This is the Business English Podcast, episode 501.
Do you feel kind of confused about this word?
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Hey, Michelle, how are you today?
I'm good.
How are you, Lindsay?
Good.
Michelle, do you like cheesecake?
Uh, kind of uh well, not cheesecake.
Uh, it's kind of like a meringue.
Oh, that i like.
Oh, you're making actually.
Do you like what do you like?
Lindsey, cheesecake meringue?
Well, probably a cheesecake over a meringue, but i'll take any of it.
Honestly, i like, i don't really like cheesecake.
I love cheese, but i don't like cheesecake.
No, interesting me.
I don't really get the.
I don't really get it, but I love, like a lemon meringue.
Oh my God.
Oh wow.
I love a good chocolate cake, like a really rich chocolate cake too.
Yeah.
Okay.
We could just talk about sweets all day, but that's what we're doing.
Bye everyone.
Today we are now on the other side of episode 500.
We're in 501.
This is super exciting, Michelle, for our listeners.
Yeah.
But we do have a listener question today to answer.
And we love when our listeners send us questions on YouTube.
Michelle, All Ears English podcast is over on YouTube.
So go check that out and hit subscribe, guys.
All right.
All right.
This comes to us from Sudan 111 and I can read the question.
So it says, Hi, Lindsay and Michelle.
My name is Obai and I'm from Sudan.
I'm a new English learner and also new to your channel, but I already love it so much.
I listen to your podcast every morning and it has become a part of my daily routine.
It really helps me a lot with my English.
I have one question.
What's the difference between kind of and kind of like?
First of all, Obai, I'm sorry.
I hope I'm pronouncing your name correctly.
Thank you so much for listening.
This is a really sweet message.
And we're honored to have you listen.
We are.
Oh, my gosh.
And a new listener.
We love hearing about brand new listeners that just discovered the show.
Let us know in a review how you discovered the show and what you think of the show.
All right.
Really good.
Yeah.
So, yeah.
Great question.
So kind of and kind of like Lindsay, what do you think of these?
Are these common?
Oh, yeah.
They're everywhere, Michelle.
They are everywhere.
Very frequently we use them.
So we're going to go through them because you'll definitely hear them in the business world.
And, of course, outside of business.
On this show we like to find the intersection between business and life.
How do we build relationships?
Right.
So, yeah, let's go into it, Michelle.
All right.
Well, first, let's start with just kind, right?
Yeah.
So it's either a sort of something, right?
A kind of ice cream.
A kind of cake.
A type of something.
Yep.
Yep.
A type.
Right.
And, you know, it could also mean nice.
Right.
A kind person.
They are very different meanings.
Completely different meanings there.
Right.
But today we're talking about it as a type or a sort of something.
Right, Michelle?
Right.
Right.
So but we'll get into that more.
So let's do let's do kind of first, Lindsay.
What is what is this?
What?
Yeah, yeah kind of is kind of saying yeah, it's just another way of saying sort of a little bit or a little or a bit.
Right.
So it's like you're wishy washy but you you, mostly it's like more than 50 that you want that ice cream or something.
So I kind of want an ice pop right now, right?
Or I kind of want a second cup of coffee for this meeting, but I don't want to be too wired.
Or I kind of think we need to review our figures from last year.
So you're not saying we have to, we must.
You're not saying with total conviction.
Mm hmm.
Mm hmm.
Um, so, or it could also be used just as an answer to a question, right?
Same meaning.
So here's a little role play.
Do you like the new software we just got?
Kind of.
There's some issues though.
So I'm not saying that I love the software, right?
I'm not going to give you that.
I'm going to say it's okay, but there are some issues and they need to be addressed.
Yeah.
So that's interesting Lindsay, because with the other examples I kind of want an ice pop right now.
We're saying it is kind of more than 50%.
But if somebody asks you a question and you say kind of, it sounds more like not so much.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah, because I think in the other examples you're kind of saying it in a way that you're expressing a craving kind of right.
I kind of want, and oh my God, I can't stop saying kind of now.
I know, oh my gosh, that's what happens.
Yeah, you're saying I kind of want an ice pop right now.
You also might.
This might mean I want an ice pop right now, but you're trying to be a little less blatant maybe.
Yeah, maybe maybe you're feeling other people out maybe, or like yeah, maybe you're saying oh, i kind of want to get a coffee right now to see if maybe someone would say, oh yeah, i'll go with you right, it can yeah, in that way be used to invite someone or to try and see if somebody will join you or feels the same way, kind of interesting, or sometimes we kind of yeah, we need that.
Um And this can go across gender lines.
This can fall differently across gender too that I feel like I was just reading an interesting book by Glennon Doyle.
I can't remember the name of it, but she was saying that she noticed in she went and asked her kids.
So she has a daughter and she has a son and her daughter and son had friends over.
So there were boys and girls in the room, teenagers.
And she asked her.
She walked in the room and asked everyone, do you want a snack?
And what happened is all the guys said, yeah.
She said, are you hungry?
And they said, all the guys were like, yeah, I'm starving.
And they didn't like look to anyone else.
They didn't make eye contact with their friends to find out how they felt.
But the girls made eye contact with the other girls and decided as a group, no, we're okay.
It's really interesting.
That is very interesting.
Yeah, really fascinating.
It's a great book by Glennon Doyle.
So there's there could be some gender stuff here, too.
I'm not saying women are always going to say I kind of want an ice pop, where guys are going to say I want an ice pop.
But it's interesting to think about how language comes into gender comes into language.
Yeah, definitely.
And then I do want to highlight just also how the more neutral way would be like a sort of a type of
So you could say...
Mint chocolate chip is a kind of ice cream.
Right.
Yes.
Different.
Very different.
Very different.
Yeah.
So interesting.
We're dealing with a lot of different uses of kind of.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Don't forget to hit the follow button, guys.
If you love our show here.
We focus on building relationships and business, which will get you so much further than knowing facts.
Yes.
Love it.
Oh, yeah.
It'll also make work more fun if you're more connected.
Yes.
Yes.
Um, so, all right.
What about kind of like, let's move into this.
Yeah, this is interesting.
So this is for giving an example or saying something is similar to something else, making a comparison,
However, unless it's like, I kind of like, right?
Like, I kind of like berries.
Very different sentence structure there, even though it's exactly the same words, right?
That is just saying I basically like berries.
Like, I sort of like berries.
Some preference for berries.
It's not like I love them, but I kind of like them, right?
Right, right, right.
What about giving an example?
That's the main... Right, yeah.
What does that thing on...
Right, exactly.
So for example, this software is very similar to the other.
Actually, it's kind of like the one we stopped using last year.
So you're saying somewhat similar.
It's somewhat similar to.
That would be exactly another way to say it, right?
This setup is simple.
It's kind of like how our office was when we first opened.
So it's somewhat similar to how our office was when we first opened, or?
This shouldn't be too hard.
I'll explain.
It's kind of like the conference we just had, but it's much bigger, so don't get tripped up here.
Even though the words look exactly the same, the meaning can be very different depending on what we're trying to say.
Right?
Yeah yep, exactly.
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All right, Michelle, so why is this useful for business?
Yeah.
So, I mean, this is so common.
Lindsay and I are tripping over ourselves because we keep on wanting to say kind of like.
I know, I didn't realize it.
I love when that happens on the show, when we are teaching something and then we can't stop saying it, naturally.
And then we're like, ah!
You're like, we need to be covering this because we say exactly.
Yeah, exactly.
So it's just so common.
And it's so.
It's really useful for relating things and giving examples, or also to say you're not quite sure what you think.
So there's many different contexts here.
Yeah.
So, Lindsay, what's your favorite kind of episode to record?
So you're asking here about my favorite type of episode, right?
So my favorite kind of episode Michelle, is answering a listener question, because I know when we answer that listener question we're directly impacting or helping a listener.
So that's what I love.
Michelle, I have another question for you, though.
Okay.
Do you listen to any other language podcasts that are kind of like ours?
Oh, so this one, it means somewhat similar to ours, right?
Yeah.
Um, I, uh, I would love to, I actually, I'm, I'm on the hunt for a good language podcast.
I think it would be really good for me, um, you know, to listen to them, but I, I'm not currently.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I know.
I want to listen to more Spanish podcasts because we know obviously for our listeners, listening to this show has helped them get better.
It's kind of a really cool way of just being edutained, you know, edutainment.
Let me edutain you.
Yeah.
So good.
So good.
So in those two questions, we can see the stark difference, right?
Yeah.
The first one was, what's your favorite kind of episode to record?
So what's your favorite type of sort of, right?
But the second one is that context of we could have just said do you listen to any other language podcasts that are similar to ours?
Exactly.
Yeah.
You can totally swap in similar to, and that would mean the exact same thing.
So shall we do a role play and clear any questions up for our listeners now?
Yeah, let's do it.
Here we go.
So we are learning new software at work.
Oh, no.
Good luck.
Good luck.
Oh, my gosh.
Here we go with the two of us.
I'm just kind of nervous about this.
Oh, don't be.
It's easy.
It's kind of like the time you were nervous about starting here, but then you were fine.
Remember?
Kind of.
Oh, I remember.
So everything we're doing today is kind of like what we worked on last week.
Same idea.
Oh, okay.
Yeah.
So kind shows up everywhere.
Yeah.
I mean, and you could hear it like this.
I mean, people, it's all over.
I don't think it's too obvious.
Oh my God.
They keep on saying kind of, right?
Because it means so many different things and it's so, it's so useful.
And we didn't even use the use of kind meaning nice.
Kinda nice.
Yeah, no, we didn't even use that.
So kinda is everywhere.
We just got to get used to it.
All right.
So you said, I'm just kind of nervous.
And you probably would have said in the real world.
I'm just kinda, I'm kinda nervous about this right.
You probably would have brought those two words together, right?
And we talk about this a lot in our pronunciation course that just came out last month Global English Pronunciation.
Guys, go over to allearsenglish.com slash pronunciation if you want to know more about that.
Okay.
Yes.
And then you said, don't be, it's easy.
It's kind of like the time you were nervous about starting here, right?
So you're relating it to something.
So you could say, you could have said it's similar to the time you were nervous.
And again, there, you could have also said, it's kind of like the time.
Kind of like.
Kind of like the time.
But for the next one, then I said, remember, and you said, kind of, right?
So it's like, almost like I sounds fuzzy not yeah, you're not clear in my memory.
Yeah, and maybe, or maybe you also just don't know if it's the same thing, you don't know.
Yeah yeah, it could be either of the two.
You either can't remember right very well or you don't think it's a good comparison.
Right right um, not showing much confidence.
Yeah right exactly, not much confidence basically uh, and then you said oh, i remember.
So everything we were doing today is kind of like what we worked on last week, same idea, so similar to um, and you could.
You probably wouldn't say kind of like.
You would say kind of like, kind of like.
No, native speakers don't have time for kind of like.
They just don't have time, they gotta get to work.
So good stuff, guys.
Go check out business english 490 doing business or making business.
That's tackling that age-old challenge of do versus make.
Right yeah, really good, love it.
Any takeaway for our listeners today?
Yeah, you will hear this everywhere.
Don't get nervous if it can get a little confusing, because we did give you a lot of different ways to use this.
Yes, I would start by looking out for one of these and one, one kind of context, and start to pick them out one at a time, because otherwise it might get a little overwhelming.
So we don't want you to be overwhelmed.
Give these a try.
Try them.
I mean, you can use one of these today easily.
I mean, there's so you know. common.
So choose one and really run with it for a little bit and then you can start stacking on more.
Yeah, that's good advice, Michelle.
Choose one meaning and look for it in listening first.
Try to find native speakers using it in that meaning.
Then once you've heard it a few times, start to use it and then expand to the others.
I like it.
So good.
Okay, Michelle.
All right.
Well, you have a good rest of your day.
I'll see you back here very soon.
All right.
All right, Lindsay.
Bye.
Have a good day.
Bye.
Take care.
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