This is an All Ears English podcast.
How to feel really comfortable with natives.
Welcome to the All Ears English podcast downloaded more than 200 million times.
Are you feeling stuck with your English?
We'll show you how to become fearless and fluent by focusing on connection, not perfection.
With your American host, Former IELTS examiner Jessica Beck, and Lindsay McMahon, the English adventurer coming to you from Denver and Portland USA.
Do you get uncomfortable when the conversation gets deep?
Are you worried that you'll never have a real connection with natives because you can't get past surface level topics?
Find out today how to make real connections today with real people and feel comfortable talking about anything.
Good morning, Lindsay.
How are you?
Hey, Jessica.
I'm doing great.
How are you today?
How's everything?
Everything's wonderful.
I am very comfortable to be here on the mic with you.
I'm happy to be here.
Me too.
Me too.
It's good to have you on the show.
We don't hear your voice all that often, but it's always a pleasure.
And we are lucky to have you here.
I'm excited to get into this bonus today.
Yes.
Yeah.
Guys, we are discussing really this is like the number one thing that I hear from students.
You know, why do you want to improve your English?
What are you scared about?
What is your challenge?
No matter how we ask that question, we hear this all the time.
I don't feel comfortable with natives.
And you and I have experienced that in other languages.
Yes.
Like that's everything.
Oh my gosh.
I mean, that's how our whole motto of connection, not perfection came about, right?
Because feeling uncomfortable, not understanding everything.
The truth is we're never going to understand everything.
It's just impossible, right?
In our second language.
And so how do we reach that moment of connection, right?
Exactly.
Exactly.
And So it's our task in life to help you figure out how to feel comfortable.
The thing is, it's often not what you think it is, right?
Because we get in our heads about the grammar, about the vocab and the reason you think you're not comfortable.
That may not actually be it, right?
So it's our job to help you figure that out.
Yeah, it's not so obvious.
That's why we're here, guys.
We do consider it, at least I do consider it, my mission in life.
This is the reason I'm here is to help people connect.
You know what I mean?
That's it.
This is what we do at All Ears English.
Exactly, exactly.
So guys, we are going to give you some tips today about how to do exactly that, how to feel comfortable with natives.
And we are also going to invite you to join our podcast back-to-school connection bundle, which is amazing, but we'll get to that in a second.
But first of all, let's explore this.
If our students do nothing about this feeling, if they just remain uncomfortable around natives?
What are the consequences of that?
Oh my gosh, major repercussions, Jessica, right?
So if you avoid conversations, you are going to basically, it can feel lonely. right?
Yes.
And we all know that feeling of being outside of the group.
This is what could happen.
And then we miss opportunities to build relationships.
And relationships are what makes us happy in the world, right?
So there are major repercussions if we just hang back and let that feeling of not feeling comfortable, if we let that guide us.
Yeah.
Think about all of these possible connections that you could be missing, right?
New friends, being a part of a community, maybe talking to other parents around you or your neighbors, right?
And at work too, of course, coworkers, clients.
You know we have students come to us who have been living in the United States for so long, like years.
At this point,
And they still come to us with this idea that they can't feel comfortable around natives.
They can't be themselves.
And that just, that breaks my heart, right?
Just picturing being that lonely.
Yeah, it's true to not be able to truly be yourself, especially if you're permanently set up here in the US or the UK.
I mean, this is the future, right?
We need to find a way around this.
Exactly, exactly.
So what could be some possible reasons?
What is getting in our students way of feeling comfortable of making that connection?
What do you think that could be?
Well, I think legitimately the first thing is our mind, but if we want to talk, right?
So we decide our mind, our mind is the ultimate block.
But if we want to talk about actual language functions, right?
Students tell us that the problem is right.
Lack of vocabulary, right?
Afraid, being afraid of being misunderstood because of their accent, right?
You guys have told us this.
What else, Jessica?
What else have we heard?
Oh my gosh.
I hear you guys say like, I'm afraid I can't go beyond simple conversations.
You know, people are like, I'm good for five minutes.
Yeah.
When people start talking about the news or like deeper topics about culture and society, like I can't participate in that conversation.
It could be. like listening skills, it's hard to track native speakers.
It could be any of these reasons, right?
Oh my gosh, yes.
What an awful feeling, right?
We don't want you guys to feel like you can start that conversation.
You can have what they call the pleasantries, right?
The niceties, the ways of greeting each other, or the weather's great today.
What do you think about this scenario? what do you think about where we are in this beautiful park?
And then, you know, there's going to be a point in which you can no longer be in that conversation.
We don't want that for you guys.
Yeah.
This is where the real connection happens, guys.
When we go beyond that small talk.
So how do we go beyond that?
How do we get past these hurdles?
It gets, It could seem like a lot to try to improve all of this at once, right?
My mindset, my vocabulary, my grammar, like how do we improve that?
I think it comes back to the way that confidence is gained.
It's not gained by reciting some kind of a affirmation, right?
We don't gain confidence by sitting there and meditating.
That's not what confidence is.
It's taking measured action on a daily basis, right?
Doing one or two specific things.
And that's where the study plan comes in.
Having a study plan, Jessica.
That's what it's about.
Yeah.
Yeah.
You need a map, right?
We all need some help.
We all need a guide sometimes when we're trying to get to a place and we don't know how to get there right.
You need someone to show you.
Yes, exactly.
So our back to school connection bundle guys.
We have all of those things listening skills for real native English, not scripted on a language CD, you know, not AI.
This is real English from real natives and speaking skills, specific pronunciation lessons, vocab all of that stuff is in that bundle.
But okay.
Let's give our students a tip first before we talk about that, right?
Okay.
So what can we say to students?
What is the best tip we can give our listeners today for feeling comfortable finally with natives?
Oh, let's go ahead, Jessica.
You tell us what it is.
I'm lost in our notes.
I love it.
Connection, not perfection, guys.
Tell us what it is.
That's what life is about.
Music to my ears.
Music to my ears.
Well, here is the biggest tip I can give you guys.
Preparation.
Taking that extra step before the conversation, before that group event, taking that extra step of preparation.
What does that look like?
Well, it actually comes From a language learning method that we came up with guys, the bridged connection method.
This is the first step, right?
You have to take a step back and think about what you're going to experience first.
This sounds a lot like our method.
And I think this really is the same thing on the IELTS Energy podcast way back in the day.
Oh, I'm sorry.
We came up with the idea of opening your brain box, right?
This is really what we're doing here.
And I love that term and that expression.
It's fantastic.
Anytime we're about... I was just talking to someone about this method a few days ago.
I can't remember what we were talking about, but this is an amazing way to prepare your mind.
And the context example here, Jessica, is the coffee shop, right?
Yes.
Yes, exactly.
So guys, you've all been to coffee shops.
Yes.
It doesn't matter where you are in the world.
You've been to a little tea shop, a little coffee shop, right?
So let's take a really specific example, all right?
Let's think about your next opportunity to speak English.
So instead of losing yourself in your head getting nervous, maybe canceling the date altogether, right?
You are going to prepare.
So you know that you're going to see a specific person there, right?
You're going to see your coworker, Daniel, let's say.
He's always getting coffee, the same place you do in the morning, and you're like oh, I really want to talk to Daniel.
I've never actually even tried to have a conversation with him before.
So what do you do, guys?
You prepare.
You make a plan.
So like Lindsay said, we open our brain box.
You know what people talk about in coffee shops when they're standing in line or at a table.
They talk about the weather, the weekend, the workday ahead.
It's your coworker.
So actually go through this situation in your head.
Rehearse.
Yeah, for sure.
What exactly do you want to say?
Oh, my God.
It's so true.
And this can be done on your walk to the coffee shop, guys.
This is not asking you to take a ton of extra time and sit down and write a novel to prepare and open your brain box.
No, this is about walking to the coffee shop three minutes away and then going through these things in your head, especially if it's a coworker.
You have a lot to talk about.
You have a lot of common understandings.
Yeah, exactly.
And so you know that you're an adult.
You have great opinions and great ideas.
You just have to take that extra step, right?
So you're prepared to be yourself.
You're prepared to share these ideas.
Yeah.
And Jessica, this is based on real science, right?
This is not just something we came up with on the fly.
This is based on applied linguistics.
Exactly.
Exactly.
That's what I got my master's in, guys.
That's what I fall back on when I'm designing every single learning activity for you.
But here's the thing, right?
Not all the connections are that easy, right?
We don't like that's kind of the surface level that we're talking about.
Just talking in a coffee shop about the weather.
Not everything is that easy or that light.
Yeah.
So what's going to happen?
We're sitting down with Daniel.
We've been talking for about 10 minutes.
You know we've caught up on maybe our weekends and everything, the weather that day and the basics.
Maybe a few things about our company, an upcoming campaign I don't know something, or company party now.
Or, you know, maybe Daniel asked a question about something a little deeper.
Like what, Jessica?
What would be a topic that we might, this is the point where this is the moment of truth.
Can we continue that conversation?
Yeah, for sure.
What if, yeah, you're done with all that small talk and Daniel goes, did you see the news yesterday?
And all of a sudden your mind freezes up like, I can't talk about the news.
Or what if he's talking about something specific, right?
And he's like, did you hear about the city's plan to close that school?
I don't know.
It could be anything, right?
Totally.
We don't know, but we want to be comfortable in those spontaneous situations.
And we know that these are the topics you guys want to be talking about.
You don't want to stay just in the weather.
I mean, I bore myself when I ask a person a question about the weather.
I just am immediately bored with what I say.
I'm like, oh, I'm so bored with myself.
You know what I mean?
And so it's like, we don't want to spend our time.
That does not create real connections.
Okay?
Exactly.
Exactly, guys.
You want to talk about culture.
You want to talk about food.
You want to talk about life philosophy, right?
Like these are the things that actually bond people to each other, right?
And we want you to experience that.
And that's the whole reason why you took that crazy 1,200-mile road trip.
12,000-mile road trip, Jessica.
12,000-mile road trip and interviewed over 70 people.
70 real native interviews.
So you guys could learn from these deep conversations.
Oh my gosh.
And when we say real English in this course, in this program, we are not talking about real English.
We're talking about spontaneous, unrehearsed English.
It's not like we sat down in a studio and I said, here's the question I'm going to ask you.
And here's what you should say in response.
Now there was nothing planned or prepared.
This is kind of another level of real English, Jessica.
Yeah. a whole other level, guys.
I mean that's why it's called the bridge to connection, because you guys have listened to all the language CDs.
You've done those apps with the little AI sentences that you copy.
Like you've been to the classroom.
Why can't you still have the deep conversations?
Because that's not real English.
This is real English, right?
So deep topics from racism to tacos.
I mean, you're going to learn to talk about and understand conversations about everything, right?
This is where you actually prepare and practice the tough stuff.
Just some examples, right?
So I went to a gun show in Texas and interviewed people on their perspective about guns having guns in the US gun ownership.
You and I Jessica, went out on the streets in Portland and talked to some people who are suffering homelessness and houselessness right
Yeah.
These are real issues, right?
And, of course, we went to a diner in Chicago, enjoyed some beers, and we know how to talk about beer and food.
It goes from serious to silly, to fun, to deep, to intense, to heartbreaking, to joyful and everything in between.
Yeah, completely, completely, you guys.
And we would love to invite you to get this Connected Communicator course.
But it's not just Connected Communicator, because we want you to take advantage of Of the fall.
We are back to school.
We are back to work.
We are back to being motivated to achieve our goals, right?
So that's why we made this back to school connection bonus.
It's all about connection, guys.
So you get the connected communicator.
You get the how to be polite and how to start the conversation.
Many courses, it's lifetime access to all three courses for the price of one.
So that is what we're talking about.
So guys, you could check it out. go to allearsenglish.com slash school.
When should they do that?
Should they do that like right now?
Should they pause the bonus and go there?
Yeah, because this is a special offer, right?
This offer is not going to be available forever.
To be able to have these extra mini courses included in your course, guys, it's going away.
When is it going away, Jessica?
When does the offer end?
September 21st at 5 p.m.
New York time, guys.
This offer will go away and never come back.
Yeah.
You know, I love the season.
Well, the two things I love.
I love that we're kind of in a new era for All Ears English.
We've really upped our game in terms of the quality of our courses, guys.
We have added an incredible amount of teacher and community feedback and practice for you guys at every level of our courses.
That means everything. monthly fluency parties.
Everyone who joins this course will be invited to monthly fluency parties as a special bonus.
Open conversation club, another special bonus.
Weekly conversation sessions with other students.
And the list goes on and on, Jessica.
The other piece I love is September is a time of kind of that freshness.
Like you said, it's the back to school.
Maybe our listeners have children.
They see their kids are back to school.
It's a time to start something fresh.
I feel a sense of freshness right now.
How do you feel?
I have had so many conversations in the past week about this amazing, like joyful, motivated feeling that I've had lately.
And maybe it's the seasonal change.
I don't want to look too closely at it, but I am feeling it.
And I know that you guys are, too.
This is such like an inspirational time of the year.
So that's the reason we're doing this, guys.
So three fluency courses, all online, lifetime access.
You get personal feedback on your goals in every course now, right?
Guys, this is amazing.
So allearsenglish.com slash school is where you want to go before school.
September 21st.
Oh my gosh.
And to speak to that personal feedback on your goals.
How cool to get a personal video welcome message from a teacher in our course.
As soon as you let us know what your goals are when you enter the course, you will get a personalized response.
How cool.
We didn't have that before, Jessica.
Now we have this as well as a final exam, right?
Where we get it graded by a teacher.
Isn't that right?
With also a video message, guys.
Like you get so much in these courses now.
Oh, and I created all these new like reflect and connect conversation activities.
You guys, there's so much more in here for you to practice and really use this new English, guys.
So the biggest takeaway for today, you guys, is the toughest connections.
The deepest connections are possible.
Those conversations and friendships you want, they're out there, guys.
You can feel comfortable. with the right practice and strategies, right?
So go to allearsenglish.com slash school and check this out.
All right, Jessica.
So where can we invite our listeners to go to get this deal one more time?
Yes, you guys go to allearsenglish.com slash school.
That's S-C-H-O-O-L.
You know how to spell school.
Go there before September 21st, guys.
This offer goes away then.
Three amazing fluency courses available.
We've already told you all the stuff.
There's so much stuff in there.
Go to allearsenglish.com slash school.
Yeah.
And Jessica, one more time.
How much are we saving by going and getting it now rather than later?
What's our total savings?
Over 30%, guys.
Over 30% savings.
Amazing.
It's huge.
Yes.
It's a crazy, awesome deal.
I love it, guys.
So go over there and get the study plan.
That's what it is.
It's about the plan, knowing exactly what to do to get to your goal.
Jessica, thanks for hanging out today.
I'll talk to you soon.
My pleasure.
Have a good day, Lindsay.
Take care.
Bye.
Bye.
Thanks for listening to IELTS Energy.
Hit subscribe now, and don't forget to find your estimated band score at allearsenglishcom.
Slash my score.
