What Is Too Hard Pile? A Practice Ground for Critical Thinking

Too Hard Pile is a website for practicing critical thinking on realistic decisions instead of reading about it. It offers 13 mental models, 1,300 practice drills, and a decision journal that follows up on your calls weeks later. A free account includes 6 drills, 5 journal entries, and the full Toolbox, with no card required and no time limit. It suits anyone who wants to train judgment on hard, high-stakes-style choices in about five minutes a day.

What it actually is

The site's own framing is blunt: "Reading about thinking doesn't make you think better." Instead of handing you a list of biases to memorize, it gives you a decision that is genuinely hard and won't move forward until you commit to an answer.

The core loop is:

• Pick a model — Inversion, incentives, second-order effects, or another from the set.
• Drill it — Short, real scenarios where you answer first, before seeing anything.
• Let it go automatic — You rate yourself, the drill returns on a schedule, and eventually you don't need the prompt.

The library covers 13 mental models and 1,300 practice drills, including inversion, first principles, incentives, base rates, and margin of safety.

Why the "answer first" design matters

Three design choices distinguish it from reading a book or article:

1. You do it, you don't read it. Every other resource tends to hand you theory; this hands you a call you have to make.
2. Commit before you peek. You answer before the drill reveals anything. The struggle is treated as the teaching mechanism.
3. It keeps score honestly. The best decision makers write the call down before they know how it ends, then check back. Almost nobody does the second part — this makes you.

The decision journal

Drills train the tools. The journal is what tells you whether they're working, because it's the only part that keeps score.

You write down the decision, what you predict happens, and how sure you are. Weeks later, it comes back and asks whether you were right. That follow-up is the honest bit most people skip.

Who it's for

The scenarios are framed around decisions where getting it wrong costs years, relationships, or the life you could have had — where to invest, whether to leave a job, who to build a life with, when to walk away. If you want structured reps on judgment rather than more theory, this is the intended use.

What the free account includes

You can also try a drill without signing up at all.

Getting started

1. Open the site and try a drill with no signup.
2. Create a free account to unlock the 6 drills and 5 journal entries.
3. Pick one model that matches a decision you're facing this week.
4. Answer before revealing anything, then rate yourself.
5. Write one real decision into the journal with your prediction and confidence level.
6. Come back when it resurfaces and check whether you were right.

The site lists a Pricing page for paid tiers, but the free tier is the natural starting point for testing whether the drill-and-journal loop fits how you want to train.