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Step 1: Determination

The 3 Pillars of English learning success

Where there’s a Will, There’s a Way


ETHAN: Aww yeah, ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls from all across the interwebs, this is
Ethan from RealLife English, where we believe that listening to podcasts is a fun, natural, effective
and gritty way to learn English. So, download this podcast now and listen to us while you're on the
bus, shooting some hoops in the hood, or even running on the treadmill. Oh yeah, I'm here in the
Transcontinental Studio with my good buddy, Justin Murray. How's it going man?

JUSTIN: Aww yeah, I'm really excited to be here to have this conversation, to do this lesson. To do
this podcast, and yeah. Looking forward to this.

ETHAN: Have you been able to catch up on your sleep? I heard that there were some pretty crazy
parties going on there?

JUSTIN: Yeah, I'm working on it. I got a little bit sick. A lot of times when you can't sleep enough or
your neighbors are being really loud, you might lose some sleep and get sick and so that
happened to me. So, if my voice is a little bit scratchy, that's the reason.

ETHAN: Got a frog in the throat?

JUSTIN: (Laughs) What do you mean by that, frog in the throat?

ETHAN: Don't you usually say that when you've got like a lot of phlegm, a lot of mucus in your
throat, and your voice is a little bit funny? They say you've got a frog in your throat.

JUSTIN: Yep, you got it. And so I said in the intro, right? While running on a treadmill. What is a
treadmill?

ETHAN: Treadmill is, basically, if you're a runner and the weather's not good outside, or you don't
like running outside for whatever reason, you'll run on this machine.

JUSTIN: Okay, and what about the word gritty?

ETHAN: Gritty, so I was actually about to say that you lost some sleep last week, but I know you're
pretty gritty, so you won't let that get in the way of recording a kick ass podcast. Grit is, well, we
both read a book called “Grit” which is defined as “a combination of passion and perseverance”,
right?

JUSTIN: Yep. And this is actually one of the main components of today's lesson, because we've
got some really great information and ideas, insights about how determination, grit, passion and
perseverance, how all this can come together and really help you become a kick ass English
learner.

ETHAN: Yeah, exactly. As any of you who listened to last week's podcasts, number 150, and if
you have not done that then press pause and go listen to that one first. We are talking about the

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RealLife Way. We are on step one of the RealLife Way this week. And the first step is called what,
Justin?

JUSTIN: Where there's a will there's a way.

ETHAN: Exactly. So what does that mean? We're actually going to use that quote or an
expression in English, where there's a will, there's a way, to explain this first very fundamental part
of the RealLife Way. So, what exactly does that mean, where there's a will, there's a way?

Justin: Well, it's a saying in English. Where there's a will, where you have desire, where you have
that intention, there is a way. So, you just need to find that way. And this goes back to our promise
of inspiring, empowering, connecting you to the world through English. And the inspire part, our
mission is to awaken the determination that you need to realize your true potential. Not only as an
English learner, but as a human being. And so, that's the will, the determination. And if you have
that, you can find the way, and we're going to help you do that.

ETHAN: I mean, really, if you have the will you can do anything, right?

JUSTIN: Absolutely, it's so critical. And today, we're


going to dive into this and to start with, I really wanted
to share a quote. And we're going to come back to our
kick ass quote. We used to do this every episode, but
there's a quote that really illustrates this and I don't
know who this is by actually. I think it's anonymous. “If
you are not willing to learn, no one can help you. If you
are determined to learn, no can stop you.”

So, this goes back to the idea that like somebody who
doesn't really want it, who doesn't really have that will,
they're not going to be successful, no matter how many
resources they have. It's just really difficult, even if you
have the best teacher in the world, the best resources,
you're talented.

And somebody who, even if they lack many of the other things, if they have the determination,
relentless desire, then no one can stop you, you're unstoppable. And this is really what we want to
share with you today, and really help you guys realize.

ETHAN: Yeah, and I think that is one of the big problems for I would say the bulk of English
learners, that their motivations aren't really in order. And what I mean by that is that a lot of people,
a lot of students I've had, for example, they're learning English out of a necessity, of needing to get
a better job. Or needing to be able to travel or they need to learn English.

But they don't have really that desire, that want that really drives them forward to go through all of
the difficult, the speed bumps that you're going to have to go over in order to reach a
conversational level. So, I think that's the first thing, is just because you need English for your job,
for example, you can probably find a deeper motivation which is going to be much more powerful
for you in helping you to achieve your goals.

JUSTIN: So, you mentioned like the fact that learners are bored. That most people listening to this
have been through maybe that existential crisis of learning English, and like maybe the traditional
methods and just learning grammar. A lot of times it can get boring, and a lot of times maybe it can
be, you might not have a good teacher, or a good method. But at the bottom of it, you have to find
a way to get motivated, and really connect to that purpose and start to see the life changing
potential with English.

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Understand that it's the gateway to a completely new world of experience, opportunities, and
perspectives. Not only as individuals, but as members of this planet. And another thing, I think it's a
really big illusion is that people learners think that it should be easy. They see somebody who's
successful and then they look at them, and they think like, “This person must just have natural
talent, it must have been easier for them.” And they don't realize that person has actually been
through their own process, and they've actually worked really hard. So, they come, just full of
excuses.

ETHAN: Yeah. And I think another thing is that maybe it's not necessarily 100% their fault,
because I just remember living in Brazil, living in Spain. So often you see different English schools
and they're advertising, they say, “Oh get fluent in six weeks with our methodology.” It makes
people start to think that “Oh, I'm going to go through this course, that's the solution. I'm going to
have this teacher that's going to teach me this method, and that's the solution.”

“I'm going to listen to this podcast talking about the RealLife Way and that's the solution.” Basically
those are all there to help you, it's like the rungs on the ladder, to help you get up to where you
need to go. But you, in the end, have to actually be the one to climb the ladder. You actually have
to do the things that are going to propel you forward. You can't depend on a teacher, you can't
depend on any methodology, you actually have to make the effort.

JUSTIN: Yeah, I would say, just owning your process. Just taking responsibility, because it always
comes back to you. You're going to go through different teachers, different methodologies, and just
try different things. And it's good to try different things, and really figure out what works and what
doesn't work. But you have to be the self directed learner. And that's the only way to succeed on a
lifelong scale.

ETHAN: For sure. All right, so shall we jump into these three pillars of determination, that you've
laid out, J-man?

JUSTIN: Yeah, absolutely. So, determination, it's like we talked about willpower, desire,
determination. So, it's like, what is it? We've kind of broken this up into three areas. We break it up
into Desire, Vision and Discipline. These are the three aspects of your learning that you need to
have down, to at least be connected to, in order to be successful as an English learner. To get
fluent- not only as an English learner, but in life in general.

So, we've learned a lot, not only from teaching English, but we've read books on the psychology of
success, the psychology of achievement, performance. There's a lot of research out there. More
and more that Ethan and I have really gotten into, and applied to our own teaching to really help
identify the root of the difficulty that a lot of people are having. There's not like a technical root, it's
not because you don't have enough grammar or enough like exercises, or resources, or
opportunities to learn English.

The problem is that people just get kind of like stuck motivationally. It's like almost an existential
crisis. So, this is why the first one is “Desire”. You need to really want it, because if you don't have
a will, there probably isn't going to be a way. So, where there's a will, there's a way. How would
you describe the main aspects of desire, Ethan?

ETHAN: So, I think it kind of starts with something that I always tell my students is a quality they
need to develop to be successful, especially at the beginning, is being very curious. Always asking
questions, always trying things, being very open minded to trying things. Because I'll give the
example with my own students, I have many different tools that I use, many different exercises that
I use. For some people a certain tool or a certain exercise will be extremely effective. And for other
people it will be boring, or it won't be effective.

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So, I think recognizing first that everyone is unique in the way that they learn. And that you need to
be open and curious to trying new things. The next thing is having a purpose for why you're
learning, and as we hinted at the beginning, usually for most people just getting a better job or
getting promotion or whatever is not a big enough motivation. Because it has to be the pain has to
outweigh the effort.

And generally, it's one of those dreams like, “Someday I'll have good enough English to get that job
that I've always wanted”. Or, “Someday, I'll have good enough English to travel the world.” When
you really need to have a purpose that is driving today, every single day, it gets you out of bed-
even if you have to get up at 5:30 in the morning, before the break of dawn, to get in your 30
minutes of English study before starting your day. You need to have a purpose that's that strong,
that burning inside you, that clear, that you can reflect on every single day. And I would say
basically those are at the core of this aspect of determination, desire.

JUSTIN: Yeah, I would add to that, once you get going a lot of people will start like a new activity,
and they'll be like, “Yes! I'm going to do this!” They'll get so excited and you'll feel that passion, but
it's like Angela Duckworth, the author of Grit, that book on the science of achievement. She said,
“Grit, similar to determination, is about passion and perseverance.”

So, it's not the type of passion that's like, you're


going to really want it one day and then the next
day just be lazy, but it's ability to really day in
and day out.

And also because every endeavor, every


learning process pretty much you start off with a
lot of motivation, but then that motivation will dip
down. It will be low some days. So, it's
important to be able to persevere through those
difficult moments-

ETHAN: There's an image that I'd actually like


to share in the show notes and in the email we
send out for this to our subscribers of actually, it's an image that Justin showed me. It shows a man
on a bike, and his goal at the end- it shows first how most people think it'll be, which is just a
straight uphill line. So, like he just has to go straight, up this hill to arrive at his destination.

And then, the next picture how it really is and it shows oh actually, he has to cross this lake, that's
got alligators in it, and he has to climb this snowy mountain. And all of these other things, before he
gets to his goal, his achievement. So, I think that that's a really good visual representation for what
we're talking about here.

JUSTIN: And it goes back to what you were


talking about, about trying things constantly.
And about taking responsibility, too, because
being in that class with 10 or 20 or 30
students? The teacher's going to give a very
generic lesson plan. But some things might not
work for you, so you need to take learning into
your own hands and not just learn in school but
learn outside as well. Learn outside of the
classroom. So, to close this part here, about
desire, there's a metaphor by this psychologist,
named Jonathan Height, and it's called “The
Elephant and the Rider”.

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And basically he talks about, imagine an elephant with a guy riding it. So, think about who's more
powerful and who's smarter. Is the elephant is this really big, powerful animal and the rider is in
control, he's riding it. But if the elephant decided that he wanted to really take control into his own
hands, he could, because he's way more powerful. So, the key is, is to get to the point where it's
like the elephant and the rider are going in the same direction.

It's like your rational mind says you might want to learn English, but if you're, that's the rider in this
case. But if your elephant, your emotional part, your motivation doesn't really want it, you can't
really do anything to get it going. But once you get it going, if you can align your motivation with
your rider, your rational self. Then you power forward with so much progress so quickly. But this is
the main idea about really plugging into your desire, to your will, and this will take you so far.

ETHAN: Yeah. And just to make this kind of more practical for people I thought I would give them
an exercise that I like to do with all of my students. To get them to think about why they're learning
English, to really define and to be able to get in contact everyday with that why they're learning.
And it only takes maybe 15 minutes or so, it depends on how deep you want to dive with this
exercise. But you're just going to sit down with a piece of paper and you're going to think of why
are you learning English?

Native Connected Speech Tip #1


T + Y = Ch (what + you = wha-chew)
Aww yeah, this is Justin, and we’re going to take a quick break from the podcast for another
simple, but powerful Native Connected Speech Tip, brought to you by our very own RealLife
Native Immersion Course, where Ethan, Chad, and I (Justin) not only inspire, empower, and
connect you on the RealLife Way, but we also specialize in helping you decipher, use, and infuse
native English into your everyday life.

In order to open our ears, and the muscles of articulation in our mouth, to the way that natives
really speak, we need to recognize that natives don’t speak like robots. We speak with rhythm and
flow, we follow a predictable pattern, which we are going to teach you to perceive and imitate.

These Connected Speech Tips are advanced, so if you want to get the most out of them, we
highly recommend you download the transcript, give it your full attention, and repeat this part as
much as you need to.

Today we’re going to use a popular song to show you how natives blend the sounds in expressions
like “got you,” which becomes “gotcha” or “nice to meet you” which becomes “nice to me-chew”.
Words that end with “T,” followed by words that begin with “Y” often form a “Ch” sound-

 “Got you” becomes “got-chew” --- “gotcha”


 “Nice to Meet you” becomes “nice to mee-chew” -- “nice to mee-cha”

Two more common words that blend together are “what you, which becomes “wha-chew” or even
“wha-cha”. Let’s do another imitation exercise:
o I like what you said—“I like wha-chew you said”
o What you really want to say – “wha-chew really wanna say”

This advanced stuff, but now we’re going to get really ninja. So we now know t hat “what you”
becomes “wha-chew,” but did you know that adding the word ARE in between WHAT and the YOU
in “What ARE you” can also become “wha-chew”? For example:”
o What are you doing -- “wha-chew doing”
o What are you going to do? -- “whachew gonna do?”

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You see, in more relaxed, or even playful situations, natives often omit the “are” in “what are you,”
leaving “what you” or -- like we learned “what-chew.”

And finally, I’m gonna share an excellent example how natives do this in the popular song, Bad
Boys, by the band Inner Circle- we’re gonna slow it down to about 80% speed, so if you wanna
sing along, you’ll find the lyrics in the transcript, with complete pronunciation breakdowns.

Listen to it and pay attention to all the times that we morph “what you want” to “what you want” and
“what are you going to do” to “wha-cha-gonna do.” If you know the song, I encourage you to sing
along, but if not, treat it as a listening exercise.

Let’s do this!
Bad Boys (Inner Circle)

Bad boys, what you1 want, what you1 want, what are1 you going
to2 do, what you1 want to3 do, what are1 you going to2 do, Bad 1. What (are) you = wha-cha
boys, bad boys, what are1 you going to2 do, what are1 you going 2. Going to = gonna
to2 do when they come for you, bad boys, bad boys, what are1 you 3. Want to = wanna
going to2 do, what are1 you going to2 do when they come for you.

Aww yeah! I hope you enjoyed that. As you can see, there’s a TON of connected speech
exemplifying today’s Native Connected Speech Tip.

To really learn and master these sounds, I highly recommend that you listen, repeat, practice A
LOT, and even record and listen to yourself.

This is the kind of native English that we teach you to decipher, use, and infuse in your everyday
life. You can learn more about the RealLife Native Immersion Course in the e-mail that you
received with this lesson, or at www.RealLifeGlobal.com/immersion. Now let’s get back to this
episode of the RealLife Way!

Just that question, write down that question “why am I learning English?” And you can write down
as many different ideas that come to mind, so if it is get a better job, so that I can help my kids
learn. So, that I can travel, so I can see the world. So I can speak to foreigners in my city, whatever
it is. You're going to write down all these different motivations. And you might even add into this
another exercise if you want to spend a little extra time.

So, if you find that your main motivation is “Oh, I want to get a better job” or “I want to get a
promotion” then, that's not again, it's not really the main motivation. So, ask yourself again why?
Why do I want to get a better job? And maybe the answer is “Oh, so I can make more money.” And
then ask yourself again why? And keep doing this, this actually comes out of that book that we
were talking about, Grit. You keep doing this until you get to the point where the answer is just
because. You can't go any deeper, and that's going to be your core motivation.

JUSTIN: It's almost like I can't not do it, right? That's why.

ETHAN: Exactly. What can't you not do? Create a little bit of a confusing sentence. So, you're
going to come up with that. That's going to be your really big goal, your really big vision, which
we're going to talk about in a minute. And you should feel excited when you think about, when
you've actually imagined that situation in your head.

And then, the last thing you're going to do is get a sticky note. Or a piece of paper, a small piece of
paper and you're go ing to write this out as an affirmation. An affirmation is basically a goal, but it's
written in the present tense, as if it were already true. So, you might say for example, “I am

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comfortable and confident speaking English with anyone, anywhere.” And that's your affirmation.
And you're going to stick that somewhere where you're going to see that everyday, hopefully
multiple times per day.

So, if I were to do this, I would probably stick it right next to my computer, because I work on my
computer all the time. I had one of the students, he took a picture of it and set it as the background
on his phone, so he would see it every time he looked on his phone. You can be as creative with
this as you want, but the important thing is you're coming into contact and thinking about this every
single day. So, that said, should we move onto the Vision aspect?

JUSTIN: Yeah. So, that's Desire. It's your why, it's your purpose. The next step, or the next aspect
of really being a great English learner and a great English speaker is having a vision. Having a
vision of yourself, where you're at in your own English learning process, to be self aware of what
you need. To be self aware, to be aware of where you want to be and what you're capable of, to
believe in yourself.

So, it's like your vision of the world and your place in it. Your vision of English learning, of all the
things you've learned about your own process. So, we're going to give you a couple of
recommendations for how you can do this. So the first thing is having clear goals. It's like where do
you want to be with your English? I think it was excellent like your student said there, to be a
comfortable and confident English speaker.

That's a pretty clear goal. I think you can be more clear as well, if you want to actually get to the
objective side. There's something called the European Common Reference of Languages, which
explains all the different levels. It explains in a very detailed way what it's like to be the most
advanced English speaker that you can be.

And a lot of the tests out there, the standardized tests, will map English fluency onto this
framework. But besides that, getting self-awareness, you can get that from a teacher, or a coach,
somebody to give you feedback. That's really important. But moving onto the belief in yourself. So,
it's really important to have a vision of yourself, where you really have the confidence that you can
do this.

Because having that belief, having that confidence is really going to help your motivation as you go
along. Like, Ethan, you have really focused on this, you've created a lot of content around how to
be a confident English speaker, right? How would you describe that?

ETHAN: Confidence really is just the ability to do what's uncomfortable, even though it's
uncomfortable, because you know it's going to get you where you need to be.

So, I would definitely say like I am more introverted, especially when I first meet people. But
something that I've learned through learning languages, something that has helped me to become
more extroverted, because I realize it's what's necessary if I want to become fluent in a language. I
have to speak to people and the sooner that you do that, the better.

So, it's getting to that point where you're comfortable in your own skin, you might say. You lean into
those awkward situations, into that initial discomfort, for example, of speaking in a foreign
language.

JUSTIN: What do you mean by lean in?

ETHAN: You lean in, meaning that you kind of embrace it. Like you recognize that it's difficult and
you do it anyway. So, I would say it's really important for learning English to learn how to do this,
and it's also you'll find that confidence is kind of a muscle. The more that you do it, the easier it
becomes. And also kind of a part in “Grit” and in “Deilberate Practice”, which we'll talk about in a

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little bit, is doing things that stretch you.

So, after a little bit, having those kind of basic conversations is going to become easier. So, you're
going to have to find ways to make the conversations more challenging. You're going to have to
keep stretching yourself and keep leaning into more and more uncomfortable situations. Or more
and more uncomfortable exercises.

JUSTIN: Stepping outside of your comfort zone, in a way it's kind of like, “My gosh, what's going to
happen?” That embarrassment, that shame, that difficulty and just being okay with it, responding to
it. And I think in some sense, like, that sense of vulnerability is super important to get really
comfortable with that, and comfortable with mistakes and difficulties that go along with that and
recognizing this is not-- there's nothing wrong with you, if you make a mistake or you can't
communicate, or if you have a problem, it's just part of the process.

ETHAN: Yeah. And I actually think in that book, Grit, as well, I thought it was really interesting that
she talks about how experts, because she interviewed hundreds and maybe thousands of experts
in all sorts of different fields. From athletics to academics, to things like chess or spelling bees,
spelling competitions and she found that people who are really experts in their field, they embrace
the mistakes. They want to know what they're doing wrong. Not what they're doing right.

So, when they're practicing some new skill or micro-skill that they're trying to master, they're not
going to ask what they did well. They want to know what they did wrong, so that they can focus on
overcoming what they did wrong. And I feel like most English learners they're wanting to avoid
what they did wrong. They're wanting to kind of ignore and maybe even deceive themselves a little
bit that they're better than they are.

Or to avoid doing the things that are difficult, that are going to make those mistakes in their
learning emerge.

JUSTIN: So it's really coming down to the question of like, not even caring about the external
validation as much as, are you actually learning? Is it actually doing you good? Are you actually
making progress?

ETHAN: And is it in line with your why, which we talked about before. With your core reason that
you're learning.

JUSTIN: Yeah. So, Angela Duckworth in the


book “Grit”, I highly recommend it, if you want to
deepen into these ideas. She has a six minute
Ted Talk, we can include this in the show notes.

Another really great piece of science that


contributed to our thinking on this is Carol
Dweck and she wrote a book called “The New
Science of Success”. And she talks about
growth mindset and these ideas overlap. But the
idea, it's kind of your theory about yourself.

And so, she discovered that there are two different mindsets. Two different attitudes that people
have about themselves, and about learning, about what success is. And these create two
fundamentally different ways of looking at, for example, intelligence.

So, somebody with a growth mindset will see like intelligence is a question of neuroplasticity. You
can change your brain, if you work hard the difficult struggle of working hard to learn something is
reciprocated by a new wiring of your brain. And if you have a fixed mindset you look at intelligent

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people or successful people and you believe that it's just natural talent. You can't see, that they
actually worked really hard for that.

So, it goes back to this question of these failures, do I have responsibility? And do I have the
opportunity to keep going and change my behavior? Keep trying, keep learning, take critical
feedback and learn from that, not be offended by it.

Like a fixed mindset is going to be offended by feedback. If somebody corrects your mistakes, you
get defensive or something. Or if you don't do well in a test, you feel bad. So, it's just kind of like a
different, fundamentally different approach to learning that we're talking about.

ETHAN: And a lot of this comes out of just what we've been told by our parents, by our teachers. I
know a lot of parents they like to tell their kids, “You did such a good job on this. You're so smart,”
instead of telling them, “You did such a good job on this, you must have worked really hard.” So, a
lot of people, when we're growing up will value our innate talent, instead of our determination, our
hard work. So, it's like you kind of have to change the narration in your own head.

ETHAN: The stories we tell ourselves are crucial.

JUSTIN: Yes, this is your vision of yourself. How you look at yourself, how you look at the world.
Your self awareness, your goals and this is really important for being successful, not just having
the desire to learn, but you need to actually empower your vision, your mindset, and your attitude
with the right tools to be successful.

ETHAN: That said, shall we jump into the last pillar of Determination?

JUSTIN: Yeah, we so talked about Desire, Vision and now we're going to talk about Discipline.
This is where we take it into that world, it's the action component. So, we talked a lot about grit
before. What exactly is grit in the discipline sense, Ethan?

ETHAN: People tend to think that what's really important is being talented at something. They tend
to see someone who is really great at something. So, for example, if you see someone from your
country, who's speaking English, and they're speaking super fluently. You're just going to think
“Well, they must just be naturally gifted with languages, and I'm not. So, I guess I'll never be that
good.”

And true, people can be naturally gifted, they can have certain talents. But something that Angela
Duckworth shows in Grit, which has actually been backed up by science, is that while talent is
important effort counts for twice. It counts twice as much as talent. So, she actually gives a formula
that skill, so your skill in something equals your natural talent, multiplied by the effort that you put
into.

And then, skill x effort equals achievement. So,


if you looked at that altogether, it would be skill
x effort squared equals achievement. Which
means that effort counts twice as much
as skill, or being successful in something. Obviously if you have a natural ability for learning
English, for learning another language, it will be helpful.

But the person who is disciplined, who is willing to work hard, who's not going to give up, no matter
what, is ultimately going to be more successful than the talented person who maybe has a fixed
mindset, or who doesn't work hard to achieve their goals.

JUSTIN: They're always going to have the ability, but they never actually get to the point where
they have enough skill.

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ETHAN: Exactly.

JUSTIN: So, you see, once you reach that first platform of skill, that first layer of skill, then you
apply that effort- the second layer of effort leads to achievement, lifelong fluency, right?

ETHAN: Exactly. And I've seen this a lot with my own learning, because a lot of times when people
find out like I speak several different languages, they tend to say, “Oh, you must be such a good
language learner.” And I would say, “True, I've become a good language learner, because of my
experience.” I've learned a lot about what goes into learning, but I don't think that I've ever had a
natural talent, I never did that well in school.

I always got kind of average grades in my language classes. And my brother, on the other hand, I
think he does have that very natural ability. But my brother is not fluent in any other languages, he
speaks some basic Spanish, still from what he learned in high school. But the difference there is
that I am very motivated to learn languages and so I disciplined myself to, at least when I'm going
through a period where I'm really studying a language, I discipline myself to do it every single day.

And my brother doesn't have that motivation, so he doesn't make it a priority. And that's a very big
difference between someone who has talent, but not motivation. And someone who doesn't have
so much talent, but they put in that effort.

JUSTIN: There you go, grit is super important in this sense. Another thing which is super important
that we've talked a lot about in RealLife English, but it comes into play a lot more here, is habit.
Again, habit is so important to really make these actions repetitive, and efficient, and easy in your
life. So, that you don't demand so much effort, you don't have to make that decision every single
day.

So, it's like if every morning you have to wake up and decide that you have to study English, that
you're going to study English, it becomes really difficult. It becomes a drain. And it becomes
something that you give up pretty easily. But, if you start with something small and you do it
everyday it becomes automatic, it becomes easier and easier over time. And then, you can expand
that base of habits.

ETHAN: So, one of the first things I do with all of my students is I have them do a 30-day
challenge. So what is the 30-day challenge?

JUSTIN: A 30-day challenge is like when you select a new behavior that you want to integrate into
your life. It can be something very, very small, it can be like eating an apple a day. Or, I don't know,
maybe like running for five minutes, but you choose to do it every single day for 30 days. And this
is like kind of that first level of developing a habit. If you do it for 30 days, then it becomes almost a
lot more automatic.

ETHAN: Yeah, exactly. They say from different studies that they've done that it takes about 30
days or up to six weeks, depending on the habit you're trying to develop for it to become an actual
ingrained habit, where it's on autopilot. Which means that you don't have to think about it. So,
basically, I do this and I have some conditions with it. And first I have them watch this TED Talk,
which I'll share in the show notes, called “Try Something New.”

And then, we develop our own 30-day challenge. So, they choose something usually related to
English, but I tell them if they have another priority they can choose that. So, for example, it might
be that they want to get in the habit of reading everyday in English. So, they're going to read five
pages everyday.

But it's not enough just to have the thing that you say that you're going to do everyday, because

30:19 10
that's it, then it's really for you one day to be like, “Oh, I'm really tired. Today I'm not going to do it.”
So, the other two conditions that they have, are one: they have someone holding them
accountable. And what does that mean, Justin? To have someone to hold you accountable?

JUSTIN: Somebody who sort of like checks on you, to make sure that you're doing it, right?
There’s sort of an external accountability, if you, as a teacher come along and say, “Hey, did you
do it?” The person's much more motivated, much more likely to do it, because it's going to suck to
tell you that you didn't do it. 'Cause you're going to hold them responsible, you're going to hold
them accountable.

ETHAN: Exactly. And then other part of it that they need to have, is they have to put something at
stake. What does that mean,to put something at stake?

JUSTIN: Put something at stake just means that you're going to lose something if you don't do it,
right?

ETHAN: Exactly. So, a lot of times it'll go hand in hand with the person who's holding you
accountable. So, for example, it could be monetary, a lot of people would just say, “Everyday I
don't do this, I'm going to donate $50 to this charity.” Or, “I'm going to give $20 to this person.”
However much money you need it to be, to motivate you to do that. But, I've had a lot of people do
other things.

I had one of my students she had her husband hold her accountable. And she told him, “Everyday I
don't do this, I will iron one of your shirts.” And she didn't want to do that because she didn't want
him to have the satisfaction of her ironing his shirts. So, that was like one example.

So, you can get very creative with this. And that's part of the fun of it, but it becomes extremely
powerful when you have someone that's going to be checking in on you and you have something
that you're going to lose if you don't do it. Most likely you're going to do it every single day, and
after those 30 days it kind of just becomes effortless.

JUSTIN: Yeah, so a couple of things, really, I just wanted to underscore here. To emphasize is that
will power, just that desire to do something everyday, the decision is a limited resource. And so you
can't do too many habits at once. So, it's like this is the whole purpose of doing like one small habit
at a time, because you need to make that habit automatic, and then you won't spend will power on
it anymore. It becomes an easier thing.

Another thing is, if you fall off the horse, if you don't do it, if you fail for a couple of days, or for a
week, or whatever, a lot of people will give up, entirely. And the important thing is just recognize it
happens sometimes, it's okay. Just get back on, just start again. And that's really going to help you,
give you permission to fail. And so, what they say is, “Shoot for 100% and be happy with 80.” And
so, at any point you can get back on the horse, you can get back on the habit.

And the third thing I want to emphasize is that there's a thing called “keystone habits”. And a lot of
times it's like one important habit that will change many other habits. So, for example, exercise is
considered a keystone habit, because when you exercise, it affects other aspects of your life as
well. So, you probably eat better, maybe you sleep better, maybe you stop doing other destructive
habits. So, in our case, with English, there's a lot of things you can do.

But one keystone habit is making English a part of your everyday life. So, maybe like listening to
this podcast, or maybe watching a TV series on a regular basis. Or there are a million other things
you can do. But it's finding that central, core habit that's going to affect all the other habits.

ETHAN: Definitely.

33:14 11
JUSTIN: So, those are the three pillars of Determination, you have: Desire, Vision, and Discipline.
And this is really important for you to be successful in your English learning process.

ETHAN: So, I just want to wrap this up by giving you guys a few small homework assignments, to
really get you reflecting on these ideas. And applying them to your own learning. This is going to
be really powerful if you actually take the time to do this. Just 10, 15 minutes is all it'll take. So,
grab a piece of paper, and I want you to answer these two questions:

The first one is: How does English help you to fill your potential in life?

The second one is: How does determination help you to realize your potential in the rest of your
life?

And of course, we already talked about a couple of other exercises that you can do. The one of
creating a new habit through a 30-day challenge, it's extremely powerful. Choose some sort of
small habit and go through this yourself, by picking, telling someone about your challenge, getting
them to hold you accountable. And picking something that you're going to have at stake. You might
even say on Facebook, “I'm going to do this thing for the next 30 days, and for every day that I
don't, I'm going to...” and you put whatever you have at stake. I'm going to eat sandwiches
everyday. I'm going to get up an hour earlier, I'm going to donate $50 to this charity.

And the other one that I talked about earlier, actually defining your why and writing an affirmation
that you look at daily. So, you have those two questions, you have the 30-day challenge and you
have the why. So, don't let all of this good information, all of this good motivation go to waste.
Actually take a little bit of time today, as soon as you finish this podcast if you can, sit down for 15
minutes and go through these short exercises.

And with that, do you have anything else you wanted to say to wrap up, Justin?

JUSTIN: I just wanted to say this is a process. So, don't think you have to learn this all at once, I
mean, there are a lot of ideas here. And I encourage you to read some of these books, watch TED
Talks, we're going to share some videos in the show notes. But it's a process and it will definitely
help you, as you learn and as you study. So, this is just the start and we have some more really
awesome lessons coming for you, in the next couple of weeks and next couple of days.

So, anyways, I've enjoyed sharing this with you guys. And I'm looking forward to the next one.

ETHAN: Awesome, so let's one, two, three, “Aww yeah” them out of here.

JUSTIN: Let’s do it.

ETHAN: One two, three.

BOTH: Aww yeah!

Song: Never Give Up (by Sia)

I've battled demons that won't let me sleep


Called to the sea but she abandoned me
But I won't never give up, no, never give up, no, no (repeat)
And I won't let you get me down
I'll keep gettin' up when I hit the ground
Oh, never give up, no, never give up no, no, oh
I won't let you get me down
I'll keep gettin' up when I hit the ground
Oh, never give up, no, never give up no, no, oh

12
I'll find my way, find my way home, oh, oh, oh (repeat)
Oh yeah, I'm haunted by the distant past
Called to the skies but she was she overcast
But I won't never give up, no, never give up, no, no (repeat)

And I won't let you get me down


I'll keep gettin' up when I hit the ground
Oh, never give up, no, never give up no, no, oh
I won't let you get me down
I'll keep gettin' up when I hit the ground
Oh, never give up, no, never give up no, no, oh

I'll find my way, find my way home, oh, oh, oh (repeat)


Never give up, never give up (repeat)

And I won't let you get me down


I'll keep gettin' up when I hit the ground
Oh, never give up, no, never give up no, no, oh
I won't let you get me down
I'll keep gettin' up when I hit the ground
Oh, never give up, no, never give up no, no, oh
I'll find my way, find my way home, oh, oh, oh (repeat)

13

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