This is an All Ears English podcast, episode 99 how an English gratitude journal helps motivation and fluency.
We believe in connection, not perfection when it comes to learning English.
Now, here are your hosts.
Lindsay McMahon, the English adventurer, and Michelle Kaplan, the New York radio girl, coming to you from Boston and New York City, USA.
How can you stay motivated and joyful while you learn English?
Start an English gratitude journal.
Get our top tips and tricks on how to do this today.
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Hey, Lindsay, how are you?
Hey, doing great, Michelle.
How are you?
How's it going?
I'm good.
I'm feeling very grateful today.
Oh, what a good feeling.
What a good feeling.
Gratitude is such a great thing to reflect on every day, I think.
I think it's very important to take the time and think about what you're grateful for.
Just take that moment.
So today we're going to be talking about this idea of an English gratitude journal.
Right.
Yes.
This is actually something that can help you, you know, feel even more excited about learning English, feel better about learning.
Get into it more.
Don't you think, Lindsay?
Yeah, I think that gratitude brings joy.
I think gratitude is like one of the precursors to joy arising.
So this is another.
We did a few, an episode a few weeks ago or just earlier this week about joy finding more joy in your English.
This would be one way to get there.
Right, right, right.
Exactly.
I think there are a lot of benefits to doing this.
I mean, you can also do this by speaking with someone or having like a person that you share gratitude with.
You know, maybe a partner or buddy.
I did that once.
Actually, I had my friend Guy and I were gratitude buddies for like a year.
And he was someone he's a good friend of mine that I met at my meditation center.
So he was already interested in.
But again, this doesn't have to be a religious or spiritual thing.
It's just more of a mental health thing.
And he and I would every day, we'd text what we're grateful for in general.
We're talking today about a gratitude journal for your English practice, but ours was more general, and that's good too.
And I mean, this is science too, Lindsay.
I mean, there's actually science to this, right?
Tell us about it.
Yeah.
Well, I mean, I can't quote the exact studies, but I do know that scientists have found that gratitude practice, a kind of meditation, a mind-steadying practice, a joy practice, does change the way your brain is structured, which is so incredible.
Wow.
That is incredible.
I love that.
It's like it's not you're just doing it just for the fun of it.
I mean, yeah, it is.
It is fun.
It can help you.
But like that there's actual science to that.
That's special.
Yeah.
So, okay.
So exactly what are we going to write it?
We're going to go get our journal.
Michelle, where do we recommend getting our journal?
Should we go to the store?
Should we go on Amazon?
Whatever you like.
I've gotten, you know...
Honestly, I so I guys I keep a journal and but my journal was a journal I purchased.
And then I realized that I really have trouble writing in a way that can be read online.
And I didn't want to do that anymore.
So I have such bad handwriting that I did switch over to just doing it online.
I mean, there are like apps you can buy for journaling.
I don't have an app.
I just use a Google Drive, but you could do that.
Okay.
Okay, so you have yours in a drive, you said.
So just online, on a document.
I do.
That's where it is.
And that's another way to do it.
It doesn't have to be a beautiful physical journal.
It's more about what you know you're going to use often.
Right, right, right, right.
So, I mean, what are some things that, you know, you guys could put in your journal?
I mean, the idea is what you're thankful for, right?
So, like what I mean, think to yourself what are you thankful for when it comes to studying, learning English?
Maybe it's a tutor.
Maybe it's your classmates.
Maybe it's all ears English.
Right.
Maybe it's a coworker who helps correct your emails sometimes, right?
It's not always those key people.
Sometimes it's someone on the side who's just helping you with your journey in English a little bit.
They're encouraging you.
They're giving you a pep talk before you go and make that presentation in English at work, right?
Yeah.
Maybe it's like a person who works at a store that you go to a lot, that you have like a nice little conversation with, that kind of makes you happy to practice your English.
And it doesn't have to be someone who's specifically teaching you.
I love that.
Or maybe just on the same similar example, Michelle, maybe it's someone here where I live.
I always take my dog for a walk in the morning and I always run into the same person with her dog and her dog loves my dog and they play for a while.
Maybe it's someone like that.
If you're living in an English speaking country and you get to have a short exchange with that person in English, maybe it's that person that you're grateful for.
Yeah, those short exchanges can be so powerful.
Yes, huge, huge, huge.
And then it could just be your own.
This I love.
This is super deep.
We like to go deep on this show.
It could just be a sense of gratitude that you have for your own discipline.
Right.
So you're saying I'm grateful to myself for understanding that I'm worth it when it comes to learning English and I'm staying disciplined.
Right.
Right.
That's right.
We can be thankful for ourselves and what we're doing.
Yeah, that's so good.
That's so good.
So deep.
Okay.
So what are some, we touched on this earlier, Michelle, you said you have it in a Google Drive.
What are some different ways we could share, do this gratitude practice?
We can think outside of the box here, I think.
I mean, you can make it easy on yourself and just do it over text.
Sometimes when I used to write in the journal and I was somewhere – because I made a rule like do not take it out of the house, because I don't want to ever lose it.
So I would just send myself a text message of – of what I wanted to say, and then I would always mean to put it in the journal, and then I didn't, and I think that's one of the reasons why the Google Drive was bored.
Yeah, that's why I think this is really not about the medium.
It's about what you interact with, what will be the most easy for you to hold the habit?
Because it's about the habit.
For me, these days, I do have a gratitude journal.
It's a tiny, cute little red book that I put by my bed that I write.
And it's very easy.
I've got the pen right in there.
So when I get into bed, I can grab my little journal.
It feels nice.
It's a nice kind of leather bound thing.
You know, you're in bed.
It's great.
And then you sit right out the three things and then throw it back on the desk next to my nightstand.
It's part of my routine.
It's in the middle of my routine.
So you do it every day, three things?
Yeah, I did it last night and then like five nights before that.
Sometimes I get off of it for a week or so, but I do come back to it.
I'm back on it now.
The worst is when I don't write in mine for a few days and then I'm trying to remember what I did because mine is not so much gratitude.
I mean, gratitude is included, but Then I have to catch up.
And then it's like a big stress.
But why don't you just say, I missed it.
And that's okay.
And I'm okay with that.
I'm going back to today.
I'm just starting again.
Just start over.
I think because I like as like, I don't know.
I don't know.
I'm like a little strange about it.
But no, I did end up a lot.
There were a couple days that I missed last week.
And I was like, just forget it.
Okay.
Well, I mean, if it makes you feel any better, most of the time I just write my dog.
I'm grateful for my dogs.
So hopefully that makes you feel better.
But that's a good thing to be thankful for.
Yeah.
But guys, you can do it in other ways.
I mean you could do apps or send yourself an email or write in a letter, or I mean you could say it out loud or into a voice recorder.
You could make your own YouTube channel that's private or public if you want, right?
If you're that kind of person and you could just make a video of yourself to yourself and that could become like a video journal online that you could come back to it a few years.
There's a lot of ways you guys could do this.
So think about what is going to make the most sense for your workflow every day.
That's the key.
Exactly.
Oh my gosh, this has been very relaxing, nice topic and also very motivating.
I feel like I shouldn't put more.
I have too many journals, too many different things that I'm doing.
But maybe I should also include like a gratitude aspect.
Yeah, you should, Michelle.
Let us know how it goes if you're able to jump on that and you can report back.
I'll be like, I started a 19th journal, Lindsay, and now I'm all stressed.
And now you have 25 journals around the house and you got to keep up with them.
Exactly.
Oh, no.
Oh, my God.
All right, Michelle, what should our listeners make sure they do so they don't miss any episodes?
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We publish four days a week Monday Tuesday Wednesday, Thursday so you can count on All Ears English to be here for you, to inspire you and to help you focus on connection, not perfection.
And in the next episode we're gonna talk about the top 100 phrases that are used in English conversation.
I'm not sure if we're going to have time to list all of them, but we'll take a crack at it.
Right, Michelle?
Awesome.
I love it.
Wow.
Almost at 100.
Wow.
All right.
Take care, Michelle.
Talk to you soon.
Bye.
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