Cue for rationalising: I feel like I'm 'rocking back' or 'rolling back down the bowl'. Hmm. Let me clarify.

A ball in a bowl will roll around when the bowl is shaken, but it goes up the side, reaches a zenith, and rolls back down. Similar for trying to scale a steep hill at a run; you go up, reach a zenith, come back down. And again for balance: you wobble in a direction, find a point of gaining balance, and return to center.

The cue is feeling that in a conversation, discussion, or argument. We sort of roll around discussing things, something comes up that I rationalise away, and it feels like I've regained my balance: the conversation tipped towards something, wobbled a bit, and then rocked back to center. Often it's in the form of reaching that zenith as a lull in the conversation, and I come in with "[reason], so we don't need to worry about that", where [reason] is rationalised.