses twice in a row go back a part. One press pauses.
- Lock screen and Control Center
- The next button plays the next part. The previous button plays the part again, and pressing it twice in a row goes back a part. The pause button pauses.
- Siri
- “Siri, next track” and “Siri, previous track”.
- The screen
- The Back, Repeat and Next buttons, and the list of all parts: tap any part to jump to it.
Listening with your phone locked
iPhone: keep the story open in a Safari tab (not saved to the home screen), press Start, then lock the phone and put it in your pocket. The story keeps playing and the microphone keeps listening.
Two low beeps mean the phone stopped listening. Unlock it and the microphone comes back on. Meanwhile your AirPods and the lock screen still work.
If your phone stops the microphone when it locks (some Android phones do), use Pocket mode: the screen stays on but black and ignores touches. Hold it for a second to leave.
No signal on your walk? Open your stories once while you have signal. Each story’s audio comes down to your phone, and then it plays offline. So do voice commands, after their first use.
Making stories
In New story, copy the prompt, paste it into Claude or ChatGPT, and add what you want to learn at the end: a topic, an article, or your notes. Paste the reply back into the app. A story usually has 20 to 80 parts.
The audio is made for you, usually within a few minutes, and you can close the page meanwhile. Each account can make audio for 40,000 characters a day, which is about four stories.
One story per idea works best. If a story has a mistake, ask the chat to fix it and paste the new version as a new story.
Other languages
A story can be in English, Spanish, French, Italian, Portuguese or Hindi. Ask the chat in your language and the story comes out in it. When you paste it, the app shows the language it found under Read in, where you can change it.
The story is read in a voice for its language, and the voice commands are words in that language:
- Español
- “vamos” for the next part, “repite” (or “otra vez”) to hear it again, “atrás” to go back.
- Français
- “allez” for the next part, “répète” (or “encore”) to hear it again, “retour” to go back.
- Italiano
- “prossimo” for the next part, “ripeti” (or “ancora”) to hear it again, “indietro” to go back.
- Português
- “vai” for the next part, “repete” (or “de novo”) to hear it again, “volta” to go back.
- हिन्दी
- “चलो” for the next part, “दोबारा” (or “फिर से”) to hear it again, “पीछे” to go back.
The first story in a new language downloads that language’s voice commands once (about 40 MB). The rest of the app stays in English.
Troubleshooting
“go” isn’t heard. Check that Voice commands is on, and say the word by itself after the part finishes, a little louder than your thinking out loud. Wind on the microphone makes it harder; earbuds help.
The microphone was blocked. On an iPhone, tap aA in Safari’s address bar, then Website Settings, and set Microphone to Allow. Or go to Settings, then Apps, then Safari, then Microphone.
Voice commands take a while to start. The first time, the phone downloads the speech recognizer (41 MB). After that it’s kept, and works offline.
The story stopped while the phone was locked. Make sure the page was open in Safari itself, and that no other app played audio meanwhile. Unlock, then press Resume.
Privacy
What’s kept: your username, your password in scrambled form (never the password itself), your stories, their audio, and where you are in each story.
Who sees your stories: only you, signed in. Their audio is made on a private server run by the thoughtfeel team. Please don’t paste anything confidential.
Your voice: voice commands are recognized on your phone. Nothing you say is recorded or sent anywhere.
Leaving: you can delete your account, with all its stories, in Account.