Better ways to say 'I want' in English | Advanced English learning

[Music] hi there everybody this is teacher harry here and welcome back to my english classes and before i forget you can always listen to me on my podcast you can download them and you can also look at the youtube channels and don't forget to subscribe to the channel and of course you can also visit the website where you get everything that you could possibly need for your english learning experience a one-stop shop okay so what am i going to talk to you about today well the lesson today is talking about i want and when we use i want in english it can sound a little bit harsh i remember when i was growing up my mother would always say to me i want never gets i want never gets and what you meant by that was if you say i want it sounds a little bit rude so if you say that all the time then i'm not going to give you what i want or what you want so if i wanted something in the sweet shop i want this i want that no no no was her response so she tried to teach me good manners and if i wanted something i would have to say i would like or could i please have something now i appreciate in many languages i want i would like sound the same or perhaps the words are the same but in the english language they're very different so when somebody says i want it sounds very demanding i want this i want that yeah so you can um picture the little child in the sweet shop i want this i want to borrow chocolate i want the toy and it sounds really really bad and all the customers in the shop will be looking at you of course but i would like or could i please have much more polite and much better huh okay so remember what my mother used to say i want never gets so we're going to look today at different ways in which you can say i want that will sound much better and much more polite okay so i'm going to give you a list of the various options that we have and then i'll go through them one by one so you can understand where and how we can use it and what's always important and also important with these is the other words we use around it for example i would like yes so it's i would followed by like i would like some tea please or i would like some coffee please or could i have some tea please or could i have some coffee please but definitely not i want so let me give you the list first of all i'm going to read some of them because i've got a long list so if i look at my screen here don't worry about that i wish i hope i long for i crave i lost after let's explain that a bit more later i lost after i desire i fancy i feel like i have my heart set on i'm in the mood for i have my eye on something or my eye on somebody i have something in mind i'm itching for something itchy and you have a scratch i'm itching for something or i'm itching to do something and then finally i'd give my right arm for something i'd give my right arm for something so all different ways in which we can say i want without saying the words i want so let me go through them one by one so the first i wish i wish i had a euro for every time somebody asked me for a lesson okay so i wish i had so look at the other words i use i wish i had or i wish i could i wish i could go out later but it's very wet i'd like to go for a walk i wish i could go out so you want to do something i wish i could talk to my friend i wish i could call him or her on the phone i wish i could use my laptop but the battery has run out okay so i wish i could i wish i could do this i wish i could do that i hope i hope that you will be able to come back soon i hope that i would be able to take a holiday next year when covid and all this pandemic is hopefully out of the way so i hope i hope that i hope to join a course next year i hope to sign up for university in the next few months so here i hope to do something and i hope that so just again look at the words that you use in conjunction with my expression i hope i long for when we long for something it's like the word long yeah long so when you long for something it means literally that you have wanted it for a very long time oh i long for a nice cold beer so on a hot summer's day and you've been working really really hard and at the end of the day you go home and you know somebody asks you what would you like oh i've been longing for a beer all day meaning you've been thinking about it all day so something that you have been thinking about for a considerable period of time then you can use the expression i long for you can long for some peace and quiet so when the kids leave home to go to school or they leave home to go to university or in fact when they leave home for good you might say ha i long for some peace and quiet along for those nice warm winter evenings when it's cold outside and i'm tucked up in bed in my big duvet or i'm sitting beside the fire and reading a book i long for those warm winter evenings inside the house okay so to long for something is to really want it for a period of time next word one is i crave and we crave for something is when we have a a desire for it yeah and usually it's to do with things like food okay so somebody who's on a diet perhaps might crave for some chocolate so they've been on a diet for several weeks or months and they they really would like to break out and uh have a little taste of something that is not so good for you but tastes very nice so oh i crave a nice bar of chocolate or i'm craving for a particular meal that they haven't had perhaps it's a chinese takeaway or a nice big dirty pizza whatever they they fancy so they crave for that and it's often a verb that's used when we talk about women who are expecting babies because things change and they they have unusual cravings for unusual types of food so they might have a cucumber sandwich or a toasted cheese with some strange topping yeah so they crave for something is a really strong strong desire okay so we might like something but when we crave for something we can get that taste the taste of the food oh go to the shop and get me that bag of sweets so go to the shop and get me that pizza i really crave for something sweet i crave for something tasty okay so to crave often when we've done without it for a period of time we have a deep deep desire to eat it okay to crave to lust after unless you have to be very careful how you use it because often when we refer to the word lust is to do with some pleasure and sometimes it might be sexual pleasure or something to lust after a person which is not a nice way to behave okay so but if we just lust for something it again it's something that you desire very passionately okay so we can lust after a bowl of ice cream you know three scoops of chocolate or vanilla or passion fruit whatever it might be you lust for that okay but to lust after somebody is to have a desire to be physically and sexually close to somebody it might not be returned so you have to be really really careful so to lust after you have to be very particular how you use it okay so you can love someone deeply but lust is something that is usually not returned okay so we'll just focus on lusting after some food or lusting after that deep red bottle of wine that you tasted several months ago and you haven't been able to find it in the shop so you you're really trying to get it so you can enjoy it one long winter's evening one friday evening when you'd like to pop the cork on a bottle of wine i desire so again to desire something a little bit stronger than like a little bit stronger than hope to haves and it's something similar to crave so to desire yeah i desire a holiday i desire a comfortable home i desire some free time yes it's really something strong and something deeper i fancy this is quite informal when we fancy we can fancy anything we can fancy the bar with chocolate we can fancy the pizza or we can say to our friend do you fancy a walk do you fancy going out tonight do you fancy going to the cinema so we use it all the time when we're trying to see does somebody want to do something that we want to do i'd like to go for a walk do you fancy joining me yeah or you text your friends and say we're meeting for a pizza in an hour or so do you fancy coming yeah so another way of saying i want okay so but it's a nice informal way and you hear it quite frequently in particularly british english now we can fancy the girl in the office we can fancy the girl in the shop we can fancy the guy in the supermarket so that means we are attracted to them it doesn't mean we physically or in any other way want them we fancy them and that we are attracted because they're handsome or pretty whatever it might be but when we say fancy in terms of going for a walk or fancy doing something it's you want to do something i fancy going out tonight i've been stuck at home for the last two weeks working remotely i fancy going for a beer because i'm really i've been flat out and i just want to get out okay so to fancy doing something do you fancy going somewhere do you fancy eating something do you fancy going into town all of the time very very informal ways to say what you want or asking somebody what they want or what they want to do i feel like and again a bit informal here ah i feel like a pizza tonight it's friday why not we always have a pizza or if we're going to have a pizza it's always on friday i feel like going away for the weekend why don't we we haven't done it for ages it's getting to the end of the summer or it's early autumn so we might get a bit of the last of the the the summer light and a couple of days and walk on the beach yeah i really feel like that yeah so to feel like i want to do something feel like going away for a few days before the depths of autumn and the early days of winter are upon us okay i i feel like going into town and maybe just having a walk or i feel like going to the park what about the zoo we haven't been to the zoo for ages yeah do you feel like that yeah so fancy doing something feel like very very similar both very very informal now some of these next few expressions a little bit longer okay and but they're equally good and again a good way to describe different ways to say i want so the first of them i have my heart set on something or she has her heart set on it so you might come down one morning and you're having breakfast and your wife is there a partner and son or daughter a little bit quiet and you ask what's up what's wrong or just a little bit of bad news she didn't get the course she wanted she had her heart set on that course meaning she wanted to go to that university really deeply because other friends are going be gentle she's a little bit upset because she had her heart set on it so when you have your heart set on something it's a deep desire it's something you've planned something you've hoped for and you haven't really considered that it might you might fail so your heart is set on it and then when somebody tells you sorry you didn't get in or you didn't have enough points well of course then naturally you're going to be disappointed people haven't been able to go away for a long long time for holidays and a lot of people had the heart set on joining their family and friends for christmas or other celebrations and unfortunately they had to cancel those arrangement or couldn't make them at all and even though their hearts were set on meeting the family introducing them to the new grandchild whatever it might be the pandemic put a stop to all of the traveling so now when hopefully things are getting to be a little bit better people can once again make those plans so perhaps you have your heart set on a christmas with your family perhaps you have your heart set on that long long holiday next year and you're beginning to do the planning already okay so to have your heart set on something is to have a big deep desire to do it i feel in the mood okay so mood is one of those things which can be a good mood or it can be a bad mood [Music] okay so when we are in a good mood we feel like doing something good yeah and when we're in a bad mood we feel like doing absolutely nothing so if i i'm in the mood or i feel as if i'm in the mood then we can do something that we really want to do i feel in the mood for a game of golf i feel in the mood for a walk in the hills so depending on what your real mood is happy or sad you will feel in the mood to do something or you will feel in the mood to do absolutely nothing perhaps you might just want to go to bed curl up and go to sleep why not if that's what you want to do then if that's what you feel like doing then that's what you should do we can have our eye on something so high e y e yeah we can have our eye on something it doesn't mean we are staring at it okay so we have to be very careful because when we stare at people they don't really like it but when we have our eye on something it means we've been watching out for that we have an a desire to buy it we want to get it yeah so perhaps you come home and your partner has bought some new dishes or some new plates or some new picture to hang on the wall and he said oh what they're they're interesting yeah i've had my eye on them for some time i've been walking past this shop every day for the last two weeks i keep looking at them and thinking they might look nice on the table or that might look nice on the wall so eventually i went in today and yeah they gave me a 20 discount so why not i bought them because i've had my eye on them for some time meaning i've been looking at them i thought they made me good and then i've made a decision yeah i really want them let's go and let's buy them you can also have your eye on another job you may be a bit annoyed or frustrated with the job you have perhaps you haven't got the promotion that you thought you might get or perhaps the salary increase that your boss had promised you hasn't come through yet your friends are moving around different jobs some of them are getting paid more than you're getting so you begin to look at the job vacancies and the adverts that are popping up on the internet so you've had your eye on a couple of jobs that might suit you so you eventually dust off your cv changes a little bit you put it on linkedin and you hope and wait to see what happens because you want to move or you want to get more money or you just want a change so you've had your eye on a change for some time so as i said when you have your eye on something it's something you want something you want to do something you want to change something you want to buy but you've been looking at it now somebody can have their eye on a person okay so if you're not so happy with the way one of your colleagues is working or if you're the boss and you've got some subordinates reporting to you and some of them are really not performing so well you might call one of them into the office one day said look i've been i had my eye on you for a while i don't think you look so happy in what you're doing or you've been late quite a few mornings or you're going home early is there something you want to tell me is there something up yeah so that's a way of approaching it you have to be really really careful so if you have your eye on somebody you're watching their movements watching what they are doing because you might be a little bit uncomfortable with the way they've been hey they have been behaving or a little bit uncomfortable with the way they are working so to have your eye on someone or to have your eye on something you might want to move home you might want a new apartment so you've been fed up a little bit with the space you have maybe there's not enough space with the pandemic you're both working at home or if the kids are at home online so not a lot of space so you have your eye on a bigger apartment or you have your eye on a new home that you might want to move to so anything that you desire anything you want to change you can have your eye on it and then just follow through the words as i've said so to have your eye on something to want to do something i have something in mind well we all have something in mind from time to time and again this can be used instead of saying i want what do you have in mind well i have in mind a change that's i don't know let's change the decoration in the home here i have in mind to paint the walls yellow or to paint the walls orange or peach or whatever color just a bit of a change because let's face it we spend a lot of time at home and we should probably change things from time to time so i have in mind some decoration what do you think so yeah you sit down and you talk about it and decide what the colors will be who's going to do what who's going to paint this room who's going to paint that room or do you need somebody to come and help you so you have something in mind and from a work point of view you can always have something in mind because you're planning things okay you're planning to change the routine you're planning to change the approach to customers you're planning to change the way you approach a job so to have something in mind i'm itching for something okay or itching to do something itch when you have a scratch you have to scratch your arm or scratch your head or whatever you have to scratch so when we're itching to do something we're very anxious yeah we really want to do something quickly immediately or we just want to change yeah so i'm itching for the start of the new football season yeah so this during the summer months not a lot of football on tv so somebody who's a big big football fan and let's face it lots of guys and girls are football fans so they're itching can't wait for the new football season to start to support their team for me i always dread the beginning of the football season because my team usually is crap and they play really really badly but i'm always hopeful yeah so when you're itching for something like a scratch you can't stop wanting it until until you itch it i'm itching for a holiday why don't we go away i'm itching for christmas because i really love it and my daughter will come home and all the family will be together the kids the grandkids everybody so we're really itching for a good time so a really really informal way to say i i want something and then finally i'd give my right arm for something or anything so to to give my right arm it literally means you'd be happy in a way for your arm to be cut off and taken away if you got something i'd give my right arm for tickets to go to that football game i'd give my right arm to win the lotto i'd give my right arm to get that promotion that i've been hoping for for weeks and weeks and months and months okay so again very very informal so when we're looking at all of these expressions that i've used as i say some of them are more formal than others some of them are quite neutral so i wish and i hope and i long for that they're quite formal i crave again a little bit formal i lost after i think i'd not use that so so often but just mentioned it because it's there to desire again a little bit more formal but i fancy or i feel like quite informal i have my heart set on something quite informal i'm in the mood for again quite informal i have my eye on something i have something in mind all more formal or more neutral than than than formal okay so mix here of formal and informal ways for you to say i want okay so as my mother said i want never gets i want never get so what we want you to practice using are other expressions i would like i would hope to do i wish i could okay so that's the lesson for today and as i said at the beginning make sure that you uh subscribe to the channel and you'll get all the details that you want about my courses on the webpage we're really happy and really grateful that you continue to support us i'll continue to support you with your learning if you want to contact me you can do so on www.englishlessonviaskype.com and if you or any of your friends or colleagues or family members want to learn english on a one-to-one basis or indeed in small groups or for the kids give me a call it won't always be me who's able to do the the lessons but i've got a lot of teachers working with me now all really really good professionals and we'd really like to help you so thanks for joining thanks for listening and see you again soon

Channel: Learn English with Harry

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Keywords: ways to say 'I want' in English, ways native speakers say want, other ways to say want in English, speak better English with Harry, learn English with Harry, stop saying I want, don't say I want in English, different ways to say want, advanced English learning

Id: eSu4Sbu-QE0

Length: 23min 27sec (1407 seconds)

Published: Wed Oct 13 2021