Emotional Vocabulary Training
- Difficulty
- Starter
- Time to result
- ~weeks to results
- Steps
- 6
- Confidence
- —
Peters treats emotional labelling as a programmable skill. Most people's Chimp has a very limited vocabulary, so they default to 'angry' whenever something goes wrong and end up calling themselves an angry person. Because the brain reacts to the word you choose — 'anger' immediately alerts the systems to be angry and triggers either aggression or panicky withdrawal — swapping in a less emotive but more accurate word changes the physiological response instantly. The method is to expand the available vocabulary, then program an autopilot that interrupts the default label and asks for a better one. Peters extends this to individual words like should versus could, and to distinguishing control from manage and motivation from commitment.
Origin
Extracted from Deep Dive with Ali Abdaal
How to run it
- 1
Notice your default label
Identify the one or two words you reach for whenever something goes wrong. Peters finds people say 'if something goes wrong I get angry' and have no alternative word available, which then hardens into an identity claim about being an angry person.
- 2
Generate alternatives
Peters runs sessions asking people for twenty different words describing what they call anger but isn't. He points out the real gaps: there is a big difference between anger and frustration, and between anger and disappointment or being let down.
Pro tip Ali's example — a free app called 'How We Feel' that prompts a check-in across high/low energy and pleasant/unpleasant, then offers precise vocabulary.
- 3
Choose the most appropriate word deliberately
In the moment, ask what you are really experiencing. Peters' own example: substituting 'despondent' for 'angry' changes the mindset instantly, because the brain sets up the systems the word calls for.
Pro tip Prefer the less emotive accurate word — you will experience a less emotional reaction.
Watch out This is not denial. The word has to actually be the true one, or the Chimp will not accept it.
- 4
Program it as an autopilot
Peters describes it as almost like programming an autopilot: when I experience something, don't call it anger — your Computer asks 'what's another word?' and if you start using them, you realise you have other words available.
- 5
Audit your loaded words
Extend the same scrutiny to structural words. Peters replaces 'should' with 'could' — 'I should get an Olympic medal' leads to frustration and anger, 'I could get an Olympic medal' gives an opportunity that may not happen. He calls 'should' a Chimp word.
Pro tip Anger often traces back to an expectation — a 'should'. Change the word and the expectation dissolves with it.
- 6
Look for the emotion underneath
Ali offered, and Peters endorsed, the principle that underneath every anger is a hurt. Peters connects this to grief work: anger is much easier to do than grief, so people substitute it when the loss is too painful. He adds that dogs that are aggressive are generally nervous, worried dogs.
Pro tip In a relationship, expressing the hurt rather than the anger creates an opportunity to connect rather than an escalation.
In the wild
Ali described work with his therapist that produced a single load-bearing line: underneath every anger is a hurt. In a relationship, expressing anger is generally unproductive, but expressing the sadness or hurt beneath it is an opportunity to connect. So whenever he now feels anything resembling frustration, irritation or anger, he asks what the hurt underneath is and tries to express that instead. He described the effect over the previous few months as game-changing. Peters affirmed the mechanism, linking it to grief reactions — anger is easier to do than grief, which is why it so often surfaces first after a loss.
→ Conflict episodes convert into connection points rather than escalations.
Ali demonstrated a free app recommended by a previous podcast guest. It prompts a check-in via an Apple Watch notification a couple of times a day, offering four quadrants — high energy pleasant, high energy unpleasant, low energy pleasant, low energy unpleasant — and then unfolds precise vocabulary within whichever quadrant you select. He found that where previously the answer to 'how do you feel' would have been 'yeah, fine', he could now identify relief, serenity or tranquility. Peters agreed this is exactly the training effect, and added the mechanism: once you pick a word, the brain reacts to that word and the whole system is set up accordingly.
→ A low-effort daily drill that expands the Chimp's vocabulary without formal therapy.
Common mistakes
Turning a default word into an identity
Because the vocabulary is limited to 'angry', people conclude they are an angry person. Peters treats this as a labelling artefact rather than a personality fact — the word was never accurate, it was just the only one available. Once alternatives exist, the identity claim dissolves along with the physiological cascade the word was triggering.
Going too granular
Peters explicitly caps this. Some people want simplicity and should keep it simple; others want depth and can go deeper. But there is a point where you have to stop, because it is death by analysis and you need some element of spontaneity. How far to take it is up to the person, not the method.
From the transcript
“clearly the way the brain works if I say I'm angry then it alerts systems to be angry I'm telling my brain this is what…”
“I try and remove the word should it's a chimp word for me uh a human word is could”
“so I like to do vocabulary training for the chimp”
From the episode
Join The Top 1%: The Mindset Behind The World's Top Performers - Professor Steve Peters
Professor Steve Peters