I’m sitting here on my last day in the Seychelles, staying at the Savoy Spa Resort. It’s a beautiful five-star setting, and the breakfast spread is splendid—pastries, exotic fruits, everything you could imagine.

But watching the people around me is fascinating. Despite our stomachs being only about the size of a fist, tables are loaded. People are eating way too much. We tell ourselves, “It’s just a holiday treat,” but in reality, overeating is a clear sign that you are out of resonance with your body.

The Disconnect: Swallowing More Than Just Food

If you were truly in tune with your body, you would never overeat. You would intuitively feel exactly what your body needs, how much it needs, and when it needs it.

I can talk about this because I was that guy. I used to binge at every hotel stay. In fact, back in the day, I’d binge eat and drink every night, then starve myself and over-exercise the next day to “compensate.” It was a cycle of self-punishment.

The root of this isn’t a lack of “willpower.” It starts in childhood.

How We Learned to Stop Feeling

When you were a child throwing a tantrum—which is normal for any toddler—were you guided through that emotion? Or were you punished for it?

Most of us were told, “Stop that. It’s not okay to be angry.” We were taught to swallow our anger. We were even told to suppress our joy (“Don’t get too excited or you’ll end up crying”). When you are forced to swallow your emotions, you eventually stop feeling your body altogether.

Our emotions live in our bodies. When you learn to experience, understand, and integrate a feeling, you build an awareness that resonates with your whole being. But if you’ve spent 40 or 50 years suppressing yourself, you end up as a successful, influential person who is still deeply unhappy. You overeat, you drink too much at night, you maybe even start an affair—anything to fill that void of disconnection.

Reconnecting: It’s Never Too Late

I used to be a miserable wreck. Today, the people who know me say my “aura” has changed completely. I am peaceful. I am calm. I am in connection with myself.

I no longer have the need to overeat. My body and I are on the same team. I start my morning with protein, have some porridge and dried fruits to replenish after a workout, and then I simply go about my day—swimming, walking, sightseeing.

That is what it means to enjoy life to its fullest. It’s not about the luxury of the hotel; it’s about the luxury of being in tune with yourself and allowing yourself to experience every emotion safely.

You’re the smartest guy on your team. You handle the most difficult tasks at work. You’re a high-level professional who knows how to solve problems and deliver results.

Yet, you can’t figure out why your wife keeps rejecting you.

It makes no sense, right? On paper, you did everything you promised 15 years ago. You climbed the ladder, got the promotions, bought the two cars, and secured the comfortable lifestyle. But in reality, your house feels empty. You come home to a stranger. The logic is broken, and you don’t know why.

The “Rigged System” Myth

When you talk to other men your age—around 40—you realize you aren’t alone. Thousands of high-achieving men feel underappreciated and discarded. They’ve tried their best, only to end up in a divorce court, paying alimony and feeling like their lives are ruined.

It’s easy to start believing the system is rigged. You see the horror stories online and the fear starts to keep you up at night: “Is this going to be me? Is she just waiting to take my money and run?”

But that fear is just another way to feel better about yourself, and ignore the reality. It is the victim in you.

There is a way out, but you won’t find it using the same logic you use at work.

The Problem with Being “Too Rational”

Our school system taught us that life is predictable. We were trained in the exact sciences—where $1 + $1 always equals $2. You assume that because you agreed on a “plan” with your wife 15 years ago, that plan should still be working.

But life isn’t driven by logic. It’s driven by emotions.

The fast-paced rat race has made you a master of the rational world, but it has blinded you to what’s happening “in here”—inside your own heart and mind. If you can’t hear yourself, you have no hope of understanding what’s happening inside your wife.

Reclaim Your Potential as a Man

I want to be clear: It is not the external circumstances. It is not a “rigged system.” It isn’t even that your wife hates you or wants your money.

The wall between you is built from blocks of suppressed emotion and subconscious programming. When you unblock the energy that’s preventing you from realizing your true potential as a man—a loving, present, and grounded man—the dynamic shifts.

She will want you again. You will be appreciated again. And the best part? You don’t have to sacrifice your career to get there. You can be an overall successful man, enjoying your manliness in all its aspects, while being respected at home.

We’ve all been there. You’re making an “X” amount of money, you’re struggling, and it feels like it’s never enough. You tell yourself, “If I just had a 20% raise, all my stress would evaporate.”

But then, you get the raise. And something strange happens.

You get more stressed. Your spending increases to match your new income. You realize you have a list of unfulfilled needs you didn’t even know existed. Suddenly, you’re even shorter on cash than before.

This is where many people fall for the “esoteric trap.” They start believing that money is the root of all evil, or that happiness is completely detached from financial matters. But while you’re off chasing “inner joy” in a vacuum, your family is still stressed because the bills still need to be paid.

The Victim Trap: “They’re Sucking Me Dry”

In this cycle, a dangerous tension grows at home. Your spouse or partner wants more—more security, more comfort, more life. But you don’t see it as a shared goal. You perceive their needs as a personal attack.

You feel like they are trying to suck the life force out of you. You think, “The more I give, the more they expect. Poor me.”

Welcome to 100% victimhood. And here is the hard truth: No amount of money will make your life comfortable if you feel like a victim on the inside. If you are stuck in the “Poor Me” mindset, more money is just more fuel for the fire. I know this because I lived it. No matter how much my income grew, my peace didn’t follow. If anything, the stakes just felt higher and the fear felt heavier.

Why Lottery Winners Go Broke

I recently saw a comment on my Facebook channel. Someone said, “If you’re such an NLP wizard, why don’t you get me an 18k-a-month job in Parliament?”

My answer? Be careful what you wish for.

There is a reason why lottery winners often end up broke, addicted, or miserable within a year. It wasn’t the money that ruined them; it was their internal emotional state. If you haven’t built the “internal container” to hold that kind of resource, the pressure will crack you.

An extra few thousand a month won’t bring you peace if your subconscious is programmed for scarcity. It will only increase your stress levels to a degree you can’t imagine.

The Magical Side Effect of Worth

Everything starts and ends with your emotions. Think about the last big decision you made. You felt a certain way, and then you acted.

If you want a different life, you don’t start with the Parliament job. You start by becoming your own authority. You start by cultivating:

• True Independence: Not being a slave to other people’s expectations.
• Internal Value: Knowing you are worthy regardless of your bank balance.
• Emotional Stability: Being the best version of yourself.

When you have these things, more money often becomes a “magical side effect.” It flows because your energy is no longer blocked by the “Poor Me” narrative. You stop being “torn apart” and start being the man who can handle whatever comes his way.

You work long hours at the office. Then you come home and… you keep working.

There are chores to finish, things to fix around the house, or maybe you’re remodeling a new place. You’re working late into the night, literally, because you’re convinced that if you just finish this one project fast enough, you won’t lose any money and you can finally have that “peace” you’ve been dreaming of.

But let’s be real: You’ve been living like this your entire adult life. That peace never comes, does it?

The Invisible Engine of Fear of Being Lazy

If you could quiet the wheels turning in your head for just five minutes, you’d realize that your constant “doing” isn’t about productivity. It’s about something inside of you that is forcing you to burn yourself out.

You are making decisions based on hidden fears:

• The Fear of Losing: Every day delayed is “money lost.”
• The Fear of Being Late: Everything had to be done yesterday.
• The Fear of “Lazy”: If you sat down to chill, would your wife think you’re failing? Would she think you aren’t providing enough?

You’ve convinced yourself that this pressure is “necessary,” but in reality, these fears are the cage. They keep you running like a hamster in a wheel until you have no time for your kids, no energy for your wife, and you’re standing on the edge of a clinical burnout.

From “Madman” to “The Rock”

A man who is burning himself out like a madman is not a stable partner. You think you’re giving your family a house or a future, but you aren’t giving them you. You aren’t giving them your time or your attention. Down that road, the relationship is likely doomed anyway, no matter how nice the house is.

But imagine a different version of yourself. Imagine resolving those inner conflicts—the ones that keep your nervous system on “High Alert” 24/7.

When you clear those subconscious fears, you become:

1. Stable: You no longer make decisions out of panic or pressure.
2. The Rock: When your wife is emotional or blames you for something, you don’t snap. You remain calm. You are the steady ground she can rely on.
3. Present: You can actually sit down and “smell the roses” without a voice in your head screaming about “lost time.”

Long-Term Survival vs. Short-Term Stress

You can continue to run until the wheel breaks, or you can choose to become a stable, centered man whose relationship actually thrives. The “miracle” happens when you realize that the world won’t end if you take a breath—but your world will end if you don’t.

You’ve survived a brutal week. You’ve been up at 5:00 AM every day, fueled by caffeine to survive the midday slump, and crashing late at night. Finally, Saturday arrives. You tell yourself, “This is it. I’m sleeping in until 9:00.”

But at 5:00 AM sharp, your eyes snap open. You’re wide awake, your mind is racing, and you can’t get back to sleep. Then, the “crash” hits around 9:00 AM. You feel like the walking dead—a total zombie—just as your family responsibilities and errands begin.

Week after month, year after year, the exhaustion piles up. You start to see clinical burnout looming on the horizon. You think, “If I collapse and have to take six months off, how will I pay the mortgage?” That thought alone creates a secondary layer of stress that makes sleep even harder to find.

The Failure of Melatonin and Sleep Trackers

I know this cycle because I lived it. A few years ago, I was waking up at 4:00 AM, unable to rest. I tried everything:

• Melatonin tablets and herbal teas.
• Sleep tracking apps and wearable tech.
• Optimizing sleep cycles and bedroom temperatures.

Nothing worked. Why? Because you cannot “hack” a nervous system that is stuck in survival mode. It turned out that my insomnia wasn’t a biological glitch; it was a result of deep-seated inner stress that had been with me since early childhood. I had no memory of when it started—it was just the “background noise” of my life.

Cleaning the Subconscious Program

The shift only happened when I stopped looking for external fixes and started subconscious therapy. I hired specialists to help me work through childhood traumas and “clean” the programs that kept my nervous system on high alert.

Slowly but surely, the magic happened. The “obnoxious” thoughts quieted down. I became a calmer person. My body finally felt safe enough to rest.

What “Putting Yourself First” Actually Looks Like

Today, my relationship with sleep is entirely different. For example, recently I woke up at 6:00 AM after seven hours of sleep. Previously, I would have forced myself to stay up and start my “to-do list” out of guilt or anxiety.

Instead, I checked in with myself. I realized I needed more energy. I had a warm drink (hot chocolate—I’ve been coffee-free for a month now!) and went back to bed. I slept until 8:30 AM.

That is what putting yourself first looks like. It’s the ability to look at a long to-do list and say, “My nervous system needs rest more than the world needs these errands done.” You can only do that when your nervous system is balanced. When you heal the root cause of your stress, you regain the ability to be calm enough to actually rest.

Are you constantly stressed out about money? Or to be more precise: the lack of it?

It seems like a stupid question, doesn’t it? Everyone is stressed about money. It’s the “modern world.” We make an X amount, the bills add up to X, Y, and Z, and the math never seems to favor us. We live in a perpetual state of lacking—lacking resources, lacking time, and ultimately, lacking happiness.

We look around and think, “That’s just how life is.” We assume only the “rich” are at peace, while the rest of us are destined for a lifelong struggle, punctuated by a few fleeting moments of joy on holiday before being sucked back into the 9-to-5 rat race.

But I’m here to break it to you: Your money worries aren’t actually about the money.

The Subconscious Decision of “Not Worthy”

It’s hard to believe when the bills are sitting on your desk, but your financial stress is actually a reflection of how you feel about yourself internally.

Every interaction you have with the external world—including your bank account—stems from your relationship with yourself. If you made a subconscious decision as a child that you are “less than,” “insignificant,” or “unworthy,” you will experience a “lack of resources” your entire life.

It doesn’t matter how much you earn. If you feel “not enough” inside, you will never feel like you have “enough” outside.

My Journey: From Budgeting Obsession to Inner Peace

How do I know this? Because I lived it.

A few years ago, I started making a decent income. I was very comfortable. Yet, I was miserable. The more money I made, the more afraid I became of losing it. I was obsessed with “rainy day funds,” pension investments, and hyper-detailed budgets. I followed all the financial advice, but the more I looked at the numbers, the more desperate I felt. I realized I was nowhere near the level of “secure.”

The insecurity wasn’t in the spreadsheet; it was permeating my life.

How I Started Enjoying the Money

I’m not miserable anymore. I didn’t win the lottery—I healed the emotions.

With the help of a specialist, I looked at those deep-seated feelings of being “small” and “lesser than.” I accepted the fear that the world wasn’t a secure place. I integrated those parts of myself and healed the internal void.

Now, I can finally enjoy life. I can feel the sunshine on my skin without a cloud of financial anxiety hanging over me. I’ve realized that when you heal the internal sense of “lack,” the external world stops feeling like a threat. You stop living for a distant retirement and start living in the moment.

So, you’ve already realized that you have low self-esteem. Maybe you’ve even seen a therapist and you’re “working on it,” yet you’re still not happy. You’re still low on energy, you feel under-appreciated at home, and you feel invisible at work.

Why is it so hard to just feel good?

The truth is that our lives are run by our subconscious mind about 95% of the time. Think about your drive to work—you don’t think about the turns or the pedals; it’s second nature. It’s automated.

Now, look at your emotional life. Isn’t that automated, too?

Your Emotional Auto-Pilot

When you meet a colleague who irritates you, that flash of anger is instant. When you speak to your boss, that surge of anxiety—that feeling like a small child in a principal’s office—is automatic.

You aren’t choosing to feel like a child. You are reacting exactly the way you did years ago when a teacher told you that you weren’t good enough. You can try to “fake it till you make it,” but you’ve probably realized by now that clichés don’t stand up to deep-rooted subconscious programming.

The Willpower Trap

These reactions are learned behaviors and emotions acquired when we were children. As long as they remain in the subconscious, you can try every “conscious” technique in the world—willpower, positive thinking, or breathing exercises—and you will likely still fail.

Why? Because willpower is a conscious tool, but your problem is a subconscious automation. You are trying to stop a speeding train by yelling at it.

Getting to the Root Cause

The only way to stop the “automated” anxiety or the “automatic” anger is through proper healing at the root cause. You have to go back to where those emotional reactions started.

Once you heal that root, you gain a new superpower: The ability to choose.

Instead of being a slave to your reactions, you can finally make a calculated, deliberate decision. The next time that person pisses you off or that boss triggers your school-day trauma, you can stop and say: “No, I am choosing to feel differently. I am choosing a different behavior.”

By exercising this new “choice muscle,” you stop repeating your past and finally start changing the course of your life.

Let’s get honest for a moment: are you truly being yourself when you communicate with the world? Whether you’re at work, with your family, or even just sitting alone with your own thoughts—are you the real you?

You might be tempted to say, “Of course I am! I tell people exactly what I think and I don’t care what they say.” But look closer. If your “authenticity” comes from a place of frustration, anger, or defensiveness, that’s not your true self. That’s just a reaction to an inner conflict. When you are truly connected to your core, you don’t need to be aggressive to be heard. You are at peace.

The Power of Putting Yourself First

When you find that connection to your deeper self, an amazing shift happens: you naturally maintain your inner peace, even in a high-pressure work environment or a heated conflict.

You stop compromising. Not in a stubborn way, but in a way that honors your values and how you feel about yourself. You naturally start putting your mental and emotional well-being first. Why? Because once you’ve found the real you, the idea of pretending to be someone else becomes exhausting and unnecessary.

How Your Boss and Clients Sense Your Worth

In your professional life, this change creates what I call a “miracle.”

When you stop pretending, the people around you—your boss, your colleagues, your clients—instinctively feel that you aren’t afraid. Because you aren’t belittling yourself in your own mind, they stop belittling you in reality.

They will actually start to cut you some slack. We all have areas where we lag behind or make mistakes; nobody is perfect. But there is a massive difference between these two approaches:

1. The Insecure Approach: You make a mistake and immediately project remorse and insecurity. You essentially tell the world, “I’m not worthy, please judge me.” People pick up on that instinctually and will often play into it, making you feel even worse.
2. The Authentic Approach: You acknowledge you are a “work in progress.” You see your faults, but you refuse to belittle yourself for being human.

Being at Peace in the Eye of the Storm

It is incredible how a lack of worthiness repeats itself in every area of your life until you address it. It’s like a broadcast signal that everyone else is tuned into.

But when you find yourself, the “miracles” start. You can be in the middle of a corporate “storm”—layoffs, deadlines, or office drama—and remain calm in the center of it.

The secret is simple but profound: Others will start to mirror the emotion you feel toward yourself. If you appreciate yourself, the world has no choice but to follow suit.

I had my first drink at 14. By 16, I’d had my first blackout. By 23, I realized I had a serious problem and quit cold turkey for eight months.

But then, that voice came back: “Hey, you can handle it now. Just one or two to feel that rosy, warm camaraderie, right?” It was a lie. I couldn’t handle “just one.” One turned into more, which turned into another blackout, which turned into a crushing weight of guilt the next morning. This vicious cycle didn’t last a few months—it lasted two decades.

Looking back, I finally see what was actually happening.

The “Social Lubricant” That Became a Refuge

Most people try to convince someone with a substance issue that “alcohol is the problem.” But they have it backward.

For me, alcohol wasn’t the problem—it was the perfect solution to how I felt inside. I was constantly anxious, jittery, and uneasy. I had deep social anxiety, and alcohol was my refuge. It was the only thing that made me feel good. It felt like my friend, not my enemy.

The real problem wasn’t the bottle; it was the emotional void I was trying to fill.

The Trap of “Hungover Control”

Beyond the anxiety, I had a deep-seated need to feel in control because my inner worth was so low. I tried to control my environment and my actions just to feel secure—to feel like I was the one in charge.

This led to a bizarre behavioral pattern:

1. I’d get drunk to feel better (but it never stopped at just a few).
2. I’d black out.
3. The next morning, drowning in guilt, I would go into “Over-Control Mode.”

I’d take a cold shower, pretend I wasn’t hungover, and even force myself to exercise while sick—just to prove to myself that “I’ve got this.” I was lying to myself every single day to maintain the illusion that I was still the man in charge.

The Emotional Void: Where the Pattern Begins

Alcohol gave me a break from constant anxiety, even if it only lasted for a few fleeting moments. But those moments were what I craved.

The moral of the story is that substance abuse is almost always emotional. It is an attempt to quell an anxiety or fill a void that often dates back to childhood. We are searching for a sense of significance and “good feeling” that we didn’t get enough of when we were young.

When you tangle up the need for relief with the need for control, you get a psychological cocktail that is incredibly difficult to break. But you can’t break it by just “quitting the drink.” You have to fix the emotion that makes the drink necessary in the first place.

Let’s be honest: if your job disappeared tomorrow, how much of your confidence would vanish along with it?

If you were fired today, how certain are you that you could find a new role—or an even better-paid one—within the next few months? You’ve seen the news. It isn’t an “employee’s market” anymore. Hiring freezes are everywhere, companies are downsizing, and everyone is betting on AI.

The moment I mention AI and Job Security in the same sentence, does your heart start to shake a little bit?

That reaction is a hard truth you can no longer hide from. The world is changing rapidly, and you have to ask yourself: What is your identity actually attached to?

As an Immigrant, Your Identity is Tied to Your Job in Particular!

Most of us have built our lives on a foundation of “External Credentials.” As immigrants, we tend to work extra hard, and we attach our worth to:

• Our current professional role.
• Our technical expertise and certifications.
• Acknowledgement from peers and bosses.
• Our reputation as a “valuable member of the organization.”

If your identity is built on these things, you are building a sand castle. It looks impressive, but it only takes one wave—one corporate restructure or one AI breakthrough—for it all to crumble. When the job goes, the man goes with it.

I’m not saying expertise doesn’t matter. It does. But if your entire core—down to your soul—is attached to something external, you have handed over your power to a world that doesn’t care about you.

Reclaiming Your Birthright

When you were born, you had a natural sense of worth. You didn’t need a job title to feel like you belonged on this earth. But along the way, most of us lost that. We learned to build a “Fake Identity” created out of other people’s recognition.

This is why the current market feels so scary. It’s not just a threat to your bank account; it’s a threat to your very existence. If the external scene changes too fast and too profoundly, and you haven’t cultivated your inner strength, you won’t be able to handle it.

Building the Unshakable Core

The only logical conclusion is this: You must start building a core identity that the external world cannot take away.

You need a strength that remains standing regardless of how “rapid, swift, and profound” the scenery changes. Whether you are the CEO or unemployed, whether you are speaking perfect English or struggling to find the words—your value must be unshakeable.

This is what we work on the coaching that I provide. We go beneath all of the external fluff to find the man who exists underneath all that noise!

Do you ever get blamed by your wife or girlfriend for not having enough time? Maybe she’s frustrated that you aren’t taking the kids out, or you aren’t “present” enough for her.

Meanwhile, in reality, you’re exhausted. You’re away at work, you’re providing for the family, or you’re trying to recover after a brutal night shift.

When she hits you with that blame, what’s the first emotion you feel? For most of us, it’s: “How dare you? Don’t you see how hard I’m working for you?”

You feel totally misunderstood. The person who is supposed to “get you” the most—the one who sees your struggle—seems to be the one who understands you the least. And so, unappreciated in marriage has become your everyday reality…

The Cycle of the “Man Cave” Escape

If this isn’t addressed, a dangerous pattern sets in. Her demands seem to grow, and you start neglecting your own needs even more. A couple of years down the line, the relationship often falls apart.

But even if you move on, the same pattern usually repeats in the next relationship. You get blamed, you feel resentful, and you find refuge in the only places you can:

• Grabbing a few drinks with buddies.
• Escaping into sports or gaming.
• Withdrawing into silence.

You develop this belief that “Life just isn’t fair. As a man, I’ll always be blamed no matter how hard I work.” And when your friends tell you that they also feel unappreciated in marriage and it is how marriages go, you just might decide to give up on women altogether. But what if I told you it doesn’t have to be this way?

What If Feeling Unappreciated in Marriage Doesn’t Have to Be the Norm?

Imagine a different scenario. Your partner says those same words to you—the same complaints, the same tone. But instead of that spark of anger igniting inside you, nothing happens. You don’t feel that defensive surge of resentment.

Imagine how interesting it would be if you could approach the situation pragmatically. You could look at her and say:

“Honey, I can see why you’d feel that way. If I were in your shoes, I’d probably feel the same. But let me tell you how I see it…”

A normal conversation ensues. She might still try to fight at first because she’s not used to the “New You,” but by the 5th or 10th time you respond with calm empathy instead of anger, she starts to change too. The “Man Cave” is no longer your only escape.

The Myth of the “Rosy” Relationship

We’ve been sold a lie that a good relationship is 100% fine all the time, where two people are always head-over-heels and never say a bad word. That relationship does not exist.

A real, healthy relationship is one where two people can disagree, argue, and analyze a situation through each other’s eyes. That is how a relationship grows. That is how you grow old together instead of becoming two strangers living under the same roof, bitter and looking for exits.

It’s Not About the Argument—It’s About the Emotion Inside You

The moral of the story is that the problem isn’t the “unfairness” of her comments. The problem is the triggering emotion inside of you that leaves you with no choice but to be mad or run away.

If you could remove that internal “button” that gets pushed, everything would change. You could analyze the situation for what it is and see her perspective without losing your mind.

I know this is possible because I have changed myself. Through specific approaches in therapy and coaching, I’ve undergone this transformation. Life is so much better when you no longer carry that heavy, suppressed anger. You gain the ability to look at life’s challenges with a calm, clear mind.

When I say the word “burnout,” what’s the first thing that pops into your mind?

Naturally, you think of work. It’s the common narrative we hear everywhere: people are burning out because they work too many hours, carry too many responsibilities, or fear that AI will eventually take over their jobs.

As an immigrant, that pressure is even higher. You’re often working twice as hard just to prove you’re worthy—to your boss, to your family, and to yourself. But here’s the kicker: while those external pressures are real, they are often just the surface story.

The Stories Our Minds Create

Our minds are incredibly intelligent. They are experts at creating logical narratives to explain our pain. You tell yourself you’re exhausted because of toxic colleagues, the extra shifts, or a boss who doesn’t appreciate you.

While there is often a degree of truth to those things, they are rarely the root cause. Your mind builds these stories because it’s easier to blame a “toxic office” than it is to face the underlying theme that has been haunting you for years.

Why Changing Jobs Rarely Solves the Problem

When you only address the surface level, your solutions become distractions.

You might think that upskilling, changing careers, or moving to a different company will finally eliminate the burnout. But without addressing the underlying feeling, you’re just chasing a ghost. You can easily waste another five or ten years of your life chasing a “better future,” only to wake up and realize you are in the exact same boat, feeling the exact same emptiness.

You aren’t just tired of your job; you are tired of the internal battle you’ve been fighting since you arrived in this country. And maybe even before that.

The Question Behind the Exhaustion

I had a session with a client who felt completely drained of energy. Before we started the actual coaching, we discussed their situation. The client had a list of very logical, professional reasons why they weren’t feeling well and they also had a plan to fix them.

But as we went deeper, the “logical” reasons fell away. We hit the real wall: the emptiness. The questions that had been suppressed for years:

• “Who am I really?” “What am I doing here?” “What is my actual path?”

Getting to the Bottom of the Burnout

Until you experience these feelings viscerally and ask the right questions, you are just scratching the surface.

In my coaching sessions, we don’t just talk about your schedule or your boss. We go to the place where those deep feelings live. My client was shocked at what was revealed once we stopped looking at the “work story” and started looking at what was going on inside of them.

The same revelation is waiting for you. You don’t have to keep living as a stranger to yourself, escaping into work or distractions just to survive the day.

When I arrived in Ireland 24 years ago, I went onto a mission of learning English vocabulary because I thought it was going to help me overcome my fluency issues.

As a result, I acquired hundreds upon hundreds long English vocabulary lists also containing plenty of words that even native English speakers don’t use and they simply didn’t have a clue what they meant when I tried using them in real life!

I like to call such English vocabulary “sophisticated”, and I’ve also written extensively on this topic on my blog, here’s a couple of articles:

• Don’t Learn Some Obscure English Words that Even Native Speakers DON’T KNOW!
• Simple vs Sophisticated Vocabulary? It’s All Just Semantics (Interpretation)!

Now I know better than to learn English words that nobody uses in day-to-day communication; I’d rather use to learn the vocabulary I already know in DIFFERENT WAYS thus enabling me to speak about virtually any topic.

Sometimes, however, knowing how to use certain sophisticated English words comes in handy and as it was pointed out by one of my YouTube commentators, some English tests and exams may include such vocabulary.

So, without further ado, let’s learn some useful English expressions containing words that you may not have heard before – or maybe you’ve heard them a few times and wondered what they actually mean.

Needless to say, it’s strongly advised you acquire this sophisticated vocabulary by learning the entire word combination thus ensuring you’ll be able to USE the word in question! (Read this article to understand what exactly I’m talking about here)

Clairvoyant – you know the way sometimes people would assume that you know something while in reality you haven’t got any idea what they’re talking about? In situations like that I’d normally say “Do you think I’m a psychic or what?” You can, however, use this sophisticated word instead – clairvoyant – it describes pretty much the same concept. “Do you think I’m a clairvoyant or what?”

Serendipity – personally I love this word – and you’d use it to describe an event which is a result of a very, very big, almost impossible coincidence that has a very happy ending. A typical example would be two people meeting each other against all odds and finding out that they were almost destined to meet.

Seismic shift – this English collocation will come in really handy when describing a massive, fundamental change: “There’s been a seismic shift in the government’s stance in relation to the water charges – believe it or not, but they’ve been abolished which nobody could see coming!”

Pivotal role – when you want to describe something or someone playing a central role in the process, this is exactly the kind of expression to use: “My master’s degree in IT played a pivotal role in the recruitment process – without it I wouldn’t have been hired.”

Obnoxious behavior – this word is used to described something extremely unpleasant – typically other people’s behavior or their qualities. Here’s a good example: “I’m sorry, but I just can’t stand Allison’s obnoxious behavior so I end up avoiding her company altogether.”

Ludicrous – have you ever experienced a situation that is absurd to the point of being funny? Imagine, for instance, being pulled over by the cops, getting checked for alcohol in your breath and actually being tested positive despite the fact you hadn’t been drinking before… It would be ludicrous simply because it would be very last thing you’d ever expect and if you’re a person endowed with a sense of humor you’d be able to laugh about it and demand a second opinion on the basis of the breathalyzer being wrong!

Exhilarating experience – super-exciting experience such as a parachute jump, for example.

Ad nauseam – when some activity is repeated all over and over again till you’re sick of it, you can use this phrase to describe how you feel about it. For example – “I’ve tried to explain it to him ad nauseam but he just doesn’t understand what I’m talking about…”

Atrocious crime – especially vicious and cruel crime resulting in a number of victims.

Begging and cajoling – when you’re trying to convince someone to change their mind and they finally give in, you can say that “After plenty of begging and cajoling I finally managed to convince my mom to allow me to go to the trip to Utah.”

Detrimental effect – a bad, negative effect.

Eliminate from the equation – exclude something from a number of factors to be considered in relation to the main issue. Example: “When talking about day-to-day stress management, it’s important to eliminate unnecessary distractions from the equation so that you can be more focused on your tasks at hand.”

Endowed with the ability – When someone or something is endowed with the ability, it simply means they possess (have) this particular ability. “All human beings are endowed with the ability to love and take care of others.”

Evoke emotions – when something makes us feel a certain way. For example – “Hard rock evokes depressive emotions whereas upbeat, cheerful music lifts up our mood.”

Gain momentum – normally used in business English to describe economical processes that require some time to reach their full potential. A good example would be a start-up business that demands a lot of investment and effort to establish, but when it’s gained momentum, it practically starts to run itself.

Heinous crime – especially gross and unhuman crime.

Unilateral decision – decision made by only one person or group of people without taking others’ opinion into consideration. This phrase was used a lot during the financial crisis a few years ago in Ireland (it’s where I live so that’s why I’m using the example of Ireland!) when the government decided to guarantee bank losses without taking into account the opinion of other political parties.

Hinder communication – to prevent communication. The word “hinder” can be used pretty much as a substitute to the word “prevent” in any context!

Conditions that exacerbate… – this phrase is most commonly used in medical context when speaking about diseases that may get worse because of certain factors. Here’s a good example – “Are you aware that you work in conditions that may exacerbate your asthma? You should change your job immediately!”

Illicit affairs – “illicit” simply means “illegal” – so when you hear the word “illicit” used in combination with words such as “affairs”, it means that some criminal, unlawful activities are being discussed.

Oblivious to – totally unaware of something. When a person is going through a really intense emotional suffering, they may become oblivious to their surroundings and people around them at times. Also, when you’re simply deep in your thoughts, you may become temporarily oblivious to what’s going on around you.

Ambiguous situation – a situation that can be interpreted in two ways; it’s when there’s no clear-cut answer to a particular problem. In sports, for example, judges’ decisions are sometimes disputed but it’s all because the situation during a game is so ambiguous that it’s almost impossible to ascertain (find out) the truth. Also, when someone sends you an e-mail, for example, and you can interpret their instructions in many ways, you can say that the instructions are ambiguous and you can’t really take action in case you get it wrong.

Eloquent – fluent, someone who has a way with words. If you can speak fluent English and you’re really good at it, you can say you’re an eloquent English speaker. Just bear in mind – you have to be REALLY good at it to be considered eloquent – not every native English speaker is eloquent, for that matter.

Media-perpetuated – when certain subject is being constantly mentioned in media – Internet, newspapers, radio and TV – it’s said that it’s “media-perpetuated”. Let’s say, for example, the current obsession with dieting and slimming has led to an increasing number of eating disorders among teenagers, and it’s strongly believed it’s a direct result of the media-perpetuated images of skinny models and celebrities.

Transcends boundaries – surpasses, goes beyond certain limits. Love and compassion transcends any racial and religious boundaries – meaning that the concepts of love and compassion don’t choose people based on their origin and religious beliefs.

He’s adamant that… – he insists that… You can use this sophisticated English word when describing a 100% certainty of someone or yourself. “He’s adamant that the goods were sent out to the customer.”

Unsolicited advice – advice that hasn’t been asked for. If someone is telling you what to do without you having asked them for advice, you can say it’s unsolicited advice.

Amalgamate the data – you can use this expression when you’re putting some figures together. For example, when you’re doing a stock take of inventory and then all those figures have to be combined, you can say that you’re going to amalgamate the data so you won’t be able to attend to other work-related duties. Personally I love this English sophisticated word because it originates from the noun “amalgam” which means “an alloy of mercury with another metal” and I think it’s got a unique vibe to it!

Irrevocably linked – you can say that something’s irrevocably linked when it can’t be undone, when it can’t be taken apart. This English sophisticated collocation is best used in figurative speech – for example: “The tobacco trade and government tax income are irrevocably linked and I simply don’t believe the State wants us to quit smoking for good.”

Subliminal aversion to – subconscious (you’re not even aware of it) disgust towards something.

Excruciating pain – very intense, strong pain.

Perseverance is the key to success – “perseverance” describes the quality of someone who’s being very persistent and hard-working.

Good luck with your future endeavors – good luck with your future attempts to achieve something, to achieve goals etc.

Paramount – very, very important, top-priority, of the utmost importance. “It’s paramount that you log out of the system first before shutting the PC down or else all the data will be lost!”

Don’t exert yourself too much – don’t put too much pressure on yourself, don’t work too hard. You can say this kind of thing to a friend of yours who’s just been sick and has just returned back to work, for example.

Reciprocal – something that goes both ways; mutual. If someone tells you “It was nice meeting you!”, you can say – “Reciprocal!” – which means the experience of you meeting them was also pleasant. Of course, it’s going to sound very smart, but it’s going to be correct nonetheless. Another use of this word – “reciprocal links” – it’s used among website owners and bloggers to describe links pointing to each other’s websites.

Fluctuations – this economy related English word describes a process that changes over time – especially price changes. Here’s an example: “Forex traders make money by trading on currency price fluctuations”. It can be also used in other contexts; I, for example, like to describe the changing English fluency (one day you can speak fluently, the next day it’s gone down followed by another day of good fluency) with this word – “English fluency fluctuations“.

Adjacent  street – if you describe a street using the word “adjacent”, it simply means that the street in question meets another street you were talking about previously; basically when two streets meet at an angle, they’re called “adjacent streets”. A simpler way to explain the same thing would be by saying that the two streets meet – but you can use this fancy word just as well.

Common denominator – strictly speaking, this is a maths term and it’s used when operating with fractions. In everyday English speech though, this fancy expression containing the word “denominator” can be used when referring to common traits in people and common characteristics in pretty much anything. Here’s an example: “All rich and powerful people share the same common denominator – they know exactly what they want in life and they aren’t afraid of taking risks.”

Dispel a stereotype – sounds really smart, doesn’t it? Here’s how the same expression would sound using simpler English words – “bust a myth”. Now you start getting the idea, don’t you? Basically dispelling a stereotype means to prove that a certain belief is wrong, for example – the typical stereotype of blonde women being stupid, or foreign English speakers being bad at understanding English just because their speech isn’t fluent.

Elaborate on something – this sophisticated English word can be used to describe the process of providing more details on something. Let’s say, for argument’s sake, you’re sitting in a class and your teacher wants you to explain a particular concept. Here’s what he’d say: “Alright, but now could you elaborate on it, please?” Just please bear in mind that the word “elaborate” can be pronounced in two different ways – depending on whether it’s an adjective or a verb. In this case it’s a verb, so its pronunciation is as follows: [ɪˈlæbərəit] – pay a particular attention to the last syllable which is pronounced as in the word “ATE”.

Gravitate towards – does this word have anything to do with Earth’s gravitation? Well, yes and no! No, because it’s not about physics, and yes, because it does in fact entail a movement in a certain direction due to a certain level of attraction by something. Basically you can use it when talking about your future plans and explaining what you are most likely to do – in other words, what attracts you, what you are gravitating towards. And here comes an example: “Well, even though I graduated as an engineer, I’m gravitating towards more academic approach – something like a university lecturer.”

Predict all eventualities – “eventuality” is just a fancy word for “possibility”, so to predict all eventualities means to predict all possibilities, all possible outcomes of a certain event. Most likely you’d be using this expression to say that it’s not really possible to predict all eventualities and you’ll always end up with taking a certain amount of risk no matter what you do.

* * *

Now, this list is by no means an exhaustive list of all sophisticated English vocabulary that you may ever need.

It’s a good place to start, however, and you can rest assured that all these words are actually used in media and also in conversations by real English speaking people unlike some other obscure words that 99.9% of English speaking people have NEVER heard.

So basically this list has been created based upon my own years’ long experience communicating with English speaking people at work and various institutions as well as consuming plenty of written English material.

Hi my foreign English speaking friends! Here I’ve created a list of the most important English small talk phrases so that you never have situations when you get stuck when bumping into someone on the street or greeting your colleagues in the morning!

Here you’ll also find a good number of English phrases you can use to respond to typical greetings. And even more – some of the phrases below will help you add more substance to what you’re saying to your chat partner and also help you take time and think over the question.

At the end of the list you’ll find typical good-bye phrases and you’ll definitely find them handy when finishing off a conversation or even if you want to get rid of the person you’re chatting with!

There’s also industry small talk phrases – and they’re definitely going to come in handy in work-related situations. Whenever you want to ask your work colleague to cover you for a couple of hours and tell them you’re going to keep a low profile because you went out the night before – all this is covered in the industry small talk section!

So, click on the links below and they’ll take you to the respective section of English small talk phrases!

• Introductions
• Conversation Starters & Greetings (UPDATED!)
• Event Small Talk (NEW!)
• Typical Responses
• Industry Small-talk
• Departure Phrases (UPDATED!)

• English phrases with the word “thing”.
• 1001 Ways To Use The Simplest English Verb ‘To PUT’!
• English Verb “To GET” & How To Use It in Phrasal Verbs, Expressions & More!
• 45 Must-Know Phrases to Land a Job!
• Customer Support & Service Industry English Phrases
• Give Weight to Your Opinion by using Smart English Phrases!
• Common English Phrases to Use at Home & With Kids
• 25 Perfect Ways of Starting Sentences in English!
• 38 Typical English Sentence Endings
• 68 Industry-Specific English Expressions & Phrases for Non-native English Speakers

Introductions

I’ve heard so much about you – in case the person you’re being introduced to is well known, this is just the right English small talk phrase to tell them during the introduction!
It’s good to have you here! – sometimes you may want to make the new person feel welcome at the party or event, so this is what you tell them to make them feel included.

I’d like you to meet someone! – this is a typical way of introducing a new person to one or more people.

I am indeed! And you must be… – when someone else approaches you and calls you by your name, and you’re pretty sure who that person is, this is the right English small talk phrase to use: “Hello, is it Mark?” – “I am indeed! And you must be James!?”

I’ll leave you two to get acquainted! – if you have to leave two people you just introduced to each other, this is the perfect phrase for such a situation.

Please, call me… – a few minutes into the conversation with a new person you may want to lighten up the mood by giving the other person a permission to call you by your name or a more friendly version of your name: “And by the way Michael…” – “Please, call me Mike!”

I almost didn’t recognize you! – sometimes we get to see people we haven’t seen for a long, long time – and this English small talk phrase is the typical way of expressing your excitement at seeing them again.

Have we met before? – in case you really don’t recognize the person saying hello to you, you can use this phrase to ask them if you’ve met before. Yes, it’s a bit awkward, but there’s really no better way of putting it!

It’s good to see you again! – this is how you recognize the presence of an old friend or acquaintance when you meet them after a while.

TAKE ACTION! Are you willing to start working on your spoken English but you just don’t know where to start? START HERE!

Conversation Starters & Greetings (UPDATED!)

How are you getting on? – just another way of saying ‘how are you?’

Are you doing OK? – asked when the person has had some tough experience recently and you want to ask politely if they’re OK.

Hi, …! What’s new? – this is a very informal way of greeting a close friend or anyone who you see on a regular basis and you want to ask has anything happened since you last met.

Hi, …! What’s up? – the same as above with a difference that you’re probably not that interested in what news the other person might have.

Hi, …! Long time no see! – used when you haven’t seen the person for a long period of time and you want to state that fact in the greeting.

Hi, …! Have you been keeping busy? – just a standard inquiry with little or no direct meaning.

Do you mind me asking…? – a typical way of asking something that might be a slightly personal question.

OK, here’s the thing … – a very handy way to start making your point if you’re not sure how to begin the sentence.

Is everything OK? – this is what you’d say to a person when you see that they’re distressed and obviously not OK. Normally you’d ask this to a close friend or a work colleague – but you can also say this to a stranger you meet in the street and if it’s obvious that that person needs help.

ENTERTAINMENT: Take a couple of minutes to this test and see how English vocabulary can be learned the super-easy way!

Event Small Talk (New!)

You can use these phrases in networking events or other kinds of events.

Typical Responses

Thanks, I’ve been keeping busy – just a standard response to a standard greeting with little or no direct meaning.

Thanks for asking, I’m fine, how are you? – a typical response and counter-question to a greeting phrase ‘how are you?’

Help yourself! – this English small talk phrase is one of the traditional phrases you’ll find in all English phrase-books, and it’s an encouraging phrase used to let the other person know that they can go ahead with the action in question. Typically this is used as a response when the other person is asking for permission to take something, and then you tell them that they can certainly do it: “Sorry, do you mind if I take this cookie? Everyone seems to have taken theirs…” – “Sure, help yourself!”

Where were we? – imagine a situation when you’re speaking with someone, and then somehow you’re getting side-tracked and you veer off the original subject, or it could be that some other person distracts you and you forget where you left off. Now, this is the typical phrase to be used in situations like these – you’re basically asking your conversation partner what it was that you were talking about last.

How’s that sound for you? – let’s say for argument’s sake, you’re proposing something to your conversation partner. Well, in this case, this small talk phrase is ideal to ask for their opinion on your proposal! Here’s an example: “Listen, I know what we’re doing tonight. Let’s go to the movies, there’s a new blockbuster out! How’s that sound for you?”

…if that’s alright with you? – you can attach this small talk bit at the end of your sentence to ask for the other person’s permission. Let’s imagine for a second you’re telling your work colleague you have to leave your desk for a few minutes, but you just want to be sure he’s OK with that. So here’s what you say “Listen Jimmy, I’m gonna leave my desk for a few minutes to make a really important phone call if that’s alright with you?” 

Hi, how are you doing? It’s good to see you! – a typical response to a greeting from someone you haven’t seen for a while.

Can’t complain – a response to a standard greeting like ‘How are you?’ It’s not as exciting phrase as ‘Thanks, I’m great!’ but it doesn’t mean you’re having some problems in your life.

Can you say it again, please? – a request to repeat the question if you didn’t understand what was said. This can also be used when the native speaking person speaks a bit too fast – they should get the hint and slow down a bit. But if they don’t, you can ask a more direct question:

Can you slow it down a bit, please?

And how about you? – a typical response when you’re not sure what to ask next so you’re asking the other person the same thing they asked you. You can respond with this counter-greeting on nearly all standard greetings.

To the best of my knowledge … – when you’re 99% sure about the statement you’re making. Also a good start of a response you want to take a bit more time to consider what you’re going to say.

As far as I know … – the same as above.

Good for you! – a response to someone telling you about their success in something or some good news that they’re happy about.

Can’t argue with that – used when you agree with the statement of the other person.

How do you know? – a counter-question you can ask when someone surprises you with a question about something they’re not really expected to know.

That’s a good one! – a surprise response to funny or surprising news from your chat partner.

Really? Tell me more about it! – used when you want your chat partner to tell me about what he/she just said.

Frankly speaking, … – just a way to start your response. It indicates that you’re about to open up and be very honest with your chat partner. A great way of establishing immediate trust.

Well, to be honest with you, … – the same as above.

Sure, no problem! – a typical response to a small request you’re happy to do. This one is especially used when responding to superiors’ requests and it sounds more enthusiastic than if you simply say ‘sure’ or ‘OK’.

Never mind, it’s fine! – this phrase is used when the person offers to do a favor for you but it’s not really necessary.

Never mind, forget what I just said – this phrase is to be used when you said something that wasn’t important at all but your chat partner wants you to repeat it. You can also use this phrase if you feel that he/she might be slightly annoyed or offended by your question or comment so you want to end it there.

You got me there – this can be said instead of ‘I don’t’ know’ – it will sound more casual and not as defensive as the old ‘I don’t know’!

You’ve got to be kidding me! – said when someone tells you something that borders on the unbelievable and you want to express your surprise.

That’s a good question. – a phrase used when you want to take your time to think over the question. This is an ideal phrase to use when you’re stuck but instead of remaining silent, you can start your response with this phrase.

Well, how to put it in the right words… – the same as above.

That’d be great! – a response to an offer that you’re really happy about.

… Do you know what I mean? – this is quite an overused phrase but you can definitely use it at the end of a sentence if you want to emphasize what you just said.

You see, the thing is that … – this is how you begin a sentence when you’re asked to explain something.

SHOCKING! Did You Know That You Don’t Have to Know a SINGLE Grammar Rule to Speak Fluent English?

Industry & Office Small-talk

Another day! – this is just a short phrase you can use to start your working day with. It doesn’t necessarily mean your job is boring; it merely states the fact that you all have a brand new working day ahead.

Nose to the grindstone! – this one is a typical English idiom, and it means to start working hard and be 100% focused on what you’re doing. Typically you’d use this one at the end of a conversation as a way of indicating you’re going back to your work-related duties.

Sorry for keeping you waiting! – and this is what you say to someone who’s been waiting for a while on the line while you’ve been trying to get through to the right person.

I’ll be with you in a minute… – this English small talk phrase will come in handy if you’re working as a receptionist, for example, and you have to leave the client for a short period of time while you’re looking up relevant information in another room or finding the right person to deal with the client’s query.

Just bear with me for a moment… – this is just another way of telling the client that you’ll be with them in a short while. In this context to “bear with me” simply means to be patient with the fact that I’ll be gone, simple as that!

Leave it with me! – if you want to tell the customer that they can leave the matters with you and that you’re going to deal with the issue, this is the right English small talk phrase to use.

How was your weekend? – you can use this small-talk greeting to inquire about the person’s weekend and it’s a typical small-talk phrase you’d hear on a Monday morning.

Anything new going on? – again, a typical phrase to be used when coming into work – especially after a weekend or a few days off.

The boss is in a mood… – you can use this small-talk phrase to let your colleagues know your boss is in a bad mood and it’s best to steer clear to avoid trouble. Please note you don’t even have to say “in a BAD mood”; the word “mood” says it all just on its own.

All work and no play! – this is another English idiom and you can use it when having a conversation about going out and taking some rest. Here’s a typical sentence: “Hey Jim, why not go out tonight, we’ve been working so hard – all work and no play!”

Better keep the head down today – this English idiomatic expression comes in handy when you need to advise someone to stay quiet and avoid problems. Maybe it’s because that person’s been out drinking the night before, maybe it’s because they’ve been giving others hard time and the boss is after them – there are many situations when this small-talk phrase can be used!

Thank heavens it’s Friday – quite obviously you’ll be using this English small talk phrase when greeting your work colleagues on a Friday morning – as we all know, Fridays are the most awaited days of the week, and everybody’s looking forward to the weekend ahead!

You working at the weekend? – in case you’re doing shift work, this is a handy phrase to use when asking your colleague if she or he is going to work during the weekend.

Are you working hours in? – let’s say, for argument’s sake, you notice someone staying at work longer than normal, so you want to inquire for the reason they’re doing this. Your best guess is that the person in question has taken some extra time off work, so you want to ask them if they’re working those hours in now. Well, this is the perfect phrase for the occasion!

I’m tired – I got no sleep last night – I guess this phrase is pretty self-explanatory, isn’t it?

I had a few drinks so I’m flying under the radar! – if you went out the night before, it’s totally understandable you’ll want to stay put and keep a low profile in case someone from the management realizes you’re not fully capable of fulfilling your work-related duties!

Can you cover me? – this is a typical way of asking someone if they can work in your place while you’re taking a couple of hours off work to deal with your personal stuff.

It’s so boring! – this is quite a self-explanatory phrase to be used whenever you’re bored. It can be used as a handy conversation starter if there’s another person nearby doing the same job – if they also look bored you can simply exclaim “It’s so boring!” and see if they respond to that.

I wish I had her job! – if someone else’s job looks better than yours, you can use this English small talk phrase to either start a conversation or respond to someone else making a remark about how easy it is for that person compared to the situation that you’re in.

We’re not paid enough! – if you think you’re not remunerated adequately (show me an employee who thinks he’s getting paid enough!), here’s a phrase to be used when you’re having a small talk with some colleague of yours and you have to express your opinion in relation to the small wages.

That’s one job I wouldn’t do! – this is how you refer to a job you definitely wouldn’t be willing to do no matter who asks you to do it. But then again – everything has a price, isn’t that right?

That’s a cushy number! – English idiomatic expression “cushy number” means a very comfortable and easy job. So when you’re seeing someone sitting around all day doing nothing, you can tell your friend “That’s a cushy number!” meaning that the job in question is really easy.

I don’t know how he got that job! – there’s always someone in the company who doesn’t know what they’re doing and you often wonder how they got the job in the first place, right? So, next time around when you make a comment about such a person when having a small talk with someone, you can use this phrase.

INTERESTING! Find Out Why So Many Foreigners CAN’T Speak Fluent English!

Departure Phrases (UPDATED!)

I really gotta go – this is the least formal way of telling someone that you definitely have to leave now. This is the best way of two friends, for example, finishing a conversation and personally I use this phrase quite often!

OK, I’m sorry but I have to leave now! – used when your chat partner has clear intentions of continuing the conversation but you just need to go so you’re making it clear that you need to go.

See you later! – used when you know that you’ll be seeing each other again sometime.

See you around! – the same as above

See you in a couple of minutes! – this phrase is typically used when you’re leaving the other person for a short while during an event, for example.

Keep in touch! – a good-bye phrase meaning you want the other person to get in touch with you every now and then and that you’ve the same intentions.

It was nice seeing you, take care! – a good-bye phrase used when you know that you won’t see the person for a while.

It’s been good talking to you! – the same as the above phrase.

Hope to see you again! – you can use this phrase when finishing a conversation with someone you’ve just met.

Say hello to …! – a short and handy way of saying to remind someone from you.

Now You’ve Finished Reading this List… What’s Next?

You’re pretty excited having found my blog and especially this list of English small-talk phrases, isn’t that right?

There’s one small problem though…

The chances are, you’re going to forget MOST of these phrases within a matter of hours, and next week you’ll be lucky to remember ANY of them!

Please don’t get me wrong – I’m not trying to insult your intelligence and imply that you have a bad memory. It’s NATURAL to forget all kinds of information after just one exposure; it’s just human nature.

So I guess it poses the next logical question – “How to make sure you can actually use such and similar phrases in YOUR daily conversations with work colleagues, college friends and people you meet?”

Here’s the Most Effective Way to Learn These Small Talk Phrases…

The best way of imprinting these small talk phrases into your mind is by utilizing spaced repetition. It might sound very technical, while in fact it simply means you have to repeat and memorize a phrase a number of times over a certain period of time.

1. Repeat each phrase three times.
2. Then do it once more tomorrow.
3. Go back to it after a longer period of time – say, a week or two.

This spaced repetition principle ensures that the small talk phrases you’re memorizing REMAIN in your ACTIVE vocabulary. It basically means you’ll be able to USE those phrases in relevant situations, and that’s definitely what you want, isn’t it?

I’ve Got Great News For You!

What if I told you I’ve compiled 1350 similar phrases and expressions and also made it SUPER-EASY for you to memorize them using the spaced repetition technique?

Wouldn’t that be cool?

Believe it or not – but I’ve done just that, and here you can check out my unique software stuffed full of English small talk and many other phrases! It’s called the English Harmony System, and here are its main benefits ANY upper-intermediate and advanced foreign English student can avail of:

• EH System imprints natural English phrases into your mind;
• EH System makes sure you stop preparing a speech in your head;
• You develop the ability to speak instinctively and spontaneously

So, do you want to develop your ability to speak FLUENTLY and use all these and MANY MORE English phrases, expressions and idioms just like NATIVE English speakers do?

Then make sure to check out the English Harmony System RIGHT NOW!

I got the inspiration to write this English phrase compilation from a guy called Guillermo, and here’s the comment he left on my blog a while back:

So basically he wants to learn useful English phrases to be used around the house describing common everyday concepts such as eating, playing, tidying up, going to bed and others.

And come to think of it, pretty much all English phrases I’ve published on this blog focus either on your social life such as the small talk phrases or your professional life such as these industry specific phrases.

That’s why I decided to compile a bunch of useful English phrases you can use at home when speaking with your own kinds in order to improve your English – just like Guillermo does – or when there are other English speaking kids around.

Speaking of which, I can tell you based on my own experience that your English may be quite advanced, but you may still find yourself struggling to speak with little children using simple language

I clearly remember how I came to Ireland all those years ago and my daughters started attending the local school.

I was in the same situation when I had to help them with their homework or speak with other kids at birthday parties, for example, and I realized that my English was lacking simple phraseology that native speakers use in daily situations at home!

So, without further ado, let’s start listing commonly used simple English expressions you’ll be able to use at home!

Chores

Put out the bins (British); take out the trash (American) – this is how you tell your child (or your partner) to take out the trash can (American) or a waste bin (British) and leave it on the street for collection the next day: “Can you take out the trash tonight?”

Can you please do the dishes? – want to ask someone to wash the dirty dishes and cutlery? This is the right expression to use in such a situation!

Do the laundry – this is an English expression describing the process of putting dirty clothes into the washing machine: “Can you do the laundry please? I’ll do the dishes tonight!”

Tidy up your room – if you want your child to organize their room, this is how you say it: “Could you tidy up your room, please?”

Clean it up – quite a self-explanatory phrase, but still a lot of foreigners might get it wrong! So basically when you’re referring to getting something cleaned up – especially if there’s a spillage of water or some other liquid – this is how you put it: “Jonny, your little sister just spilled her drink, can you clean it up?”

Make the bed – this expression will come in handy for you when asking your kid to make their bed presentable by straightening the blanket and covering it with a bed-cover: “Sweetie, can you make your bed before we leave?”

Get dressed – another very simple yet useful English phrase to be used around the house quite often: “Honey, I think it’s time to get dressed – we have to go in an hour!”

Walk the dog – did you get a puppy for your kid? Well, I guess you’ll have to remind them of walking him every day by saying something along the lines of: “Did you walk the dog yet? It’s getting late!”

Did you lock the door? – this is a really self-explanatory phrase but as you may already know, many of us, foreigners, find it hard to say the simplest things in English because of various fluency issues!

Learning

When’s your homework due? – this is something you’d ask your child in order to check on the deadline for a specific homework. Obviously, if they respond with something like: “Well, it’s due tomorrow…”, you’d be telling them to start doing it immediately!

You have to be ready for school in… minutes! – another simple phrase, but I know only too well that sometimes we may be struggling to say very simple things. Specifically, it’s the “to be ready for” part that you should pay the greatest attention to, so make sure to repeat it and memorize it well!

You’re off school for a week – the collocation “off school” might be another problem area for you as a foreign English speaker, so make sure to memorize it. And here’s a practical application of this phrase: “Isn’t it great Jenny you don’t have to get up early in the morning? You’re off school for a week!”

Eating

What’s for dinner? – this is how you ask the question. You see, the thing is that in real life we sometimes tend to overthink such simple matters and eventually we may get it wrong: “What did you make… eh… cook… as a dinner… eh… for dinner…” So, make sure to memorize the simple phrase “What’s for dinner?” and you’ll never have those awkward moments again!

Who’s cooking tonight? – if you and your spouse are sharing the cooking task, this is the question you put to your better half to find out who’s cooking tonight.

Put the kettle on! – let me remind you once more that as a foreigner, you may have the tendency to overthink very simple matters, and the simple question of putting the kettle on (either an actual metal kettle or the electric one – it describes both types!) might pose certain difficulties because you probably want to describe the entire process: “Please can you pour water into the kettle and turn it on?” Needless to say, the more words you’re saying, the bigger the risk you’re going to get something wrong, so memorize the simple phrase “Put the kettle on!” and use it!

Take a few more bites! – this is something you’d tell your child if they’ve had very little to eat: “Please Harry, just take a few more bites and then you’re free to go!”

Playing

Close your eyes and count till ten! – this is what you tell your kids when you’re playing “hide and seek” with them.

Want a piggyback ride? – let’s say, for argument’s sake, your daughter loves when you’re running around the house with her up on your back. Well, guess what? It’s called “piggyback” in English, and here’s how you propose the activity to your child: “Want a piggyback ride?”

Go easy on him (her) – imagine two children playing and one of them getting a bit physical with the other. It’s not really a fight situation but you’re still a bit concerned that someone might get hurt – so this is how you tell the child to calm down a bit and not be so aggressive.

That’s my boy (girl)! – this is how you praise your child for having done a great job or having shown good results in some sports game.

Common, you can do it! – are you not so sure how to encourage your child during a competition? Well, learn this phrase and use it!

You beat me again! – and this is what you’d say when your child has beaten you in some game. Well, we all know only too well that sometimes we allow our kids to beat us in order to make them feel good about themselves, so this phrase will definitely come in handy for you in such situations.

Gotcha! – are you chasing your kids around pretending to be the Big Bad Wolf? Or maybe you’re just playing “hide and seek”? Then this is the typical exclamation you can use when catch or find someone.

Sleeping

It’s time to brush your teeth! – is it getting too late and it’s time for the kids to get ready for the bed? This phrase is typically used to tell them to go to the bathroom and start brushing their teeth.

Let me tuck you in! – “tucking in” is the process of putting the blanket edges in between the child’s body and the bed thus “wrapping” them tightly and making sure they feel safe and sound. And this is how you tell your child you’re going to do it: “Let me tuck you in!”

Sleep tight! – just another version of “Sleep well!”

Sleep in – “sleeping in” means sleeping longer than usually, typically it’s understood you sleep till you wake up without an alarm. Let’s say, your kid doesn’t have to get up early the following morning, so this is what you might say: “Honey, you can sleep in tomorrow, the school is off for a few days because of the bad weather!”

Time to get up! – your daughter or son will hate you for saying this, but what other option have you got? If they have to get up for school or a trip, it just has to be said!

Rise and shine! – this is an English idiomatic expression, and you use it when waking up someone in the morning. The meaning of this phrase is “wake up and feel great!”

Sleep well? – and this is how you ask the question “Did you sleep well?” in conversational English. Basically you just drop the first two words and make it shorter.

Worrying

Are you warm enough? – this is what my granny always used to ask me, and it’s something you can also ask your child when you’re a bit worried if they’re dressed appropriately.

Are you hurt? – if your child, or anyone else for that matter, seems in distress and you want to make sure they haven’t gotten themselves injured, this is the right question to ask.

Where are you hurt? – this question means “Which body part is hurting?”

Where did you get hurt? – and this question means “Where were you when you got hurt?”

Scolding

Be nice to your (mom, sister, etc.) – if you’re witnessing a child behaving a bit inappropriately towards someone, this is the remark you may want to use.

Where are your manners? – imagine your teenage son burping or indeed – farting – at the dinner table, for example. Now, this kind of behavior would merit a response such as: “Where are your manners?”

Don’t do that, it’s not nice! – this is what’s typically said to small children when you don’t want them to do something that’s not socially acceptable.

How dare you speak to me like that?! – if your child is verbally abusive towards you, you may be left with no other option but to say such a thing. Yes, we should stay calm on all occasions, but sometimes we also lose our cool, so this phrase will come in handy in such situations.

Orders

Hurry up! – this is a very simple way of telling someone to make it quicker.

Get ready! – “get ready” is a typical English collocation and is used to prompt the other person to ready themselves for something. It’s simple enough, but still worth learning because some of us may find it hard to use the right verb with the word “ready.”

Compliments

Although you should not exaggerate with compliments, some compliment in the right occasion is fine.

Good job! – you can tell this to your child when he gets a good grade or made something go.

You’re doing this well! – while your child is performing a new task.

Wow! That’s a huge leap forward! – when your child improved a lot in a class or in a task

* * *

Now, obviously this just barely scratches the surface when it comes to English used around the house and with kids, but I hope you’ll find this phrase-list handy!

Regards,

Robby

P.S. Are you serious about your spoken English improvement? Check out my English Harmony System HERE!

For those foreign English speakers who are big into reading, but still haven’t started reading English literature. If you think achieving English reading fluency requires building huge active English vocabulary first – you’re in a nice surprise!

Although I’m generally discussing all things about improving spoken English on my blog, I’m a keen reader too.

I have loads of English literature sitting on my book shelves. It covers different topics starting with yoga and meditation and ending with political and economical writings. The biggest part of my books, however, is taken up by historical and fantasy fiction and these genres are my favourite ones.

Initially I started reading English in order to improve my overall knowledge of the language. I made a mistake in that I didn’t actually define which aspect of English I needed to focus most on. For some reason or another it wasn’t clear to me that different aspects of English language – reading, understanding, writing and speaking aren’t merged into one big thing called English. I achieved complete English reading fluency but I was perplexed about the fact that my spoken English wasn’t coming along.

I haven’t had any regrets for a single second, though, having mastered English reading skill. During the last years I haven’t read a single book in my native language. For the most part it’s because I’ve fallen in love with David Gemmell’s fantasy fiction so much that I’ve read all his books and I re-read them every now and then. And also taking into account I live in an English speaking country it’s not hard to understand why I choose to buy books in the local bookstore.

OK, the point that I want to make in this blog post is the following:

You won’t start speaking fluent English by focusing mostly on reading English literature. In order to achieve natural English fluency and improve your spoken English you need to focus on speech exercising – just like the English Harmony System offers.

Reading English however, will help you with understanding the language which is also quite an important aspect of English language. Besides the direct benefit to your English understanding you’ll keep yourself constantly immersed in English. So while focusing on reading and writing alone will leave you frustrated and embarrassed in simple daily English conversations, combined with English speaking sessions it will improve your overall English level big time!

There is one main problem though, to be faced by everyone who’s quite competent in English and eager to start reading. It’s simply the number of unknown words in any English book you’ll pick up and start reading!

If so far in your live most of English that you know comes from media and traditional English studies, the chances are that there’s a whole world of English vocabulary waiting yet to be discovered by you!

My first historical fiction was Tim Severin’s Viking trilogy. Many of the words that I learnt from the Viking books were never heard before. To bellow meaning to shout, to heave meaning to lift something heavy, rope went taut meaning rope was tightly pulled – have you often heard such words and expressions used in everyday English? Well, me neither and I wouldn’t even use those words in daily conversations because they’re not generally used.

Much of that new vocabulary is specific terms related to the topic of the book you’re reading. Nautical terminology like prow and stern of a ship (front and rear parts of a ship) and collocations like sail billowing in the breeze are typical words you’re going to come across when reading books where sea voyages are quite frequent events.

If you read literature about well-being involving taking care of your inner self and living in harmony with nature you’re going to learn different vocabulary altogether. Affirmations are positive sentences one can speak to program oneself for success in a particular area of life. Posture is a pose one adopts when positioning body in a certain way when meditating or practicing yoga, for example.  And to manifest means to bring about certain things using your imagination and visualization.

So the biggest question is:

How you can start reading an English book if you’ve never ever done it before and the text you’re reading doesn’t read naturally?

As you know, if you read a book in your native language you don’t have to exert your perception to read and understand the text. All you have to do is just scan a line and it reads itself in your mind. It happens automatically.

Would you like to achieve the same level of reading fluency in English? And here’s something even more exciting – would you like to achieve this English reading fluency without consciously learning all new vocabulary?

It is possible – I did it – and I’m sure I’m not unique!

Anyone with intermediate English understanding skills can start reading simple English fiction fluently in relatively short time

Make no mistake though – I’m not saying there’s magic involved. Most likely you’ll have to translate plenty of new words you’ll come across in your first 2 – 3 books. I remember my first book I bought in Ireland – Irish History. I had difficulties communicating in English so I decided I’d improve my English by reading, memorizing new vocabulary and studying English grammar.

Of course, it didn’t do much to improve my spoken English, but back then I didn’t know what else to do. So I started reading the book and I had to look up the new words in dictionary nearly all the time. It wasn’t the best reading experience but it gave me the basic vocabulary to build upon.

The next book was about meditation. I was in a bookstore and for some reason the book caught my eye and I started liking the idea of acquiring inner peace and taking bigger control over my spiritual life. This book was much easier to read as it was actually written using simpler language than the Irish History book.

The third one was my first English fiction – The Virgin In The Ice by Ellis Peters. Medieval times have always fascinated me so when I came across this book I decided to have a read and see how it goes. It appeared to be even easier than the other two books I’d read – so that’s something I’d suggest you do when jumping into reading English. Go for easy-to-read fiction rather than specialist literature That way you’ll avoid unnecessary disappointments and you’ll discover how easy it actually is to gain English reading fluency!

Before we move on to more technical aspects of fluent English reading you have to understand a few things.

Initially, especially with your first books, reading is not going to be the same as reading in your native language. There will be plenty of new words you’ll have to look up in dictionary and that will slow reading down considerably for the first time. The most important thing here is not to despair and throw the book away. It will come to you eventually.

Don’t aim for 100% understanding! Let’s take a sample sentence: One of the novices, reported for the second time for a nocturnal excursion, received two hundred lashes with a scourge (Viking – Odinn’s Child by Tim Severin).

The key to English reading fluency is to understand that the meaning of the whole sentence can be grasped without knowing all the words!

The key words in this example are novice, nocturnal excursion, lashes and scourge. At the first glimpse they all might seem strange to you. I’d say, though, that only the last two are probably worth looking up in a dictionary. Of course it would depend on your native language background, but the chances are that you’ve seen the words novice and nocturnal in some context previously in your life. Novice stems from Latin word novus meaning new and would be somewhat similar to the same word in a number of languages. Factor in the context from the book and it’s not hard to understand that a novice is a person who’s recently joined a religious order, a new one to put it simply.

Nocturnal has obviously something to do with night. Just look up the word lash in a dictionary and it becomes clear that the whole point is about novices being punished for going out at night time. You don’t necessarily need to know the exact meaning of the word scourge as it’s most likely the object punishment is being delivered with. And what else could it be if not a whip that you use to lash someone? So if you come across the same word scourge for a few times, from context alone it becomes pretty clear that it’s a synonym for a whip.

You simply must be patient and remember that the more you read, the easier it gets. You’ll start understanding the English text instinctively. Eventually you’ll reach a stage when you’ll stop using dictionaries and thesaurus. You’ll become a master at reading English fluently by knowing direct translations of just 70 – 80% of vocabulary used in a particular book.

WARNING

If you hold to a belief that fluent English reading can be ONLY achieved by knowing 100% of English vocabulary, don’t read more of this blog post.

You’re welcome to spend years of your life trying to build huge English vocabulary before embarking on the exciting journey of reading English.

But if you want to jump into unknown, immerse yourself in English and widen horizons of your spiritual world – I warmly suggest you start reading English fiction right now!

Personally I read English fluently without knowing the exact meaning and translation of quite a few words I come across. It doesn’t prevent me from completely understanding the text that I read, though.

Also bear in mind that if you come across a particular English word a number of times, its meaning becomes clear from the context alone. You’ll start recognizing the word and as far as reading goes, it’s completely enough.

IMPORTANT

Recognition and ability to use certain English words are two completely different things! You can be a fluent English speaker with an active English vocabulary consisting of 2000 words. When you read English, you recognize meaning of probably 8000 – 10 000words. And it’s totally fine!

You have to understand that you’ll never use most of the vocabulary used in English fiction to communicate in real life with real people, so what’s the point of adding thousands upon thousands of words to your active vocabulary? You won’t be able to use them anyway as you won’t get to practice and use those words!

Easy Step-by-step Plan To Achieve English Reading Fluency

1. If you haven’t done much reading previously in your life – start with reading some children’s book. I’d suggest you buy a simple book about general knowledge like an encyclopedia about the world around us. Read a few pages every day and write down new words in a notepad. Try to avoid direct translations to your native language as much as possible – explain the new words using other, simpler English words. In a few weeks time you’ll have increased your English understanding level so that you can move on to the next level!

Tip: You can also read websites like Simple Wikipedia where everything is explained using most commonly used words. You’ll have little difficulties understanding complicated subjects and this way you’ll build your vocabulary very gradually and effortlessly!

2. The next step – walk into a school shop and buy an English reading book for a sixth grader. Don’t be too concerned about the topic of novels and stories in that book – they tend to be quite interesting and cover a large variety of subjects. Language used in such a book is much simpler than in adults’ books and you’ll get to practice your English reading and train the instinctive understanding of simpler texts. Again write down new words in your notepad but only if necessary and only in a context. If you can guess a meaning of a new word and dictionary or thesaurus confirms you’re right – don’t bother writing it down. Train yourself to become very good at guessing the meaning of new words and try not to rely so much on dictionaries.

3. Now it’s time to buy your first English fiction book. Well, it doesn’t really have to be fiction if you’re into something else. Just pick something that you’re really interested in as this is a crucial factor for maintaining your interest and motivation while reading. If you’re into sports – buy a book about sports nutrition or particular type of exercising. If you’re concerned about global issues – buy a book about rain-forest preservation or global warming. And if you’re mad into watching crime films, most likely you’ll find crime fiction is the one that fires your blood with adrenaline and keeps you reading.

A few tips when choosing your first book!

Always have a read of a few random pages in the book. You’ll get a good idea on how difficult reading is going to be. If vocabulary used in the book is too specific, reading will be hard and you can easily lose motivation. Look for something simpler!

Choose a book that is part of series of books. If not, go for an author who has a good number of books on the shelf. Reason behind this is the following – vocabulary used in one author’s books is consistent and you’ll increase your English reading fluency dramatically by reading a few books of the same author one after another.

4. Reading your first book. Frankly speaking – some authors write in a less exciting manner than others. I have started and stopped reading a few books simply because I found them boring OR written in a manner that just doesn’t seem right for some reason. The very fact that the book is on sale in a bookstore doesn’t mean the author is a true professional. He or she may be a professor in archaeology, but it doesn’t mean the historical novel written by that person is very exciting and an interesting read! So don’t start feeling as if you’re useless at reading English fiction if you just can’t read a particular book you’ve chosen. Bring it back to the bookstore and choose another one!

Remember – reading English fiction or whatever literature you’re into is supposed to be exciting and interesting for you!

Don’t go into reading just because you feel you have to! If you don’t want to – fair enough! If you’re good at communicating with English speaking people and understating enough English to watch films and read newspapers, you can still enjoy life at full in an English speaking country!

So when you’ve find the right book – the one that captivates you and makes you forget everything else while you read it – you’re on the right track to achieving English reading fluency!

More tips for reading:

As I previously stated in this blog post – it’s all about understanding the text as a whole as opposed to striving for understanding the exact meaning of all words separately.

Of course, to achieve English reading fluency, you need to build your vocabulary. After steps 1 – 2 you will have acquired decent new English word vocabulary, and also when reading your first ‘real’ English fiction or whatever books you choose you will probably use notebook to put the unknown words down. But when you’re past your first books, that won’t be needed anymore.

You’ll acquire new vocabulary the same way you pick up new English words from context when you hear others speak.

Let me give you a very simple example – oil gushing out from the broken pipe. Do you really need to know the exact translation of the word to gush in your language to perfectly understand the meaning of the sentence above? Of course you don’t! The sentence draws a picture before your eyes where oil is leaking out from the pipe and you don’t need to know the exact translation as the meaning is all that matters!

And this is actually the best way to build English vocabulary – through context and guessing, and it’s how you can achieve complete English reading fluency in a relatively short time. Just a few books will separate you from reading the sixth grader’s texts and adult fiction.

Anyone seeing you on a train reading it will definitely think you’re a native English speaker! OK, that was a joke – but it does help your confidence if you’re able to read English as well as anyone who’s born in an English speaking country. And if you incorporate decent spoken English training in your English studies – your overall English will improve big time indeed!

Another sample sentence from a book I’ve read a few times over – The Legend Of Deathwalker by David Gemmell. He staggered on, rounding a bend in the black cavern. Ahead of them an awesome bridge arced across a chasm. Druss stepped on to it, and glanced over the edge.

To be honest with you – I’ve never looked up the words to stagger, a cavern, and a chasm in a dictionary. I know their meaning because the author uses the same words over and over again in his books, and the meaning becomes quite obvious after a few times.

Of course, if the unknown words are the KEY words in a sentence you can’t do without, you have to look them up in a dictionary. But as I already said – once you’ve finished a couple of books, you’ll have the essential English dictionary.

From that moment and on you can rely on your natural intuition and the sentences will suddenly start depicting the events and situations before your eyes the very same way it happens when you read in your native language!

Robby

P.S. Are you ready to get on the fast track to spoken English fluency? Check out my English Harmony System HERE!

This is English Harmony, and it’s all about improving your SPOKEN English, right?

And there’s no better way – as a matter of fact, it’s the ONLY way! – of improving your spoken English than engaging in heavy spoken English practicing.

I’ve been receiving a lot of questions in relation to this topic.

I mean – specifically about PRACTICING spoken English.

• What’s the best way of doing it?
• What to do when there’s no-one else available to practice with?
• And what to do when I don’t know what to talk about?

Every time I respond to these type of questions, I use pretty much the same answer because I know for a fact it WORKS:

If you’ve got no-one else to chat with, you can do it all by yourself – just narrate your thoughts and if you don’t know what to talk about, the best topic is to describe what you’ve been doing during the day and what your plans are for the following day. And in case you’re skeptical about this approach – read this article to find out why speaking with yourself isn’t so dissimilar to speaking with other people!

There’s one aspect of spoken English practicing, however, that I haven’t touched upon on my blog yet, namely – READING ALOUD.

Come to think of it, I actually do it all the time.

You see, when I write my blog posts, I always read them out loud while editing them, so I personally don’t need to set aside any time to do it purposefully.

All I have to do on top of that is some actual spoken English practicing to keep my fluency sharp, and HERE you can see how I do it while driving to work, for example.

As far as YOUR oral fluency development is concerned, however, I warmly suggest you do some reading aloud if you haven’t been doing it already!

Reading Aloud is the IDEAL Way of Practicing If You’re Just Starting Out!

When I do some spoken English practice, I’m very comfortable doing it – and so are other foreign English speakers who’ve been engaging in similar activities for a while.

But what if you’re just starting out?

What if you’ve rarely had the chance to open your mouth and you just can’t produce coherent speech no matter how hard you try?

Well, let me try to remember how I did it, I mean – how I started engaging in spoken English practice… To be honest with you, it was so long ago, that I can’t actually remember much! I have a vague recollection of me lying in a bed at night and trying to speak in English with myself to see how good I would be at it – it must have been more than 10 years ago at this stage.

But anyway – if you want to do it but you don’t’ know where to start then READING ALOUD IS THE IDEAL WAY of kick-starting your spoken English practicing routine!

When you read aloud, you don’t have to:

• Think about WHAT you’re going to say – you can focus on pronouncing the words and sentences instead!
• Think about the CORRECTNESS of your speech – you can focus on getting the intonation right and making the speech flow!
• Worry about anyone thinking you’re a weirdo if they catch you doing your spoken practice – after all, reading aloud is perfectly fine, right?

So, you don’t have to do it in bed at night – you can do it out in the open!

Reading Aloud Guides Your Mouth in the Right Direction!

Have you ever thought about the fact that you can learn English quite fast if you MIMIC native English speakers?

Here’s why it’s very effective – you don’t have to create English speech from scratch by sticking words together! You can repeat sentences and phrases that are used by others – it’s the perfect shortcut, don’t you agree?

Now, hands down the best way of mimicking is when you can HEAR someone else say something and then you repeat it.

• Watching a TV program or a video and repeating what the character says would be a good example of that – it’s also a great method of acquiring native-like pronunciation.
• Using the English Harmony System would be another example of you listening to how a native English speaker speaks and then you repeat after them.

When you read aloud, you can’t really hear how those sentences and words are pronounced, so that’s a drawback.

But as far as mimicking native-like English sentence structures – reading aloud is PERFECT

Just think about it – someone else has done all the work for you by writing it all down, and all you have to do is open your mouth and train it to speak by repeating THE SAME EXACT sentences that some other English speaker has created!

Basically you allow your mouth be guided by the text, and in my opinion it just doesn’t get better than that!

What Kind of Material Can Be Used for Reading Aloud

And here comes the best part – you can choose pretty much ANYTHING as a source for your spoken English practice if you decide to do some loud reading:

• English fiction – just make sure it’s easy-to-read;
• English newspaper articles;
• Quite obviously – online news articles and other websites you find interesting;
• You can also write something yourself and then read it out loud;
• You can even read my blog articles out loud

There’s only one thing you absolutely have to make sure of.

You have to UNDERSTAND what you read and it has to be written in an easy-to-read manner.

Don’t fall victim to the pitfall of choosing some sophisticated English text you can barely understand thinking that it somehow is going to improve your English in a short space of time.

In reality, quite the opposite is going to happen – you’re going to get confused and eventually you’ll end up HATING the very concept of reading aloud!

Just like I said – what you want is something that flows nicely when reading.

But in case you’re one of those perfectionists with very high standards – please watch this video where I’m talking about the fact that you have to lower them to stand a chance of achieving oral English fluency.

On the finishing note, let me tell you that you don’t have to go with some specific material created with the purpose of reading practice in mind.

The KEY is probably to read out loud something you’re actually INTERESTED in, something that excites you!

And now it’s your turn to write something in the comments section below.

Let me know if you’ve ever been doing loud reading practice, and also let me know if you have any specific tips on it that other English Harmony readers might find useful!

Cheers,

Robby

P.S. Would you like to find out why I’m highlighting some of the text in red? Read this article and you’ll learn why it’s so important to learn idiomatic expressions and how it will help you to improve your spoken English!

P.S.S. Are you serious about your spoken English improvement? Check out my English Harmony System HERE!

I often touch upon the subject of English idiomatic expressions on this blog for the simple reason that more often than not our every-day speech consists of such and similar word combinations and it’s making our speech so much more easier!

Just look at the above paragraph – it’s stuffed with various idiomatic expressions and collocations, and the one common trait they all share is that you have to learn the EXACT way they’re used so that you can learn them off by heart and then use them in your own conversations.

Then there are proper English idioms you can’t even understand unless you actually know what they mean – such as “It’s no skin off my nose” or “Until the cows come home”.

There are, however, certain English phrases that may at first sound as if they don’t have any double-meanings AT ALL, yet they mean something completely different!

If you’re an advanced English speaker and you’ve been communicating with real people in real life for years, this list will probably reveal nothing new to you.

If you’re someone who’s just starting off in an English speaking country, for example, the following phrases might turn out to be an eye-opener for you!

You don’t want to do that!

If you take this phrase literally, it sounds as if someone is making a statement that you don’t want to do something (in which case it doesn’t really make an awful lot of sense – I mean, how can someone else possibly know what I do or what I don’t want to do?!)

In reality though, this phrase is used when advising someone not to do something, so the real message behind this expression is “You shouldn’t do it!”

Why do English speaking people say “You don’t want to do that!” instead of simply saying that one SHOULDN’T do it?

Well – it’s just the way conversational English goes! Don’t ask WHY – just accept that it’s the way native English speakers speak, and life is going to be a whole lot easier for you.

Another version of the same phrase – “You don’t want to be doing that!” – is used just like the original one, and once again – don’t ask WHY there are two different versions of this phrase in use.

Just accept it and use whichever one you want to use!

He can’t help himself

When I heard the English verb “to help” used in this context for the first time, I thought the person in question must be physically handicapped once they can’t help themselves.

I mean – the word “to help” is quite simple and straightforward, so when someone can’t help themselves, they quite literally can’t assist themselves with performing certain tasks, isn’t that right?

Turns out it’s not the case!

When someone says about another person that they can’t help themselves, it means the person in question can’t RESIST doing something, they’re too weak to say NO to themselves

Let’s say, you’re eating too much chocolate on a daily basis, and your work colleague asks you one day why you’re eating so much chocolate every day. You can simply respond by saying “I just can’t help myself!” which means that it’s a habit so strong you can’t resist it.

Shut up!

When someone tells you to shut up, it’s quite clear what they want to tell you, isn’t that right?

They’re telling you to shut your mouth, and needless to say, it’s quite rude to be talking to someone like that.

Sometimes, however, the phrase “Shut up!” can be used to express something completely different – namely, your amazement at something the other person is telling you about.

So if you’re speaking with an English speaking person and they respond to you by saying “Shut up! I can’t believe it!”, it doesn’t necessarily mean they want you to shut your mouth and stop talking to them. It merely means they’re so surprised at what you just said that they’re using the phrase “Shut up!” as means of expressing they disbelief or excitement.

Sure enough, you’ll be able to read the true meaning of those words off the other person’s face and tone of voice – the role of body language can’t be underestimated, after all.

There might be some occasions, however, when you’d think the other person is being rude to you while in reality there’s no harm intended, so please bear in mind that the expression “Shut up!” can also have a pretty harmless meaning!

Go away!

I don’t know about you, but where I live (Ireland) this phrase is used the same way as the one above (“Shut up!”) when expressing your surprise at something the other person has just said.

Basically it’s just another way of saying “Really?!”, and when they say “Go away!”, nobody means it literally. It’ just a way of letting the other person know that you’re shocked to hear it, and you may as well start using this phrase in your own daily English conversations.

I see!

This is a very, very simple English phrase, but when an average beginner English student sees it, on 9 times out of 10 they’ll think it means that someone is saying that they SEE something.

In fact, the phrase “I see!” is used conversationally all the time when people want to say that they get it, that they UNDERSTAND it, and this is actually something that a lot of foreign English speakers should learn pretty early in their lives.

On way too many occasions my fellow foreigners say “I understand” while the phrase they should be using is “I see”!

You see, “I understand” sounds way too formal when used during your daily conversations, so I warmly suggest you start using the much more friendlier version of it “I see!” instead.

See where I’m coming from?

If someone asks you if you see where they’re coming from, you may assume they mean it quite literally, in which case you may be thinking “How on Earth am I supposed to know where they’re coming from?!”

When people ask you this question, what they actually mean to say is “Do you understand the reasons why I’m saying this?”

Basically the conversation would go something like this:

“I think we should swap this machine for the other one because the production output is much lower now that the busy season is over.”

You: ???

“You see where I’m coming from?” (Do you understand why I’m suggesting we should swap the machines on the production line?)

You: “I haven’t got a clue what you’re talking about! Can you explain everything to me step-by-step please?”

You may want to…

This phrase may seem a bit confusing at first. You may… You want… Why “You MAY WANT” then? Why are the two words grouped together? Does it mean you’re giving the other person a permission to do something as in “You may do it”?

What this phrase actually means is quite the opposite to giving someone a permission to do something – it’s all about giving the other person a suggestion that they should probably choose to do whatever it is you’re telling them to do!

Why not simply say “You should…” instead?

Well, you see – “You may want to…” is a very polite way of letting someone know as to what would be the right course of action while “You should…” might actually sound like a command rather than a suggestion!

I don’t buy it!

This English phrase has nothing to do with buying stuff, it’s all about BELIEVING what you’re told!

If someone makes an empty promise to you or you’re told some news you don’t believe, you can respond with saying “I don’t buy it!” in which case you’re simply making it clear you don’t believe what you’re told.

I’m looking forward to…

As a beginner English student you may think this phrase means to be looking straight ahead of you (as opposed to be looking backwards or sideways, for example).

In conversational English and also in English in general, however, this phrase has a completely different meaning – it simply means to be expecting something, to be really waiting on something to happen!

I remember when I’d just started living in Ireland 11 years ago, my supervisor asked me at work if I was looking forward to my holidays, to which I didn’t really know what to say because the sentence didn’t make a lot of sense to me.

Now I know only too well that it means to be expecting something, and in case you didn’t know it – it’s about time to add this English phrase onto your vocabulary!

Tell me about it!

“Tell me about it!” doesn’t mean “TELL me ABOUT it”.

It means “Yes, I know exactly what you’re talking about – I have the same experience!”

Here’s a situation to describe exactly what I’m talking about here:

You: “My little sister is real nightmare – she constantly makes demands to our mom and cries if she doesn’t get what she wants!”

Your friend: “Tell me about it!”

What your friends is telling you is – “Yeah, I can completely relate to that because I also have a little sister who’s behaving that way!”

So now that you know what this phrase means, you wouldn’t start telling your friend MORE ABOUT it. You’d simply understand your friend is going through a similar experience!

It doesn’t hurt to…

When someone tells you that it doesn’t hurt to do something, they don’t literally mean that it’s not going to be painful.

What they mean to tell you is that the activity in question is going to result is something really beneficial to you, so it’s definitely worth doing it!

How do you find this…?

I remember someone asked me how I found my job to which I started telling them about the recruitment agency who helped me to land my job with the company…

What that person actually meant was – “What do you THINK ABOUT your job?” – so in this case the English verb “to find” has another meaning on top of the most common one which is to actually find something after you’ve been looking for it!

* * *

Now, did you find this article interesting?

Did you learn a few new English phrases you didn’t know existed?

If so – let your friends know about them by using the social sharing tool below!

Thanks for reading,

Robby

P.S. Would you like to find out why I’m highlighting some of the text in red? Read this article and you’ll learn why it’s so important to learn idiomatic expressions and how it will help you to improve your spoken English!

P.S.S. Are you serious about your spoken English improvement? Check out my English Harmony System HERE!

I’m so overwhelmed by the need to discuss this topic that I can barely contain my excitement! It’s been a controversy all along the way and it seems to me that many foreign English speakers still don’t differentiate much between spoken and written English. But those two creatures are from different planets indeed, and here’s why it’s important for you as a foreign English speaker:

By learning English the traditional way you can become very good at writing but you still won’t be able to speak English fluently Fluency in either of them doesn’t necessarily guarantee fluency in another!

Majority of foreign English speakers and also natives aren’t aware of the huge differences between those two. But it’s that simple indeed – judging by your writing you might be mistaken for a native English speaker but when you open your mouth you might be constantly running into difficulties with verbalizing your thoughts and expressing yourself properly!

Have you ever encountered such issue? I bet you have – so keep reading this article and you’ll find out a whole lot more about it!

I know this for a fact because I’ve been a good English writer for a long time – long before I achieved speaking confidence. And I also know it too well that being an excellent writer can actually have a detrimental effect on your spoken English. Are you surprised to hear that? Well, it should come as no surprise at all if you just dwell on it a bit!

If a foreign English speaker has achieved fluency in English writing, he/she is risking becoming too complacent and not paying enough attention to English speaking

The awareness of being a very good English writer reinforces one’s notion that they’ve achieved the utmost English fluency. And if you’re clapped on the back for being an excellent English writer by others with comments like: “Your English is perfect, you’re better than most native English speakers that I know!”, you really risk losing the grip of reality!

And here’s a very good example that explains exactly what I’m talking about.

When I visit online forums and websites like Yahoo! Answers I often see a question “how can I improve my English?” coming up. And it’s often followed by a paragraph or two written in impeccable English! A typical response a person gets on such an inquiry is – “Your English actually is really good judging by your writing, I don’t think there’s much you can actually improve!” or – “Looking at your English writing I can tell you that you speak excellent, better than most native English speakers that I know!”

You know – if I were that foreign English speaker, I would put the question in a different way, like this:

How can I improve my SPOKEN English?
P.S.
Please don’t comment on my WRITTEN English skills, my English SPEAKING skills don’t even come close because I’ve spent long years on traditional English studies focusing on READING and WRITING. So please, if anyone has any idea on how I can improve my SPOKEN English, please let me know!

Are you getting the idea?

The person in question is most likely unaware of the differences between spoken and written English. I mean – although he/she feels that some area of his/her English needs to come along, the notion of what EXACTLY needs to be improved is sometimes very vague and clouded. Are you surprised? Do you think that all foreign English speakers realize that they need to focus exclusively on speaking because it should be obvious to them that it’s their spoken English that needs improvement?

My friend! The cold reality is that unless someone points it out to that person, the likelihood is that he/she will carry on without being consciously aware of the real situation!

It’s shocking, it’s weird, and it’s crazy, but it’s true nonetheless!

On 90% of occasions foreign English speakers can’t even figure out EXACTLY what area of English they should work upon, simply because everyone says: “Your English is great, your English is really good, hey – you write like a native English person!”

I was having the same issues – my Latvian friends were clapping me on the back saying: “Robby, your English is great, no really, personally I can’t even write in English properly!” So every time I was complemented for having great English knowledge, it reinforced my conviction that I have to work even more on my English grammar, vocabulary and writing because I was having frequent fluency issues.

Now when I’m looking back at myself, I want to scream – “Robby, for Christ’s sake, don’t you get it that it’s your spoken English that needs to be improved so you’d better focus on speaking!” There was no-one though, to shed the light on me back then, so I kept struggling for years with traditional studies!

OK, let’s get back to the main topic; I’m getting a bit carried away!

So my point is that sometimes in life you need to be pointed out the EXACT thing, and if it’s not done, chances are that you’ll keep wandering in the English language woods being completely unaware of the world outside!

Why Written English And Spoken English Are So Different

People assume that once you write in very good English, your speech is the same – well articulated and rich. I’ve actually seen questions specifically about spoken English on Yahoo Answers answered with: “But you speak very well already, you don’t really need to improve it!” – as if they had heard the other person speak!

I think this myth stems from notion that a well educated person who’s become fluent at English writing automatically masters English speech, too. It’s hard for the average Joe to comprehend that foreigners haven’t learned the English language like native children do. Children would pick up speaking skills first and only then learn to write and spell.

Most of foreign English learners, however, go a completely different route by learning to read and write first! This approach can leave a deep mark in ones ability to form fluent speech later on, because the first thing that person imagines as he/she needs to speak is – English words written in front of their eyes!

Yes, they will most likely try to visualize the English sentence they’re building as they speak – as if they’re writing it on a piece of paper!

But it’s so, so wrong… I can’t even put it in the right words how wrong it is, because this approach has a really big detrimental effect on a foreigner’s ability to communicate! The resulting speech is slow, full of hesitation and stuttering – simply because the person in question tries to write English text in mind and then speak rather than speak instantaneously and naturally!

Have you got any doubts left now that English writing and speaking are from different planets and don’t always get along fine?

If you have – keep reading and I’ll dissipate all of them!

Spoken English means Improvizing!

Spoken English is instantaneous. When you open your mouth and say something, you can’t take it back – what’s said is said! When you write, on the other hand, you can think about what words you use and in what order you put them! If you’d go this path when speaking English, your speech would become very hesitant, with constant ‘hmmms’ and ‘eeerrs’ and you’d correct yourself all the time by picking better fitting words.

When you write, you create the piece of English text by working on it. When you speak, you’re IMPROVIZING, you don’t create anything, only ‘raw’ language stuff comes out of your mouth

This factor explains very well why so many foreign English speakers are so good at writing but their spoken fluency is quite poor. They can create impeccable written English texts because they’ve got time to think on word choice and grammar structure. It’s something we’ve all learned in a classroom, we’ve passed English exams by using the same academic skills and we feel quite confident about our English knowledge. Real life isn’t academy, though! The moment you have to start chatting with a real English speaking person, writing skills are no help whatsoever!

Written English utilizes all of your vocabulary – passive and active!

It’s not hard to understand, therefore, why your written English texts might be filled with rich vocabulary so that it gets even natives amazed. Once you have enough time to look up relevant words from your ‘inner’ vocabulary, your English writing skills are only limited by your imagination!

When speaking, on the other had, you are able use only your active vocabulary! It’s those English words and phrases you’ve been actively using and you can speak them automatically – as opposed to passive vocabulary which consists of words you recognize but can’t use in a live conversation.

And here we can draw a logical conclusion – if you haven’t been paying much attention to speaking in English, your active vocabulary can be significantly smaller than your passive one! On top of that you have to consider the factor that spoken English fluency depends on your socializing experience.

If you’ve spent very little communicating with other English speaking people, no writing skills will help you form a fluent and natural speech!

Simple awareness of your active vocabulary’s existence makes it so much easier to understand why you can’t use all words that you know when speaking English. Majority of foreign English speakers and learners are simply unaware of this fact and they have difficulties with explaining the significant fluency level differences between their written English and spoken English. They usually resort to even more traditional studies believing that will help them overcome the issues… Simply because that’s the only way of improving English they’re comfortable with!

You can correct text before finalizing a written piece of information

It’s especially easy in this day and age when most of us use computers instead of a pen and a paper. Don’t like something that you just typed? Just delete it! Does it sound too awkward? Make it sound more naturally by adjusting a few bits here and there! And even if you write something in a traditional way, it’s very easy just to take time and create the sentence in the head first and then put it down on the paper.

Have you ever had this feeling of knowing the exact thing to say right after you’ve replied to someone in English by using bad grammar or not the best fitting words? It’s typical for those who’ve learned English the traditional way! You’re so used to creating English sentences on a piece of paper in a slow, considerate manner, and you simple can’t think fast enough to speak fluently! Your mind constantly lags behind your mouth, and this is yet another proof that spoken English is an entirely different animal than the written one!

If it was true and anyone could simply replicate their English writing style when speaking, all foreign English speakers who are very good at writing would be equally good at speaking. It’s not the case, however, because your speech cannot be corrected during a conversation! What you say for the first time is what counts, and even though you can correct or add certain words right after you’ve spoken, generally speaking you either speak well, or you don’t. There’s no going back to what you’ve said in order to correct it

Spoken English is less formal, written English – more formal

Another difference between the two – spoken and written English – is in the type of vocabulary that is being used. Now I’m not talking about passive and active vocabularies, here I’m refereeing to what kind of words and phrases people go for when they speak. It’s about formal language versus phrasal verbs and less formal words!

As you may have noticed, spoken English usually sounds friendlier and it’s also easier to understand than written texts. Although not always, but there are more phrasal verbs and informal sayings used when speaking in English than writing. Of course, there are plenty of occasions when you’ll read a newspaper news column written in a very colloquial style and hear a very formal speech.

Generally speaking, everyday spoken English tends to be more informal than written instructions, magazine articles and novels or indeed – online content.

Well, I have to admit that I’m writing my blog articles in a fairly friendly style, too. Nonetheless, if had to convey this blog post’s message verbally, I would have probably chosen different words when describing certain concepts. Instead of “chosen” I would have said “picked”, “nonetheless” would have been swapped for “anyway”, but it’s in fact hard to say exactly what I would have said differently. As I said previously in this article – English speaking is more like improvising as opposed to writing!

But to see the most obvious difference between spoken and written English, just pick up some piece of English fiction. Read a page or two and try to imagine yourself or some other English speaker you know speak in such manner. Quite impossible, isn’t it?

Which Fluency I Should Go First – Writing or Speaking?

The ideal scenario for any foreign English learner would be to learn both aspects of English – writing and speaking – simultaneously. If you follow an English studying plan based on incorporating new vocabulary and phraseology directly into speech and following it up by writing tests to get the spellings right and also develop broader writing skills, you’ll develop English language skills close to those of a native English speaker.

I’d say you have to begin with learning every new word and phrase by speaking it out loud and using it in a conversation. If you live in an English speaking country and spend most of your time with other English speaking folks – fair enough, you’re improving your English the natural way through conversation. In that case you actually put 100% of your focus on speaking, and you should devote at least some time during the day to work on your writing.

But if you’re studying English from home, taking classes or studying through institutional education, the chances are that you’re not making enough effort to develop your English speaking skills. Most of classroom time is dedicated to listening, writing and reading so you should make additional effort to read and repeat loud all you’re writing and reading.

You can discuss different topics with yourself or friends; you can read short passages from English newspapers and retell them using your own words and certain phrases and words that you’ve learned that day. And of course, you have to seek every opportunity you can to practice English in real life with real people!

All the above efforts combined will definitely give you an edge in a long run over those English learners who’ve been only developing their expression skills on the paper!

So my opinion is – develop both writing and speaking if you want to be able to communicate effectively and easily and also be a literate foreign English speaker. Apart from those who are brilliant in classroom but useless on the street I’ve known a few who can speak fluently but can’t write at all! As you can imagine, it also poses difficulties throughout professional life and inhibits your overall English improving progress.

However, if I was asked – “All right Robby, but if you had to choose between the two, which one would you go for?” – I’d say without a moment’s hesitation that I’d choose spoken English any time.

And if you think about it deeper, I think you’ll agree with me. English, just like any language, is means of verbal communication first and foremost Regardless all the other circumstances, you simply can’t do without interpersonal verbal communication! Back in the days when only the chosen ones knew how to write, people were still using language to communicate with each other despite being totally illiterate.

Therefore you have to agree that for humans as social beings spoken English is the most important aspect of the general English knowledge!

But of course, it’s all just theoretical consideration. In the 21st century you simply need to have good English writing skills if you’re to achieve at least something in your professional and also personal life. Imagine yourself being unable to write a decent e-mail to your future employer, for instance… You simply wouldn’t stand a chance of getting that job, right?

Robby

P.S. Are you ready to get on the fast track to spoken English fluency? Check out my English Harmony System HERE!

Let me tell you about Maria, one of my students from Spain. She had been studying English for five years, knew grammar inside and out, but would literally hide behind pillars at networking events to avoid English conversations. Sound familiar?

Three months later, she was confidently presenting to international clients. What changed? Not her grammar knowledge – but her entire approach to English conversations.

Today I want to share the exact system that transformed Maria’s speaking confidence, and has helped thousands of my students overcome that paralyzing fear of English conversations.

You know that feeling, right? Your heart starts racing, your palms get sweaty, and suddenly all those grammar rules you’ve memorized just vanish from your mind. I’ve been there myself, and I promise you – there’s a way out.

The Hidden Truth About Conversation Fear

Here’s what most English teachers won’t tell you: 95% of conversation anxiety has nothing to do with your English level. It’s about three psychological traps that keep you stuck:

The Perfectionist Trap: You believe you need perfect English before you can have real conversations. This is like saying you need to be a professional swimmer before you can get in the water!

The Judgment Fear: You’re convinced native speakers are secretly judging every mistake. Reality check: most people are actually impressed when someone is learning their language, and they’re usually thinking about their own problems anyway.

The Overthinking Curse: When you focus too much on grammar rules mid-conversation, you lose the natural flow. Communication becomes mechanical instead of authentic.

The Confidence-Building Framework That Actually Works

After working with over 10,000 English learners, I’ve developed a proven system that builds unshakeable conversation confidence. Here’s how it works:

Phase 1: Master Your Inner Voice

Before you can confidently speak with others, you need to be comfortable speaking to yourself in English. This isn’t just practice – it’s rewiring your brain to think in English naturally.

Your Daily Mission: Spend 10 minutes narrating your activities in English. “Now I’m making coffee… I’m choosing the blue mug… The weather looks cloudy today…”

Maria started doing this while cooking dinner. Within two weeks, she noticed English thoughts appearing naturally throughout her day.

Phase 2: Build Your Conversation Toolkit

Having reliable conversation starters eliminates that terrifying “what do I say?” moment. Practice these until they become automatic:

• “How’s your day going so far?”
• “What brings you here today?”
• “Have you tried [relevant topic] before?”
• “That’s interesting – tell me more about that.”

Pro Tip: The magic phrase that changes everything is “I’m still learning English, so please bear with me.” This immediately removes pressure and often makes people more patient and helpful.

Phase 3: Focus on Connection, Not Perfection

Here’s the breakthrough moment: The goal is to communicate your message, not to speak like a native speaker. If someone understands what you’re trying to say, you’ve succeeded!

One of my students, Ahmed from Egypt, used to apologize for his English in every conversation. Now he says, “My English is improving every day, and I love practicing with native speakers!” Same level, completely different energy.

The Confidence-Building Exercises That Work

The Mirror Method: Practice conversations with yourself in the mirror. Yes, it feels silly at first, but it helps you get comfortable with the physical act of speaking English. Maria did this for 5 minutes every morning.

Record and Review: Record yourself having imaginary conversations, then listen back. You’ll often discover you sound much better than you thought! This builds objective confidence.

The 30-Second Rule: When someone asks you a question, give yourself permission to take up to 30 seconds to think before responding. Most people won’t even notice the pause, and your answer will be much better.

Progressive Exposure: Start with low-stakes conversations (ordering coffee, asking for directions) before moving to complex discussions. Build your confidence muscle gradually.

The Mindset Shifts That Change Everything

From “I Can’t” to “I’m Learning”: Replace “I can’t speak English well” with “I’m improving my English every day.”

From “Mistake” to “Learning Opportunity”: Every error is valuable data that helps you improve. Native speakers make mistakes too!

From “They’ll Judge Me” to “They’ll Help Me”: Most people genuinely want to help language learners succeed. You’re giving them a chance to be kind.

Your 7-Day Confidence Challenge

Ready to transform your conversation confidence? Here’s your action plan:

Day 1-2: Master one conversation starter through mirror practice
Day 3-4: Have one low-stakes English conversation (even just “How are you?” to a cashier)
Day 5-6: Record yourself speaking for 2 minutes about your day
Day 7: Identify one limiting belief about your English and challenge it with evidence

Real Results from Real Students

“I used to avoid English conversations at work. After following Robby’s system for just one month, I volunteered to lead our international team meeting. My English wasn’t perfect, but my confidence was!” – Lisa, Germany

“The mirror method felt weird at first, but it completely changed how I feel about speaking English. Now I actually look forward to conversations!” – Carlos, Mexico

Take Your Confidence to the Next Level

If you’re serious about building bulletproof conversation confidence, I’ve created something special for English learners who want to accelerate their progress. My English Harmony Fluency Course includes advanced conversation confidence techniques, real-world practice scenarios, and personalized feedback that takes you from nervous to natural in English conversations.

But remember – confidence starts with your very next conversation. You don’t need perfect English. You just need to start.

Your Next Conversation Starts Now

The most important thing? Start speaking today. Your future confident English-speaking self is waiting for you to take that first step.

What conversation will you have today? Share your commitment in the comments below – I read every single one and love celebrating your progress!

Remember: Every conversation, no matter how short or imperfect, is a victory. You’re not just learning English – you’re building the confidence to connect with people from around the world.

Keep practicing, keep improving, and most importantly – keep speaking!

Robby

P.S. If this article helped you, share it with a fellow English learner who might be struggling with conversation confidence. We’re all in this journey together!