Most of us are creatures of habit. What that means is that we
prefer to have routines. We find comfort in having a routine. Think about what you do every
morning after you wake up, do you follow the same
routine every day? Why? Because we like having the routine. We like the predictability
of what's going to happen. And not only do we enjoy
the comfort of routines, but having effective daily habits
allows us to make progress to meet our goals. But as you and I both know,
starting a new habit is really tough. Even if we have a goal we really want to
achieve like becoming more confident in English. Not only that, but it can be difficult to
know if you're making progress, I'm Annemarie with
Speak Confident English. This is exactly where you want to be
every week to get the confidence you want for your life and work
in English. This week you and I are going to answer those
questions so that you can easily create an effective English habit that helps
you meet your English goals and know, without a doubt, when
you're making progress, plus get a variety of common
expressions, collocations and phrases, English speakers use when talking about
habits so that you can incorporate them into your English conversations with
friends and coworkers. In the end, you'll discover five simple steps you can
take to build an effective daily habit and get eight common
expressions to use as well. Not only will you get all of that, but I'm also going to tell you why I'm
super envious of basketball players. And I'm going to share with you a free
download to help you get started in building a daily English vocabulary. The first step toward
building an effective habit
to help you meet your English goals is to connect the new
habit you want to create with an existing habit. That sounds more complicated
than it really is in English. We call this stacking your habits. Think about how you stack
plates or cups in a cupboard. Why do you stack them that way?
We do it because of course, plates stack on top of each other
or they fit together perfectly. The same thing is true
with cups and bowls. So how does this apply to habits?
Well, to answer that first, let's talk about the habit that you
want to create to help you meet a goal. For example, maybe your goal
is to read a book in English. The habit you would create is
to read something every day. Or perhaps your goal is to
increase your English vocabulary. So the habit becomes taking time
every day to practice specific vocabulary. In both cases, you're attempting to add something
new to your daily routine, which might be time to read or
time to practice vocabulary. Usually when we want to start
something new like that, we simply say, I'm going to start studying
for 30 minutes every day, or I'm going to read for
15 minutes every day, but we don't really identify
a specific time when we're going to do that. As a
result, we don't commit to it. A more effective way to build in a new
habit is to think about your current routines, maybe your morning or evening routine
when you already have time alone without distractions. And you can
commit to some focused time. If you can identify a current
habit that you have and connect it to this time that you want
to practice vocabulary or spend time reading, you are stacking your habits. You're finding an opportunity
where your new habit fits perfectly with your existing habits.
Let me give you an example. I'm certain that in the mornings and the
evenings part of your routine includes brushing your teeth. I know that sounds
kind of strange, but I'm serious. You spend a few minutes every
day, brushing your teeth. It doesn't really take a
lot of focus to do that. So perhaps you could add another
habit while you're brushing your teeth. For example, you could put a sticky note of
vocabulary words on your mirror, and while you're brushing your teeth, you build in a new habit
of practicing those words. When you do that, you're
stacking your habits. You're incorporating a new habit
into an existing one. As a result, it's much easier to start that
new habit and do it consistently. Now the second step to building
an effective habit is to start small, really, really small. In English, we have the expression bigger is better, which means that something
big or large is more valuable, but that isn't always true. Sometimes bigger means
more pressure and stress, a feeling of being overwhelmed. And when
you're trying to create a new habit, bigger is definitely not better. A smart way to think about building a
new habit is to follow the advice of Desmond Tutu, who said there's only one way
to eat an elephant one bite at a time. When we aim to implement small, bite-sized habits, they're
more likely to stick. To make a habit stick or
alternatively to stick to a new habit means to do it consistently
so that it eventually becomes automatic. Just like brushing your teeth every day
is automatic. You don't think about it. You don't stress about it. You just
do it because it's what you do. And the goal of creating a new habit
is that it follows the same pattern. It just becomes something
you do every day. So let's go back to those ideas of
building a habit, to meet an English goal. For example, reading every day so
that you can read a book in English, a small habit would be
read one page every day or read for five minutes
every day. Similarly, if your goal is to increase
your English vocabulary, a small bite-sized effective
habit is to practice just five words a day. Again, maybe while brushing your teeth or
driving to work or walking your dog. Step number three is do
it daily several years ago. British researchers found that
it takes anywhere from 18 to 254 days to make a new habit automatic. Now, automatic
is a word I've already used, and that's the key word here. Last year, I did a lesson on how to master your
English confidence. And in that lesson, I introduced the word automaticity
in language automaticity is the ability to use the language
without having to think about it too much. In other words, without having to stress and search for
the perfect word or trying to remember the right grammar structure. Instead, you just. Say it, it just happens. It's natural, which is exactly what we all want
when it comes to communicating in our second, third, fourth or fifth language. So how does that automaticity happen? It happens through daily
consistent practice. And again, that may take anywhere from 18 days to 254 days. Daily practice guarantees that
you get the repetition you need to be successful and make progress, eventually reaching your goal. And
that brings me to step number four, you have to track your progress and
you need to celebrate your successes. Now here's where I want to share with you
why I'm envious of basketball players. Not only are basketball players tall,
which if you don't already know, I'm not someone you
would describe as tall, but also it's so easy to know
if you're getting better at basketball. It's so easy to
know if you're making progress. When you throw a ball at a basketball
hoop, either it goes in, or it doesn't. A basketball player who practices
consistently is going to see that ball go in the hoop
successfully more and more. Their progress is clear that
isn't always true when we're starting a new habit,
particularly related to language, we don't always see what
we're doing. You know, you're practicing English regularly.
You that you're going to classes, but you still feel stuck,
frustrated, nervous, or shy. Why do all that work if you don't
know that you're making progress? I recently told some of my students
about a huge mistake I made in my own language learning. When I first
started language learning, I was extremely diligent
in writing everything down grammar structures. I was learning
new words. I wanted to remember. And the benefit of doing that was after
some time passed, maybe a week or two, or maybe even a few
months, I could go back, look at my notes and say, Oh my gosh, I've done so much. I remember when that grammar
structure was difficult for me. I remember when conjugating
that verb was difficult for me, but it isn't difficult anymore. My progress was clear. The mistake I made was at some
point I stopped doing that. I no longer had a written record. I no longer had demonstrated
proof of my progress. And as a result, I lost motivation. I got frustrated and I wanted to give up. So the key to knowing if you're
making progress is to track your habit, keep track of what
you're doing and to make it easy. I've got a free download
to help you do that. I'll tell you more about it in a moment, but first here's why a
habit tracker is so useful. Number one, it's a visual reminder to
help you complete your daily habit. This makes it easier for
you to get into your new habit. And second, it becomes your
visual proof of progress. Every time you mark a day
of completing that habit, every time you write down what
you did, what you learned, what you want to remember, you're documenting another
step toward your goal. You're creating a written record of
your progress. And on those days, when you feel frustrated that
nothing is changing, you can go back, take a look at that documented
record and say, Oh my gosh, actually a ton has changed. I have accomplished so much
in the last few months. That is an amazing feeling. And
when you get that, celebrate it. And step number five for building in
a new effective habit to meet your English goals so that your
habit becomes second nature (in other words, it's something that you do instinctively)
is to use two of my favorite words in English: yet and but. No
matter what our goals are, no matter how successful we are
at implementing a new habit, we all have days when we feel discouraged. Those two words - yet and but -
can be helpful when it's time to shift your mindset from something
negative to positive. For example, if you start to think, I still haven't reached my goal of reading
a book in English. What's the point? You can shift that statement to, I still haven't reached my goal
of reading a book in English yet, but I will. If I continue my daily habit
of reading one page every day. Or I'm not making any progress
in increasing my English vocabulary again, using those two simple words yet
and but we can shift that to, I haven't made any progress in
increasing my vocabulary yet, but I will, if I keep
practicing every day. And the best way to know that you
have is to use that habit tracker a written record. So now let me tell you about
a free download I have for
you to make all of this easier. This download is
available on my website. So I'll leave a link to that just
below this video, in that download, you're going to find
two things. Number one, you'll find a habit tracker where you
can write down what is the new habit that you want to start? What month is it? And you can track it every day that month, all you have to do is write a simple
little X or a check mark every time you do it. Again, by doing that, you're giving yourself a visual reminder
of what you should do every day and you're tracking your progress. I'm certain that one of your goals in
English is to build your vocabulary. So I want to help, you know, how to do
that effectively with this download. There's a place for you to
write down the new words, collocations or idioms that you want
to remember and practice for one week, then every day, there's space for you
to write down some example sentences, or different ways that you
might use that new language. Following this pattern gives
you that repetition to create automaticity, the ability to use that new word
or collocation automatically. There's a new page for every week,
during the month. And then at the end, there's an opportunity to reflect
on what you learned that month. When you complete those
documents successfully, you've developed concrete proof
of how you've increased your vocabulary that month. And then you can do it again the next
month and the month after and the month after. So if you want to get started on
increasing your English vocabulary and build an effective daily
habit to help you do that, simply go to my website,
get the free download, and immediately start using
it. Once you've done that, I would love for you to
tell me how it's going, the best place for you to do that is in
the comments at the end of the lesson. And with that, you have five simple steps that you
can take to build an effective habit. Plus you have eight English, collocations, and idioms to help you talk
about habits in English. If you found this week's lesson
useful to you, I would love to know. And you can tell me in three
simple ways, number one, give this video a thumbs up
here on YouTube and subscribe
to this channel so you never miss one of my Confident
English lessons. Number two, share this lesson with friends or
coworkers by email or Facebook, and finally go to my website,
download the habit tracker. And tell me about what you're learning
or share with me the progress that you're making. I would love to celebrate with
you. Thank you so much for joining me. And I look forward to seeing you next
time for your Confident English lesson.
