- Improving your English by watching videos
created for native speakers is super exciting,
but it's often difficult and frustrating to do alone.
Today, I'll help you to learn
some business English expressions
and understand some of the big ideas
in a video from one of my favorite authors
on habits and motivation.
Hi, I'm your English coach, Christina,
and welcome to Business English with Christina,
where you become better at English and better at business.
Having just a little help
can make a big difference in how much you understand
and learn when you watch real life videos in English,
like videos created for native speakers.
So today, I wanna help you to understand
a video that I really like
to help you get some interesting expressions
from a video that you can find right here on YouTube,
and it's by James Clear,
like I said, he's one of my favorite authors
because of his book.
There it is, over there,
"Atomic Habits" which I definitely recommend
if you can read books in English.
Now, you might be interested in James Clear,
if you're interested in reaching your business goals,
or really improving any area in your life
where you need good habits to succeed,
like learning English, for example.
So the big idea from his video
that we're gonna talk about today
is if you can change your habits,
you can change your life.
- And so if you can change your habits,
you can change your life.
- And before we get into that video,
let me just remind you
that you can go to christinarebuffet.com/worksheets
and get some free activities,
a free worksheet that I've created to go with this video
so that you can really test yourself,
learn these expressions,
use them in real life,
and start creating good learning habits.
Early in the video,
James Clear talks about what would happen
if you were able to improve by 1% each day.
- If you were able to improve by 1% each day
for an entire year...
- And that means in some area of your life,
you make some tiny change.
Maybe you would learn some new expressions
that make you just 1% better in English,
but then you would do that for each day for an entire year,
because he also talks about
all of these small changes adding up,
as we would say in English.
And he says...
- And those gains compound,
you would end up 37 times better at the end of the year.
- If those gains compound,
you would end up 37 times better at the end of the year.
Now, if you work in finance
or you just have a bank account with interests,
you probably already know about compounding gains,
or basically it's earning interest on your interest.
And that means that when you start now and you keep going,
the change at the end is much bigger than you might expect.
And then just notice how he says
the same thing in plain English.
- The small habits
and little choices are transforming us everyday already.
- Small habits and little choices
are transforming us every day already.
Since I'm a neuro-language coach and a business owner,
I love this idea that starting small and simple
just to get that new habit is great,
and then being consistent about it
is what's gonna make that big change.
And so many of the people
that I've worked with to improve their English,
they've put these things in place
for their own English practice,
and made bigger changes than they thought possible
just by starting small and simple and easy 'cause often,
getting started, it's the hardest part.
Speaking of that sort of topic of motivation
and getting started on the topic of motivation,
James Clear says...
- Many people think that they lack motivation
when what they really lack is clarity.
- Many people think they lack motivation
when what they really lack is clarity.
In this case, if you lack motivation,
it means you don't have enough motivation,
but what does it mean to lack clarity?
It means to not have a good mental image
or a good understanding of the real problem.
And one of the big problems
that James Clear points out in the video
is when you don't have a plan for starting your new habit,
which simply means that you don't really know
or you haven't decided how you're gonna reach your goal.
You've got the goal,
but you don't know what to do next.
And he talks about the importance of having a plan
when he says...
- But instead, you can take the decision-making out of it
by explicitly stating when, where,
and how you will implement the habit.
- You can take the decision-making out of it
by explicitly stating when, where,
and how you will implement the habit.
Here, to take the decision-making out of something,
it means that you remove the need
to make any choice about your new habit.
And when you don't have to choose,
it's easier to act.
I've signed up for a running plan program
because it means
I don't have to think about what I need to do.
I just have to check the app,
see what the coach tells me to do,
and I go and do it.
And I promise you,
it makes my life so much easier.
And more importantly,
it makes it easier to stick with the plan
and that helps you reach your goals.
Now, going back to James Clear,
he said explicitly stating something.
So when you explicitly state something,
it just means that you say
or you write exactly what you mean
so that there's no confusion, no ambiguity.
It's just very clear.
And to implement a habit,
it simply means to start your new habit,
to put it in place.
You can also say to implement a plan,
to take an idea and then to put it in to action.
Think about it for a minute.
Is there a habit that you would like to implement
that could change your life?
And maybe you want to make that new habit
practicing your business English regularly.
Well, you're in luck,
because, as I say,
if you don't use it, you lose it.
And here's how you can use what you learned today
and also start putting in place,
start implementing some new habits
for improving your English.
So, first thing you can do,
tell me about the habit that you would like to start,
and you can put that down in the comments.
And then the next thing to hold you accountable
and help you to get started is I want you to write down
exactly what you'll do to begin that new habit.
Like James Claire said,
make it explicit.
This is the perfect opportunity to practice,
to make sure that you are starting your new habits,
and practicing your English and using it correctly.
If you liked this type of lesson
where I take let's say real world video
created for native speakers and then break it down,
divide it into smaller parts to help you to understand it,
let me know.
It's something new that we're trying.
There is a part two.
So whether you like it or not,
you are going to get the part two.
Anyway, just let me know
what you think of this type of video,
and there are three ways that you can tell me.
You can give this lesson a thumbs up on YouTube
and subscribe to my channel
so that you don't miss any future Business English lessons.
You can also go to christinarebuffet.com/worksheets
and get the free worksheet that goes with this lesson
to test what you've learned.
And, of course, you can watch this next lesson,
which is all about feeling absolutely confident in English
with less effort starting in just two minutes per day.
All right, thank you so much for improving your English
and yourself with Business English with Christina,
and I'll see you next time.