What's up guys?
Today we're doing something brand new on our channel,
learning with books, aw yeah!
So this is not just a list of grammar and vocabulary
books these are real life books that natives actually read and they can help
you in developing practical skills like grit confidence and good habits that
will help you with your English but also in being a better human being and
achieving anything you want to achieve in life plus if you do read them in
English you can develop some advanced vocabulary.
Now we're not going to be
covering strategies for reading in English in this lesson but if you would
like us to make a lesson on this then let us know by giving us a like it down
below and if you're new here we are constantly helping you to take your
English to the next level like this, so if you want to learn real-life English
with TV series movies and even books just hit that subscribe button and the
bell down below so you don't miss any of our new lessons now let's jump into this
list of 6 incredible books for your English and your life!
All right, so the first book that I have for you on this list is The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People.
Now this is definitely one of my top books ever and I really
think it should be required in high schools all around the world because if
it were we would have a generation that would make such a bigger impact that
would get along so much better.
Now if you want to be more successful at
anything you should really consider reading this book it will help you
develop some essential skills that will help you to be more effective as a person.
Now what does this mean exactly?
This means that you will be able to
achieve more in a more productive way.
Now it will also help you in building
different relationships in business of course but also with your
girlfriend, boyfriend, wife or husband and with your children if you have them or
anyone else in your family.
Now The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen Covey
is packed full of advice that will help
you a ton in different areas of your life I want to take a look at just a
couple of these that will help you a lot with your English but then I really hope
that you'll go out and pick up this book.
So one of the first habits that Stephen Covey
talks about in this book is beginning with the end in mind.
Now Covey actually begins a section in the book by asking us to
envision our own funeral, he asks us who's there and what did they say about
us and ultimately the purpose of this is for us to get a vision of what we want
to accomplish in this life, who do we want to make an impact on.
Now as an English learner this can be extremely powerful as well as an exercise to think
about what exactly will it be like when you're fluent, what are you doing?
Who are you speaking to? What are you using the language for?
And when you can kind of
have this vision in mind it will really help power you through all of those hard
nights studying or the courage that you need to go and have a conversation with
someone in another language.
And really the more clear that you can make this vision
the more powerful that it will be.
Exactly who are you speaking to?
What are you using your English for?
Doing this should help you to actually make the
right choices today to get there.
And really what this habit is about is not
just letting life happen to you but actually designing how you want your life to be.
All right and then another habit from this book that I think really
applies to you as an English learner is to seek to understand before being understood.
Now this is really crucial in your own language but if you are
learning another language it becomes even more important.
Now what this one is about is that normally we don't really listen to people.
We're in a conversation
with another person they're talking and we're probably thinking in our head how are
we going to respond to what they're saying we're not really listening to
what they're saying.
As human beings we love speaking in fact think about it for
English learners almost everyone's goal is to become a great fluent English
speaker I very rarely hear any English learners say that they want to be a great English listener.
However the listening part is so important because
if you don't really understand people and I mean beyond just the words that
they're saying, if you don't really empathize with them really put yourself
in their shoes then it's unlikely that that relationship is going to go very
far and this is even more important when that person is from a different culture
from you because it can be so easy to judge someone when you don't really
understand where they're coming from.
Now I would imagine that your big goal with
English is to be able to communicate using the language right?
But communication is a two-way street and there's a really great quote that says
that you have two ears and one mouth use them proportionally this means that you
should listen twice as much as you speak probably really you can think of some of
the people that you feel like you connect the most to some of the people
that you've met in your life that really you felt like I understood you the best
and it probably was because they were really good at really listening to you.
So if you only choose one of these books on this list to actually go and read
I really hope it's this one, you will be a better english learner for it but more
importantly you'll be a better person.
All right so the first book that we
looked at was The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, now how do you actually
even build a good habit or break a bad one?
Well journalist Charles Duhigg and
got really curious about all these questions and dug into all the science
of it bringing us a book that brings us some down to earth stories that help us
learn all about how we can replace our bad habits with really good ones.
Just to start out with an example one of the stories that I still remember is that he
tells us about a man who lost a lot of weight by creating a running habit.
What was his secret?
He actually ate a piece of chocolate after every run but more on
that in just a little bit.
So first off if you want to learn anything it's
really important that you are able to develop habits that support it because
when you do this it becomes effortless.
This is why I used to hold all of my
students accountable to creating fun everyday habits in English and with the
ones that actually succeeded in doing this I noticed huge differences in their
comprehension and English fluency.
So just to give you a taste of this book
let's look at how habits actually work.
Now a Duhigg tells us that habits have
three parts the first part is the cue now a cue is something that causes
another thing to start happening so let's take for example running again if
you want to develop a new running habit you might create a cue by leaving your
shoes right by your bed so as soon as you wake up in the morning you would see
your shoes and you would know it's time to go running.
Now for your English you
might want to try something like pairing your studying with your morning coffee
so I have my coffee in the morning and automatically I know
it's time to study English.
All right so the next part of the habit is the
routine this is really the bulk of the habit so for running it would probably
be doing the warm-up exercises the actual run and then the stretching
afterwards and for your English maybe it's actually studying some grammar
recording yourself and listening to it or doing some writing exercises.
Now the last part of the habit is the reward and remember I told you about that man at
the beginning who use chocolate to motivate himself to run?
Well that was his reward but eventually you didn't need the chocolate, he just felt so good
after running, getting a runner's high, that that was a reward in itself.
In most of time when we think about habits we only think about the behavior, right?
We think about like eating the donut or going for an exercise and going
for a run right but this cue and this reward are kind of the keys to unlocking
habits and to shaping them and remaking them and so if you know this as an
individual it's enormously powerful.
Now for your English you could totally do
the same thing you could have a treat after you've done some really hard
studying or taking really good notes watching this video but you could also
use for example watching an episode of Friends or a funny Ellen video or
writing a friend on Whatsapp and in English for a few minutes to reward
yourself for having done something more difficult in the language.
So The Power of Habit is a really great read if you want to upgrade your learnings from any of
these other books because you'll just make them a habit.
So the next book I have for you is called A Mind for Numbers, now don't be deceived by the
title of this book it's another really great fundamental read which will help
you with so many other things.
Now while it actually takes the point of view of
learning math and science which for the author Barbara Oakley was a really huge
struggle even though she eventually got her PhD in Engineering it actually
teaches us the skills that we need to be able to learn anything more effectively.
Now for me one of the most impactful things that I learned with this book is
that we usually think of learning just as studying that time when we really
have our head down in the book and we're trying to memorize really difficult
concepts and in English for sure this for you would be when you have to
memorize grammar rules or vocabulary now while this is
important for part of the brain what is called the focused brain to actually be
spending that time really memorizing which Oakley actually shows us how to do
better this is just half of the equation, so the other half of the learning
process is the diffuse brain and this is actually how our brain makes the
connections when we're not studying and we can actually use the diffuse brain
in an effective way to make information stick.
So the best thing to do when
you're really stuck and frustrated on a problem is not to keep focusing on it
you actually need to get in a very different mode of thinking and that's
what is represented here and so what this means practically
for you is you're sitting there you're working, hey get out go for a run go down
and have a...go take a shower if you need to or do something that really gets your
mind totally off it because when you're in this mode as long as your attention
is focused on that problem you're still in this mode you can't get to this way
of solving things.
So while it is important to actually have that time
where we're really studying hard if we can then activate the diffuse brain
doing something like taking a nap or playing sports it is going to stay with
us much longer this is why if you study at night sometimes it can be good then
when you sleep you'll wake up with the information much more locked down in your brain.
Now Oakley gives us a really great example of this with Thomas Edison
who is famous for inventing the light bulb.
What he would do is he would be in
a session where he was thinking really hard trying to discover something and
what he would do is he would sit down in his chair with something in his hand and
take a nap now right as Edison was falling asleep what he had in his
hand would drop in the floor and it would suddenly wake him up and what he
found often is that suddenly he would have a discovery that he wasn't
realizing before so he would kind of use this to activate the diffuse brain.
Now this concept is really just the tip of the iceberg so if you read A Mind for Numbers
this is definitely going to help you a lot with learning English and also
for learning any else you want.
Hey so I highly recommend
you go and follow us over on Instagram because every week we are doing fun
reading exercises with some incredible books like Harry Potter, The Hunger Games
The Hobbit and so much more.
So for some more fun reading with your
favorite books go and check us out over on Instagram.
So the next one is called
Grit by Angela Duckworth.
Now this one made a really huge impact on me when I read it.
in fact it should be a required reading for any parent out there as
grit is the number one characteristic that you can cultivate in your children
but even if you're not a child you can cultivate grit.
Now what is grit?
I'm saying this word a lot, right?
Now Duckworth uncovered that grit is the
number one characteristic shared by successful people whether they are
soldiers, musicians, athletes or students.
Now grit is a combination of passion and perseverance.
Now passion is the deep desire to master
whatever skill it is that you're learning and it's not really the
fireworks it's not that excitement that you get about something new, its enduring.
Maybe you already know what perseverance is perseverance is not giving up when
things get difficult.
Now a really great place to start is with the fantastic TED
talk that Angela Duckworth gave on grit and then you can grow your grit by
reading the whole book.
Grit is living life like it's a marathon, not a sprint
Now if you can learn to be gritty with your English learning you are guaranteed
to reach your goals.
All right so the next one is Daring Greatly by Brené Brown
and this one is a bit different than any of the other
ones that we've seen so far.
Now shame is a normal emotion, we all feel it, shame is
the fear that we won't be able to connect with others because they will
judge something within us that tells them that we're not worthy of that
connection with them.
Now Brené Brown actually discovered that the way to beat
shame is through vulnerability, however in most societies we tend to think that
vulnerability is the same as weakness.
Now Brené Brown shows us that this is not so.
Brené shows us the vulnerability is actually courage.
Now the courageous people, the people who are willing to be vulnerable
they show up, there in the arena, they are willing to fail.
I have a vulnerability issue and you know and I know that vulnerability is kind of the
core of shame and fear and our struggle for worthiness but it appears that it's
also the birthplace of joy, of creativity, of belonging, of love.
now the reason that this book is on this list is because most English learners feel shame when it
comes to speaking English now for you as a learner vulnerability is being able to
admit that you are not perfect that you make mistakes and to embrace those mistakes.
Is that courage to be able to have a
conversation with someone and to sound a bit like a child to feel that silliness
and be okay with it and to know also the people who are critical are just scared
by your courage because they don't have that same courage to go out there and to
do something that's really difficult like speaking in another language.
Now Brené Brown can say it's so much better than I can
she actually has one of the most watched TED talks of all time on these topics so
I highly recommend that you start out by watching that and if you're interested
in these ideas then you're going to really love at reading Daring Greatly.
So a really great strategy to improve your English with these books is to listen to
the audiobook while you are reading it this way you not only improve your
reading and your vocabulary but you also improve your English listening and it's
just so convenient I love listening the audiobooks every day while I'm making my breakfast.
Now I've got a really great opportunity for you to do this as well
you can sign up for audible with the link down in the description below and
in addition to a free 30-day trial you'll get two free books!
So just imagine you could choose two of the books from today's video and listen to
the audiobook absolutely free and even if you decide not to continue your
subscription after the 30 days you get to keep those two audiobooks yours forever.
So what are you waiting for?
Sign up with that link down in the
description below so that you can start learning with audible and improve your
listening with those two free audiobooks.
All right so the last but not least
book on this list is The War of Art by Steven Pressfield.
Now this one is very short but nonetheless impactful and it was extremely popular in the
entrepreneurial community. Now Pressfield shows exactly why we don't
do the things that we know we must do in order to become better at whatever the
skill is that we're dedicating ourselves to and it's called resistance.
Now resistance is the fear that you feel when you want to go up and start a
conversation with someone in English but you don't or it's the procrastination
that you feel when you really know that you should be studying or it's the
excuses that you give that you can't do it for some reason even though other
people are out there doing it and resistance shows up all the time in our
lives just to give you an example this has probably happened to you there's
something that you know that you're going to do that you want to do it's
something that will help you to advance your English or another skill that
you're building but then all the sudden your head you think okay well the dishes
are dirty so I better do the dishes and then I need to take out the trash and
then by the time you actually have done all these little chores around the house
or little things that seem important you don't have time for the thing that is really important.
Resistance is when we tell ourselves that we'll start tomorrow
instead of just getting started right now.
Resistance as I define it with a capital R is that negative force that arises
whenever we try to move from a lower level to a higher level or we're trying
to identify with our nobler nature with our higher nature you're trying to get
out of your own little petty ego and and channel the muse or try to get something
wonderful out there so that elicits resistance it'll assist this equal and
opposite negative force.
Now Pressfield differs between pros and amateurs
now amateurs let all that fear excuses and procrastination get in the way of
attaining their higher self now the pros they also feel the fear they also hear
the voice in their head tying them they have to do something else before
they get started but they recognize that as part of the process and they show up and do it anyway.
Now in the war of art Pressfield gives us the information that
we need to stop being an amateur and to become a pro.
Now are you a pro or an amateur with your English?
An amateur we'll watch this video and then not
really do anything different, a pro will watch this video and get inspired and go
out and get one of these books or sign up for audible and download the
audiobook and start learning with it or just watch one of the TED Talks that I
mentioned in this video or do something else that's going to actually advance
their skills in English.
So my challenge to you is to pick one of these books and
download it or order it and start reading or you could get the audiobook
and start listening or do both together now you could read these in your native
language and they will really have an immense impact on you that could be a
great place to start but you could kill two birds with one stone learn a ton of
vocabulary by reading in in English so let me know down in the comments
below which of these books are you going to read or if I missed any great ones
then be sure to share them with me and other learners down in the comments below.
And if you enjoyed this lesson and want more lessons to help you with your
reading then let me know by giving it a like below or let me know down in the
comments what you would like to see and if you'd like to get some help learning
the vocabulary that natives really use in our everyday lives
then our Fluent with Friends course can help you a ton so I highly recommend
that you check that out by signing up for our free three-part masterclass.
Now it's time to go beyond the classroom and live your English, aww yeah!