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Hey everybody, this is Connor and you're listening to episode 90 of the Listening Time Podcast.
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All right?
In today's episode, we're going to talk about some life lessons that I've learned.
I thought of this topic and I thought this would be a great series of episodes.
So I think that From time to time I'll do an episode about different lessons that I've learned throughout my life and it will be a good way for me to reflect on different things that I've learned and share that experience or information with you.
So in today's episode, I chose three specific lessons that I've learned in my life.
So I hope that will be interesting for you today.
Remember that you have the transcript for this episode that's in the description down below.
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All right, let's get started.
Are your ears ready?
You know what time it is.
It's listening time.
Okay, so let's talk about three life lessons that I've learned so far.
So the first one that I want to talk about is that success or progress in life comes gradually as the result of small habits.
So when I say the word gradually, I'm saying that it happens slowly over time.
So the lesson that I want to talk about is that when you have success in most areas of your life, It's usually a result of good habits that you've put in place.
And these aren't miraculous, amazing things.
They're just small, good habits that help you gradually or slowly become more and more successful.
Okay.
So let me talk about a few examples, a few areas of your life where you might see this and where I've seen this.
So first, let me talk about health.
So I've had successes and failures when it comes to health.
So I think I've been successful in staying healthy in general.
So I would say that I'm pretty healthy on average.
I think I'm healthier than the average person in my country.
And I don't think that this is because I made some huge change in my eating habits or my exercise habits overnight and then I suddenly became really healthy right away.
I'm not saying that that can't work.
I know some people that have done that.
They've made huge changes in just one decision, and then they completely changed their life from that point on.
That's okay, and some people have done that.
But I think for most people it's about just changing little habits in their nutrition or in their exercise and implementing just good habits little by little.
And eventually, the overall accumulation of these habits makes you a healthier person.
So, for example, I haven't completely stopped eating any junk food, for example.
However, little by little, I've gotten better about choosing a better option.
For example, nowadays I don't drink a lot of sugary drinks.
And that wasn't just like one day I decided I could never have sugary drinks ever again.
But what I did is, for example, I stopped keeping sugary drinks at home.
So I didn't buy them from the supermarket.
And so I didn't have them in the fridge.
So even though I wanted soda or juice or whatever, when I opened my fridge, there wasn't any there.
And that little habit made me start to drink just more water and not these sugary drinks.
So it wasn't some huge miraculous decision in my life.
By the way, that word miraculous comes from the word miracle.
So a miracle is some supernatural event.
So it wasn't anything like that.
I just implemented the small habit of not buying soda or juice when I went to the store and that, little by little, made me a healthier person.
So things like that have helped me be more successful in my health, but I've also had failures.
The opposite has also happened, where just a small habit of, for example, allowing myself to buy a snack every time I went to the corner store, because oftentimes in Mexico we would go to these little convenience stores we call them to buy water or something like that.
And if I was inside, I would often see some type of snack and say, okay, I'll buy that.
And because of that little habit, I realized I was eating much more junk food than I was before.
So it happens and it occurs both ways.
So it could be something that can help you succeed or fail in your health.
And in my academic career, I have had a lot of success.
I was a good student throughout my whole educational career, not because I'm a genius or anything far from that but because I had really good small habits that I would put in place.
So I had 14 days to write 10 pages.
So I would divide the number 10 by the number 14 and then I would see how many pages I needed to write every day, right?
So it would be like you know something, 07 or whatever, and then that's the amount of pages I would write every day, from the first day until the day before the assignment was due, right?
In English, when we say that something is due, this means that you have to deliver it on that day.
It is due then.
So because of that little habit, I always finished my essays on time and I never had to do everything on the last day, for example.
So that was an example of a little habit that made me successful today. in my academic career.
And one more example in my career in general, I create a lot of content for English learners, as you probably know, And now I'm able to actually support myself financially by doing this.
Not 100, but I'm able to slowly start decreasing the hours that I have to spend teaching one-on-one classes.
So now I'm teaching much less than I was before.
Because I've been able to become more successful in my content creation.
And that's helped me support myself financially.
And that didn't happen because of one overnight success.
And in English, when I use that word overnight...
What I'm saying is that it happens in one instant.
It's overnight.
So I haven't had overnight success.
What I started with was a simple YouTube channel back in 2017 where I posted really low quality videos teaching English.
And I just decided to post videos there.
I posted videos every week almost.
Sometimes I was a little less consistent, but I never stopped that for like five years pretty much.
And even though I had zero success at the beginning and I had zero success throughout the first four years or so, to be honest I continued with that little habit of just posting a video, posting some free content, and that small habit of, Over time, eventually built up a big audience of people that was watching my content.
And that allowed me to start this podcast after that.
And it allowed me to have an audience listening to me here.
And this podcast has grown a lot since it first started.
So it wasn't just one miraculous moment or one overnight change that made me successful.
It was just implementing this small habit of creating a little bit of content each week, right?
And I'm not saying that I've had a ton of success in my career.
I don't want to give you that impression, but I just thought this was a good example.
I've also had failures in my career where I haven't implemented these small habits and I waited for just the inspiration to do some project, for example, and then that inspiration never came and I never did the project.
So I've also failed in that regard because I didn't implement these small habits and I didn't wanna be consistent and patient and wait for that success.
So let me talk about the second life lesson now, which is that complaining solves little.
So I know a lot of us complain.
I'm guilty of this.
I have complained a lot throughout my life, especially when things aren't fair.
When I say, that's not fair.
Why is it like that?
I've complained a lot about things that I haven't found to be right or fair.
So I'm definitely guilty of this.
And this has caused a lot of stress in my life.
I immediately feel more stressed when I start complaining about something and I have that type of attitude.
And I've realized that complaining doesn't actually solve my problem, right?
Sometimes it could help you out if you complain to some business that you didn't like their service or something like that.
They might give you something for free or something like that.
But in general, complaining doesn't solve things.
And so what does solve things is actually doing things.
So instead of complaining about a certain problem, it's better to actually act and do something, be proactive, and you can actually make some progress and solve problems like that.
So there have been times in my career where I complained about not having success.
Because as I already mentioned, it took me a long time before I had any type of success.
A long time.
Years.
I created a lot of free content and it was a little bit hard for me at times and I complained at times, but that didn't help me at all.
It actually made me produce less content during certain periods of time and that made it worse for me.
So what helped me was to actually think of new ways to do things, or to think of new projects, or to think of new types of content that people might like, and that's how this podcast got started.
Right, i decided that this was a good way to reach more people, and i decided to do this instead of just complain about not having success with youtube or whatever.
And then Eventually, I actually started having more success with this podcast, and that's because I stopped complaining and I started just doing things to try to solve the problem.
So that has helped me in my life for sure.
And one lesson that I'm still trying to incorporate into my life is that I need to accept things that aren't in my control and that aren't perfect.
Right.
Because things are not always going to be perfect.
That's a hard thing for a lot of us.
But it's life.
Right.
Life isn't perfect.
Life isn't fair a lot of the time and we just have to use the hand we're dealt and act and do something.
In English, when we say that you use the hand that you're dealt, we're just saying that you use whatever tools, whatever resources, whatever situation that you've been given.
All right, and the third life lesson I want to talk about is that budgeting is important.
In English, when we use the word budget, this could be a noun or a verb that we use when talking about planning how much money you you're going to spend.
This could be a monthly thing, a monthly budget, a weekly budget, a yearly budget but basically it's planning and organizing the money that you're going to spend and you decide How much money you're going to spend on what thing, right.
That's budgeting.
So for many years, I didn't budget well.
I just had the idea in my mind that I was spending less than I was earning.
So that was okay.
And that was a big mistake.
I can see now.
Now that I've started budgeting, I can see how important it is.
Simply put, if you don't budget, you can't really manage your financial situation well, because you don't know how how much money you're spending and you don't realize how much money you're spending on different things.
It's really a mystery until you look back at the last month and you look at all the money you've spent and then you suddenly realize whoa, I spent a lot of money last month.
It usually comes as a surprise.
And for many people they think that they are spending a good amount of money, but they realize that they are having trouble saving money and they don't know why that is.
And that's usually because they're not budgeting.
They don't actually have a plan of how much money they're going to spend or and on what they're going to spend that money.
So since I've started doing that, it has really changed my financial situation.
So one thing that happens is that it lets you know if you're actually spending too much, because sometimes you don't know this.
You don't know if you're spending too much or not.
But when you budget, you can see that very clearly and you can say, oh, I'm spending too much.
I shouldn't buy this.
And, on the other hand, it also allows you to not feel guilty for spending, because sometimes I have the habit of not wanting to buy something because I think that I shouldn't spend money on that.
However, if I create a budget and I actually organize my spending and allow myself to spend a certain amount of money on different things, then when I spend money on something and that's part of my budget and I haven't gone over my limit, then then I don't need to feel guilty, right?
I already have money allocated towards that thing.
In English, when we say that you allocate money or time towards something, this just means that you dedicate it towards that specific thing.
So because I've allocated some money towards a certain thing, I can spend on that thing and I don't need to feel guilty because I know that that's part of my plan.
And that's really helped me as well, because a lot of times I feel guilty for spending money on certain things.
And it's not fun.
And budgeting also allows you to save up for future things that you want to buy, because you allocate a certain amount of your income towards your savings, and it allows you to just save money in general.
Like I mentioned, a lot of people have trouble saving money in general, but if they actually plan this and they say this percentage of my income needs to be saved, then it becomes much easier to save.
So budgeting has a ton of benefits.
It allows you to really take control of your financial situation.
And so that's why I've included it here in this episode about life lessons.
All right.
Why don't we stop there for today?
I hope this episode was interesting for you and I hope it was good practice for your listening.
Remember that if you want my specialized training, then you can sign up for my membership and, And in particular, if you want my advanced episodes, then become a Listening Time family member or VIP.
And if you become a VIP, you can ask me your questions regarding English or language learning and I'll answer them every week in a video.
QA session.
So the link to sign up is in the episode description below this episode.
And remember to follow me on Facebook as well.
The link is down in the description.
And of course, the link to the transcript is there as well.
And if you like this podcast, please give it a five-star rating and write a review and share it with anyone else you know who's learning English.
All right, thank you for listening to this episode and I'll talk to you on the next episode of Listening Time.
