Welcome to a new episode of English Vocabulary Booster.
My name is Lara and I'm a SALSA-certified English teacher.
Learning new vocabulary usually takes a long time, but we'll do it in a way that's easy, quick and efficient.
In every episode, we'll learn how to use five new English words or expressions, so that you too can start speaking like a native.
So let's get learning!
Hey everyone and welcome to a new episode.
If you could just see me now, you would die.
I am sitting at a desk because obviously I want to be professional, and then over me I have a blanket and just like when I say over me, it's not like on my lap.
I mean like It's basically like a little tent that I built for myself.
And my computer and I are both underneath this blanket, because this is the only solution I've found to make the sound work.
Because otherwise, I wasn't happy with the way the podcast sounded.
So yeah, the only problem is that it's still pretty hot in my mom's house.
So yeah, I'm going to try to make it quick.
Anyway, let's listen to the story.
Today we're going to talk about guilt.
This was so fun.
I love the pool here.
Man, if only you could have a house like this.
I know, right?
I can't believe we have to leave in a few hours.
So wait, all you had to do in order to stay here was tell this lady you were going to watch her cat?
Yeah, she said she was going to be gone for a couple days and that she needed someone to stay here feed the cat.
You know that kind of stuff.
Sweet.
Yeah, and she's away a lot, so if everything goes well, we get to do this a...
Mark, is the glass door open or closed?
Um, it's, it's open.
Do you want me to close it?
Of course.
What if the cat gets out?
Fine, fine.
Here, it's closed.
Where is the cat though?
Oh no.
Simba?
Simba?
Come here, kitty.
Oh my gosh, I think it got out.
Listen, Can't be far.
Oh gosh, I don't... It's all my fault, Mark.
I can't believe it.
I had one responsibility and I... Okay, no.
This is not the time for guilt trip.
We're gonna find it.
What do you care?
It wasn't your responsibility.
I was the one in charge.
What are you talking about?
It's my fault too.
I was here with you, so I'm guilty by association.
Okay, look under the couch.
I've seen it there earlier.
No, there's nothing here.
I'm telling you, man, if we can't find it, this thing is going to weigh on my conscience forever.
Okay, can you just be a little bit more optimistic for a second?
I can't.
I'm getting nauseous.
And is that the door?
Oh my gosh.
What is she doing here?
She was supposed to get here tonight.
Hello.
I'm home.
Oh, there you are, Susie.
Oh, you have company.
Hi, Mrs. Williams.
Yes, this is my friend Mark.
Mrs. Williams, before you say anything, I just need to come clean.
I don't even know where to begin.
So the thing is that earlier Mark and I were in the pool and we got out and we got back in the house and the door was closed, but like it wasn't really closed.
And I just thought, what's this trying to say is that we lost your cat.
You feel so bad, Mrs. Williams.
You have no idea.
I'm gonna help you look for him.
I'm gonna stay here until I- Susie, what are you talking about?
Simba's right there.
What?
Oh my gosh, thank goodness.
All right, ready for some new expressions?
I don't know how much oxygen I have left. in this little tent that I built for myself.
So if I just stop talking all of a sudden, you know why?
It's probably because I've ran out of oxygen.
Anyway, let's talk about expression number one, guilt trip.
This is not the time for a guilt trip.
If you're on a guilt trip, does that mean the reason you're feeling guilty is usually reasonable, or not?
Not really.
When you're on a guilt trip, that means that you're feeling too guilty, especially considering the situation.
And you're very obsessive about how guilty you're feeling.
So you might keep talking about it or you might obsessively think about how guilty you feel and why, and all the bad things that you've done.
It's just it's not a fun trip.
Let's put it that way.
Being on a guilt trip is no fun at all.
When was the last time you were on a guilt trip?
I think I go on a guilt trip pretty much every time that my boyfriend has to change his plans to kind of accommodate mine.
Or better like say, we want to spend some time together and he had something planned and then he has to cancel something.
Every time that he has to do something like that, I go on a guilt trip.
And, you know, he's a lot busier than I am.
He's got a lot more friends.
He's got a very active social life.
He plays lots of sports.
And I'm like the complete opposite, I would say.
So more often than not, he's the one who needs to compromise and cancel one of his plans to spend time together.
I mean, to make just time for us, you know, as a couple.
And I know that that's how relationships work.
And, you know, you're supposed to compromise.
You're supposed to make sacrifices in order to be in a relationship.
Otherwise, you know, you can't be in a relationship.
Right.
But that doesn't prevent me from feeling super guilty every time he has to like cancel something.
Expression number two, guilty by association.
I was here with you, so I'm guilty by association.
If you're guilty by association, are you guilty because you did something bad or not?
No.
If you're guilty by association, that means that you didn't necessarily do anything bad.
But if you're guilty by association, who did something bad?
If you say that you're guilty by association, that means that someone that you're with did something bad.
So someone I don't know just say someone decides to tell a lie and you know about it, but you don't tell the truth, then you're guilty by association.
Even though you didn't do anything.
Just you know, because you were there and you didn't do anything to stop this bad thing from happening.
That makes you guilty by association.
Have you ever been accused of being guilty by association?
I don't think so.
It was mostly because if I wanted to do something bad and I'm especially referring to the time when I was a teenager, when I was a little bit more rebellious I would just do it.
If I was a little bit naughtier than I am now well, much naughtier than I am now.
There are some things that I look back to and I'm like, oh my gosh, like why did I do that?
That is so messed up.
Um, but it was always me.
If I wanted to do something bad, I was the one doing it.
And maybe some of my friends were guilty by association, but it wasn't the other way around.
So no, I don't think I could have ever been considered guilty by association.
Expression number three, weigh on your conscience.
If we can't find it, this thing is going to weigh on my conscience forever.
If something's weighing on your conscience, do you feel guilty about it or not anymore?
Yes.
If something is weighing on your conscience, you are feeling extremely guilty.
You have like, you know, there's a reason why you have the word weigh in this expression.
It's because it does feel like a weight.
It's like this pressure that you have, I don't know, on your chest or you know in your head, and you just feel so guilty and you can't let it go.
What feelings might you experience if something's weighing on your conscience?
I think, I don't know, maybe it depends.
I think definitely you might be feeling sad if something's weighing on your conscience.
You might be obsessively thinking about that thing.
You're feeling irritated.
You're feeling frustrated.
But mostly yeah, I think mostly there's a You would mostly feel sad and maybe disappointed in yourself for not doing the right thing.
Is there something weighing on your conscience right now?
A lot of things.
But I think right now my number one thing is that I'm not making enough time for the people that I love.
It's something that makes me feel really bad and it's really weighing on my conscience.
And especially the fact that I'm not really in touch with my nephew and my niece, my older sister's kids.
That's something that just...
It really weighs on my conscience because you know I don't know if you're familiar with this but my sister and I are no longer talking.
And you know, it's hard for me to keep a relationship with my nephew and my niece when I don't talk to my sister, because it's just, it's weird, because I don't know what they think of me.
I don't know.
It's just it's complicated.
And maybe I'm making it more complicated than it should be.
But yeah, I often think about it and I'm like, you know, this is bad.
I wish I had the courage and the strength to do something, to kind of have that relationship with my nephew and my niece again.
And hopefully it's going to happen sometime soon because, like I said, it's really weighing on my conscience.
Expression number four, come clean.
Mrs. Williams, before you sing anything, I just need to come clean.
If you come clean, do you tell the truth or not?
Yes, if you come clean, that means that you've decided to tell the truth.
And how do you usually feel before coming clean?
What about after?
So if you've decided to come clean, that means that beforehand you were hiding something.
You had a secret or you had done something bad and you didn't want to share it.
And then you decide to come clean and tell the truth.
Well obviously, before coming clean, you're probably, if you do have a conscience and if you're not a psychopath.
I guess you might be feeling very guilty, very sad very Um, frustrated with yourself and you might be thinking very negative things about yourself.
Whereas after coming clean, after telling the truth, you know, especially after hiding something for a long time, I think you would definitely feel relief.
So you would feel relieved.
You would feel so much better, I guess lighter in a way, because a weight has been lifted off your shoulders.
So yeah, it feels good to come clean.
It's always scary, super scary, especially when it's a big thing that you're hiding.
But I think you always feel better afterwards.
When was the last time you decided to come clean?
So usually I don't hide things from people.
Well, I don't want to say, but it's like small things.
If that happens, it's not something that would really weigh on my conscience.
But I remember this one time we were in Naples and we were traveling.
So we were staying at an Airbnb like we did.
Every week, you know, it was a different house.
And I remember we were in this little apartment in Naples or near Naples, I should say.
And there was a glass door.
And I remember at this one time walking out onto the balcony and then coming back in and shutting the door.
And apparently I did it with a bit too much strength, I guess.
And there was a piece of metal that just broke.
And so you couldn't close the door.
And the thing was that we were on the first floor.
So obviously, like we needed to, that that door especially when you left needed to be locked because you didn't want people coming in and out of the house.
And I just, I was so, I felt devastated.
I felt so bad.
I mean, accidents happen.
There was this one other time when we broke like a jar or something.
And when I say we, I mean, I broke a jar because they dropped it in another apartment.
I'm very clumsy.
So, you know, these things happen.
But this one was like a big thing.
And I was like researching everything you could do to fix it.
I was trying to kind of estimate the costs.
And, um, at the end of the day, I decided to, you know, come clean with the owner of the place.
I sent him a text and I was so, so worried.
I did not want to come clean.
And then my boyfriend was sort of like you know, like stuff like this happens, like don't worry about it.
Um, And so I sent him the text and he was okay about it.
I mean, he wasn't thrilled, but who would be in this case?
But anyway, I felt way better after I came clean.
Expression number five, feel bad.
I feel so bad, Mrs. Williams.
If you're feeling bad, what kind of feelings will you experience?
If you're feeling bad, you're going to feel guilt, a lot of guilt, definitely remorse and, I guess, sadness too.
Is there a difference between feeling bad and feeling guilty?
So I think this is really interesting because I never really stopped to think about the distinction between these two expressions.
But there is actually a difference.
And I think it's a really interesting difference.
So basically, when you say that you're feeling guilty, I feel like the focus is mostly on you, on how you're feeling.
So you might be doing a lot of reflection on how the action that you did, the bad thing that you did, is making you feel and what consequences that action is having on you and your person and your thoughts.
Whereas when you say, I feel bad, The focus, I feel like it's more on the other person.
So you're not so much concerned about what you're feeling, but more so on what the other person's feeling, on how your actions have affected someone else.
So if you like say stepped on someone's toes, then you might be feeling guilty.
So you might be feeling like, oh, I like, I wish I didn't do that.
I'm a terrible person and this and that.
I don't think you're a terrible person for stepping on someone's toes, by the way.
But, you know, it's just an example.
But if you say I feel bad, that means that you're thinking about this other person's toes and you're thinking about how you're stepping on their toes affected them.
So there is a slight difference and an important one, if you ask me.
When was the last time you felt bad and about what?
I actually think it was yesterday.
So my sister had invited me to a lunch with her in-laws.
She sometimes goes there for lunch and she was going with her husband, her kids and my mom was going as well.
And she invited me and I knew like she wanted me to be there.
But I was feeling so tired.
And at first I said yes.
And then I thought about it.
I was like okay, this is just not, like if I go I'm going to be miserable because I'm tired and I don't want to drive, and all these things.
And so, yeah.
You know, I thought it's just best if I don't go.
But I definitely felt bad because I knew that she would have liked it if I had gone.
But that's okay.
I mean, I also know that she doesn't take these things personally.
And that's what I love about her too.
So, but yeah, that was the last time that I felt bad.
And that is it for today.
And remember, if you want to access the transcript, as well as lots of other resources, visit enboocom.
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Have a great day.
