Why Ageben
What Ageben is for, what it looks like, a tour of the features that serve its aims, and what it does not claim.
On this page
Purpose
Ageben builds psychological concepts and self-improvement techniques into its vocabulary and grammar, so that using the language nudges you toward healthier habits of thought.
Its psychological goals are three outcomes: compassion, rationality, and empowerment. Psychological features describes each one with the features that serve it. Ageben also has structural goals: every sentence has exactly one reading, the sounds are easy to sing, and a few patterns do many jobs.
Ageben is not therapy, and its effects are a design intent, not a proven result. The language is in beta (limits).
Ageben at a glance
Here is a common ruminating thought in English: I failed. I'm no good at this, and I never will be. English lets you say all of that without checking any of it. Here is how the same thought might come out in Ageben:
zoguvom thaber guwathum. zuwen veveroxem./zo̞.ɡʉ.vo̞m ðä.be̞ɹ ɡʉ.wä.ðʉm. zʉ.we̞n ve̞.ve̞.ɹe̞.ʒo̞m/
z-failure | th-INTUITION.weak | g-competence-unmet-modifiable . z-speaker | v-triumph-unable-modifiable
"It's only a faint hunch, but my failure set back my competence, in a way that can change. I can't succeed yet."
That is five words, and three of them make you choose something English lets you skip. Each choice is a question about the thought itself, and answering it honestly is what turned never into yet:
thabersays how you know: a gut sense, and only a faint one. Other words say you saw it, remember it, worked it out from clues, or were told, and other endings say the hunch is strong. Said once, it covers the next sentence too (evidentiality).guwathumnames what the failure costs: competence, one of the sakes (things that are good for a person). Its ending says the cost can change with effort or circumstance; other endings say it is lasting, or only for now. Other sakes, such as relatedness or purpose, name a different cost, and swapping the unmet vowel for the met one names a gain instead. The sake word also makes the failure yours, with no separate word for my.veveroxemis can't succeed, but only yet: it may still change. Other vowels say right now (you usually can) or never (ability).
Ageben does not force the gentler answer. You can still say I can never succeed (zuwen veveroxum.), call the hunch strong, or call the cost lasting, and sometimes that is true. But English I'll never be good at this does not ask how you know or how lasting it is, so the harsh version slips by unchecked. In Ageben you cannot say can't without choosing among right now, yet, and never, and that one moment of choosing is often enough to notice that yet is the honest answer.
The first letter of each word tells you its role in the sentence: /z/ the subject, /ɡ/ what the subject is, /v/ the verb, /th/ what is in your mind. Because the roles live on the letters, word order is free, and every sentence still has exactly one reading. Inspect opens with this sentence loaded, so you can click through each word.
Try it in English first
You don't have to learn the whole language to start using these ideas. Claritish is a set of short lessons on dropping single Ageben words into everyday English. For example, English I'm anxious can mean anxious right now or an anxious person. I'm anxious-tha says it is this stretch, not who you are, where English would need a whole extra clause. Other lessons cover how you know, how far a label reaches, thanks that name the need, and more.
Every word Claritish teaches is already real Ageben, so nothing you learn there is wasted. Start with the Claritish introduction.
Psychological features
This section tours how the three aims show up in vocabulary and grammar. Under each aim, the features are grouped by the thinking trap they answer. Each feature says what English blurs, what Ageben marks instead, and what that helps you do; the linked pages teach the actual forms. A group's name is the habit its features push against, not a bias they have been shown to cure (limits).
Compassion
Support self-acceptance and acceptance of others, and make judgments visible when they arise.
Praise can name the sake a person’s work actually served instead of stopping at a vague good. A flash of anger or anxiety can be described by the unmet sake behind it, how strongly it stirs, and where it sits, so the feeling points at something you can act on rather than a blank label. Can’t comes in kinds (temporary, modifiable, or irreversible), so a block never has to read as who someone is. And because says what made something happen without claiming anyone is to blame, unless you choose to say so.
Treating a moment as identity
A hard moment, a label, or a past pattern hardens into a fixed fact about a person. The features here let you say how far a label reaches, how permanent a block is, and which past events still count today, so a bad stretch stays a stretch.
How far a label reaches
English Alazun is angry can mean one outburst or the kind of person Alazun is. One act slides into a verdict on someone's nature, and a name for a problem (lazy, anxious) starts to sound like its cause.
Label scope lets any label say what kind of claim it makes: about this stretch of doing, about a practiced role, about one relationship (a stranger to Azozon), or about a type that follows the person across scenes.
Marking a label's reach helps you describe what happened without turning it into a verdict on who someone is, yourself included.
In English: Claritish: Labels.
Can, can’t, and won’t
English I can’t can mean a temporary block, a lasting inability, or a choice not to.
Ability says whether someone can do an activity or have a property, and for can’t, which kind: not right now, not now but it may change, or not ever. Choosing not to is an ordinary won’t, not a kind of can’t.
Saying can’t right now or may yet change instead of impossible helps you stop treating a temporary block as a fixed incapability.
What still counts, and what used to be true
English has done and used to mix two questions: when something happened, and whether it still matters now. Used to also leaves open whether a habit still describes you today.
RESIDUE says the result of a past event still counts now (a debt still unpaid, a door still shut). FORMER says a pattern was usual but you are not claiming it as how things are now (cue: usual weather vs today’s report). Neither word is a past tense: each can combine with what you see now, what you remember, or a forecast.
Because residue is marked, an event you mention without it counts as closed, so carrying a past event forward is a choice rather than a default, and rumination stays optional. Marking a former pattern lets I was always this way describe the past without claiming the present. As-of names the moment that leftovers and patterns are measured from (as of Friday), so you can weigh an old situation by its own date instead of against today. For English if they had … they would, the as-of moment is a placeholder you do not claim is real, which is not the same as pretending.
Treating a feeling as a label
A feeling, a thanks, or a should arrives as a single opaque label, so what is met or unmet and what would help stay out of view. Sakes name what is at stake, and emotions are built from them.
Sakes, gratitude, and oughts
English often blurs I want, I need, I should, and this is good for me, so gratitude, motive, and ought run together.
Ageben’s sakes are a fixed list of things that are good for a person (autonomy, competence, understanding, purpose, relatedness, beneficence, pleasure, physical, or unspecified), and each sake word also says how you stand toward that sake:
| Stance | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Met | This serves the sake, including whether the payoff lasts or is only for now (gratitude / savoring) |
| Motive | Acting for this sake, including where the reason stands |
| Prescription | This act ought to be done for this sake; the word’s ending (its last letter) says whether you are inviting it, offering it, or trying it (invited / offered / trial) |
| Unmet | Costs the sake, including how changeable that is |
Naming the sake and your stance toward it helps you notice gratitude, motive, and oughts instead of blurring them into a vague want, should, or good.
In English: Claritish: Oughts and motives.
Emotions as composition
Opaque labels (angry, anxious, proud) hide which sake is in play and what to ask for.
Ageben builds an emotion from three parts: a sake and how it stands (usually met or unmet), where the feeling sits or what it points at, and its motion (surging, flowing, or still).
Building the feeling from those parts shows you what to ask for, instead of leaving you stuck at the label.
In English: Claritish: Feelings in three parts.
Thanks that name the need
English thank you says you are grateful, but not for what.
Ageben has no set phrase for thanks. Instead, you say which of your sakes was met; saying that to the person who acted is the thanks. The ending says whether the payoff lasts or is only for now. To name someone else's sake instead, put that person right after the sake word (whose stake). Put the sake word right after a thing you own and it appreciates that thing, with no separate word for my, so appreciating what you already have takes one word (personal possession).
Naming the need that was met makes thanks specific, which helps both of you notice what actually helped.
In English: Claritish: Thanks and sorry.
Treating a cause as a fault
An explanation of what made something happen slides into blame, and one cause among several ends up carrying the whole outcome. The feature here keeps cause, blame, and a share of the cause apart.
Cause, blame, and share
English because of you can mean you made it happen, you did something wrong, or you were one part of it.
The ending on a because word says which claim you make: plain cause with no fault (thahum), a reason that broke a norm (thahul, it's their fault), or one share among other causes (thahur, partly because). Plain cause is the default.
Keeping cause apart from fault helps you explain what happened without blaming, and saying partly keeps one person, including you, from carrying a whole outcome.
Rationality
Surface common biases that make self-delusion easy.
Claims can say how you know: memory, a report, a pattern, clues, a deduction. A general claim says whether it allows exceptions and how many cases it rests on.
A because or an if says what kind of link it claims. When the “must” is really an ought, the sentence shows the value behind it instead of treating a wish as necessity.
A list of choices can say whether it is open or closed, so two options cannot pass themselves off as the only ones.
Treating a guess as fact
A guess, a rumor, a hazy memory, or a wish gets treated as settled fact, and a few cases get treated as a rule. The features here show what a claim rests on: how you know, how strong that evidence is, whether it is only possible, and whether a general claim allows exceptions. Forecasts belong here too, but they are taught together with plan and decision under wanting, planning, and deciding.
How you know, and could be
It is easy to treat a could be that keeps looping in your head as settled fact, and to lump memory, hearsay, gut feel, and maybe they left together as if they were equally good grounds.
Evidentiality lets a claim about the world name how you know: a live look, memory, a pattern, clues, a report, or a gut sense. MEMORY is recalling a scene from earlier, and memory can be wrong. A live look (LIVE) is sensing it while it is still in view. Name the channel once and it carries over your next claims, so a whole story can rest visibly on one so they say.
The ending on that evidence word says how strong the evidence is (a vivid memory or a hazy one, a reliable source or a rumor), separately from how likely the claim is. Marking how you know helps you catch overconfidence and hearsay before a claim hardens into settled fact.
A deduction is its own channel, apart from strong clues: it says the claim must hold if its premises do, and its ending says how far you checked the steps. It obviously follows is easy to say about a conclusion the clues only make likely; keeping the two apart, and marking whether you grant the premises at all, helps you catch a leap dressed as a proof.
In English: Claritish: How sure are you? and How do you know?.
Always, usually, and how many cases
English always and never sound absolute even when you mean usually, and they do not say how many cases they rest on.
A general claim says in its ending whether it allows exceptions: closed always (hual) allows none, and open always (huam) leaves them open, like usually or as a rule. A PATTERN evidence word says how much the claim rests on, from a well-established pattern (thubol) to only a few cases (thubor).
Saying usually when you mean it, and from a few cases when that is all you have, helps you catch overgeneralizing before one bad day becomes it always goes wrong.
Treating a wish as a law
A link between events, a habit, or an ought gets treated as a law the world must obey. The feature here says what kind of link a claim makes.
Causes and if
Everyday English because, leads to, and have to blur three distinctions: a condition that is enough vs one that is required, a reason in the world vs your grounds for saying something, and a wish vs a law of nature.
Causation gives each link its own word: if, only if, because, and if and only if. An intended result (so that) uses a separate word, hovam (so that): the action is aimed at that outcome without claiming it happens, and it is not the same as acting for a sake (motive, tho). When the “rule” is really an ought (hard work should earn promotion), say it with a sakes prescription (the) on the act, not with a causation word.
Keeping these apart helps you stop treating wishes and habits as laws the world must obey.
Treating a few options as all of them
Two options pose as the only ones, one way of seeing a situation poses as the situation itself, and an unstated standard decides the ranking. The features here show how many options are in play and what standard is being used.
Open lists, closed lists, and false dichotomies
It is easy to present two options as if they were the only ones possible.
Joins mark what kind of list you are building (inventory, exclusive choice, inclusive and/or, rank, …) and whether the listed items are the only ones in play (closed) or still open. Open forms leave room for alternatives you have not listed.
Saying whether a list is open or closed helps you notice false dichotomies, and leaves room for options you have not named yet.
Alternatives, reframes, and judgment bars
Work talk often freezes on the problem or the solution, or ranks options against a standard nobody has said out loud.
Prefer numbered alternatives (ordinary nouns plus an ordinal, like solution 2) so candidates stay plural and revisable. Reframe the same situation with softer wording rather than inventing a second candidate. A comparison like worse than… names its bar, the standard it measures against (than usual, than I expected, than you demand), so the standard stays visible, including when it is only your own expectation.
Numbering candidates, rewording, and naming the bar help you keep choices and standards revisable instead of freezing on a single framing or a hidden standard.
Empowerment
Support authentic choice by making reasons for action visible.
The motive or ought behind an action can be named with the sake it serves instead of collapsing into a bare should. A must or a may says who it comes from. Wanting, planning, and deciding stay separate, and a decision can mark how revisable it is. An attempt can be a low-stakes trial, a plan can name its backup before you start, and enough is measured against what you need rather than against perfect. Consent says whose yes it is and how binding, and an opening can say how long the talk will last before it starts.
Treating a choice as forced
Wanting, needing, and being obliged blur into a bare should, and a plan or a pick sounds locked. Sakes already name the reason behind an action (motive, or an ought you choose to take on). The features here show where a must comes from and keep wanting, planning, and deciding apart, so the choice stays yours.
Who says you must
English must, have to, and is supposed to sound equally binding, whether a law requires something, a person demands it, or people only expect it. May hides the same split for permission.
A say word says where a must comes from: a rule, a person who demands it, only an unwritten expectation that nobody actually demands, or you yourself. It does the same for may: a rule allows it, someone said yes, or nobody objected.
Naming the source helps you notice when a have to is only an expectation, so you can decide whether to meet it.
In English: Claritish: Allowed and required.
Wanting, planning, and deciding
English will mixes plan and prediction, and I want to can sound like a promise. It is easy to talk as if the future were already known, and a confident prediction can fuel anxiety or overconfidence. A pick, meanwhile, often sounds more locked than it is.
Ageben splits them: want for what you wish for, without meaning to do it yet; PLAN for what you mean to do; DECISION for how revisable a pick is; and a forecast for what the world will do. A forecast has no word of its own: you say how you know, with the same evidence words as above, and add blral (later). So every forecast says what it rests on, and its ending says how strong that evidence is.
Wants, plans, and decisions all live in someone's mind, so with nothing else marked they are yours; someone else's want, plan, or decision takes a holder that says how you know it.
Splitting these helps you hold a want without owing it to anyone, avoid treating a wishful or “certain” forecast as settled fact (or as a commitment), and keep a revisable pick from sounding locked forever. Marking how you know someone else's intention keeps a guess about what they mean to do from passing as fact.
Compare with: English will. Use PLAN for intention, an evidence word plus blral for a forecast, and DECISION for how firm the pick is.
In English: Claritish: Wants and plans and Decisions and tries.
Treating effort as all or nothing
Every attempt can feel like a full commitment that either succeeds or fails, every plan like it has to be complete before you start, and every result like it has to be perfect. The features here let you match the effort to the task: probe instead of committing, plan the backup first, call a result not yet instead of failed, and stop at enough.
Trying it out
English try does not say whether you are committing to keep going or only testing whether something works, so every attempt can sound like it will end in success or failure.
Try says that an attempt happens and leaves the outcome open. Its ending says how far the attempt will go: a committed attempt (howal) keeps going until it works or is ruled out, and a trial run (howar) is a low-stakes probe where failing is useful to know.
Calling an attempt a trial run helps you start without betting everything on it: if it fails, finding that out was the point.
In English: Claritish: Decisions and tries.
Planning the backup first
A plan made in English often names only the first choice, and it either stays vague or feels like it has to be complete before you act.
A fallback joins an attempt to its backup with xen: try A; failing that, B. The backup counts only if the attempt before it fails. The PLAN ending says how much of the plan is drawn: backups included, steps filled in, or only a direction. No level is better, and a sketch is often all a small or early plan needs; for a plan that matters, the backups-included ending is a prompt to ask what could go wrong.
Naming the backup before you start helps a setback turn into the next step instead of a dead end, and matching plan detail to the task keeps planning from becoming a reason not to start.
Good enough
English enough and too much often compare a result with an unstated ideal, so nothing ever counts as done.
A sake bar measures an amount against what a sake actually needs: enough, too much, or not enough for that need. When you do not name which sake, the unspecified sake stands in.
Measuring against the need instead of against perfect helps you notice when a result is good enough to stop.
Treating silence as a yes
An act that touches someone else's body, things, or time can go ahead on a yes nobody said, and a yes once given can sound permanent. The features here say whose yes it is and how binding, so consent comes first.
Consent: whose yes, and how firm
English she's fine with it does not say whether she signed on, said yes and can take it back, or was never asked.
A say word names whose yes it is (the one the act happens to, the one it is told or given to, or the doer) and says how binding it is: a binding agreement made in advance, a yes they can take back at any time, or a yes you are only assuming because nobody objected.
Marking an assumed yes as an assumption helps you check before acting, and marking a spoken yes as revocable keeps it theirs to withdraw.
How long you can talk
English hi does not say whether you can stay a while, have only a few minutes, have one thing to ask, or are just passing by.
A greeting is your own name said as a sentence (n.). Calling someone is a vocative. A conversation-length bid adds one vowel to your name: open-ended, a few minutes, one thing to ask, or passing by. The other person can answer with their own bid; the shorter bid sets the limit for both of you. When you leave, the same form says whether you are leaving soon, about to leave, or leaving now. The vowel describes the conversation, not either person.
Marking the opening that way lets you agree on how long to talk, so saying hello never commits you to unlimited time.
Conceptual metaphors
Abstract ideas are hard to hold onto; without a concrete picture, the psychologically useful reading of a word slips away in the moment. This cuts across all the groups above.
Many roots have an abstract sense beside a concrete one, so an idea you cannot see is tied to a familiar scene that already carries the caution. For example:
- Memory as fishing (a guess as fact): cast into opaque water; you may pull up a fish or a boot (the memory can be wrong).
- Live look as attesting (a guess as fact): you report what you see while the scene is still in view.
- Residue as unpaid debt (a moment as identity): the result still counts, like a balance still owed; not a past tense.
- Former climate as an empty nest (a moment as identity): the nesting season is over; a pattern that has ended, not a past tense.
- A pattern as paw-prints (a guess as fact): a general claim rests on a trail of cases, and the ending says how long the trail is. Always from a few cases is a short trail, not a law.
- As if as theater (a guess as fact): pretending is framed as a stage scene; what really happened stays offstage.
- Mechanism as gears (a wish as a law): you say how a result comes about, like gears meshing, not only that it follows.
- Affect as water (a feeling as a label): surging, flowing, or still water (motion) plus where the feeling sits or points, instead of an opaque emotion label that hides the sake.
Because each picture already carries a warning against the trap, it helps you reach for the healthier frame in the moment and remember it later.
Why language can help
Unhelpful thoughts are often automatic: catastrophizing a small setback into “my life is ruined,” treating two options as the only ones, or labeling a feeling as anger without naming which sake is unmet. (A sake is something that is good for you, such as autonomy, competence, or connection with others.) Healthier framings exist, but they are hard to reach in the moment.
Ageben puts those framings into ordinary words and into optional pieces added to words. When you speak or think in the language, the helpful distinction is already built into the sentence.
Limits
Ageben encodes psychological concepts and techniques, but it is not therapy, counseling, or medical advice, and it is not a substitute for professional care when you need it.
The design aims at compassion, rationality, and empowerment, and each feature is chosen to target a common, everyday problem, drawing on research where it exists. That is design intent, not a claim that speaking or studying Ageben has been shown to improve mental health or other outcomes.
The language is currently in beta: grammar, lexicon, and these docs can change as the design settles.
Criticisms
Can a language change how you think?
Some people doubt that a language can influence how its speakers think (the claim that it can is the weak form of the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis). I make no claim here about natural languages, but for Ageben specifically, I offer this argument:
- The way a concept is framed (phrased) affects how people think about it. This is well established in psychology and the social sciences generally.
- Ageben’s vocabulary and grammar build particular frames into how certain concepts are expressed, as laid out on this page and in the linked grammar docs.
- Therefore, Ageben influences how its speakers think.
Ethical considerations
Some people are reminded of Newspeak from 1984, where a totalitarian government alters the language to make the populace more compliant. What makes Newspeak unethical is that it is forced on people who do not know what it is doing to them.
For Ageben and languages like it, as long as using the language is voluntary, the speaker knows how it influences their thoughts, and the language delivers on those promises, it is morally good. Learning the language is like enrolling in a self-help course to change your thought patterns: clearly ethical if it changes you in the healthy way you want. Claritish lets you sample the effect in English before you commit to anything more.
Language influences thought but does not determine it. Speakers who want to think or communicate in a way the language discourages can still do so, though their sentences will likely be longer.
Language evolution
Some expect that the change every language goes through over decades of use will eventually water Ageben down until it loses the properties that make it beneficial.
The language can and should change to keep up with the times, but I am optimistic that it will keep or even strengthen its beneficial properties. The people who choose to learn it want those properties, so they will tend to adopt changes in line with the language’s goals.
Even if the language does lose its potency over a century, a positive impact on many people over that long a time is still worth achieving.
Next
To try the ideas in English first, start with Claritish. To go straight to the language, continue with introduction.md for the name, the grammar's design, and how to use these docs, then phonology.md for letters, word-endings.md for citation endings, clause.md for clause shape, speech-moves.md for turns, then dependents.md. To ask questions or follow updates, join the community on Reddit or Discord.