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- Hello, I'm Julian Northbrook from DoingEnglish.com.
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(lively music)
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How to speak fluent English without hesitation?
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It's a good question,
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and it's one that many of you are asking.
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I've got two things to say on this.
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The first is a little bit simpler.
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It might sound a little bit patronising,
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but it's very important.
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The second is a little bit more complicated.
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It's a little bit deeper, but it's also very important.
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But first things first.
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When people say to me,
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I'm struggling to speak English well.
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I'm not fluent in English.
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I hesitate when I speak.
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I can't respond to people quickly, automatically in English.
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My first question for them is always
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how much time and energy
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are you putting in to learning the language?
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Learning the English that you need,
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and then practising it to get good at it.
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It's such an obvious thing,
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but you'd be amazed at how many people
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actually really aren't doing much of anything.
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You see, what happens is people have a conversation
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in English with an overseas client,
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somebody from their work, whatever.
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And they will completely screw that up.
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They will misunderstand something, say something stupid,
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the whole thing will go horribly wrong,
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and they end up horribly embarrassed about the whole thing.
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They go home, and they search on their computer,
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how to improve my English,
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how to speak fluent English without hesitation,
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or whatever it is that they type in.
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And they are super motivated to improve their English,
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for about a day, two days.
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And then, the embarrassment fades,
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they feel a bit better about the whole thing.
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Time, as they say, is a great healer.
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Then suddenly other things come up,
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work gets busy, there are good things to watch on TV,
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beer to be drunk in the pub.
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English gets pushed to one side,
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and never gets done.
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Until of course, the next time they have a conversation
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with an overseas client, or somebody from their work,
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or whoever it is that they speak English with.
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And once again, the whole thing goes horribly wrong
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and they end up horribly embarrassed all over again,
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and repeat the same situation again,
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and again, and again.
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You don't need me to tell you
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that this is a shitty way to improve your English.
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Mastering a language is simple.
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It's not easy, to be sure,
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but it's definitely not complicated.
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Learn the language, get a source
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of good language to learn from,
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learn the language that you need,
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practise it, make it easy to use,
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automatic, fluent, and then just do it.
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It really is that simple.
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But, you need to be doing it every single day.
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You need to be learning new language every single day.
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Practising on a regular basis.
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Getting out there, doing more with your English.
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You can't do nothing in English,
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and then expect to get better.
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It's not gonna happen.
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Again, kind of obvious,
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but something that many people overlook.
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Of course, if you're not too sure what language to learn,
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how to practise it,
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or really how to do any of what I've just said.
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If you're confused about the whole
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English-improvement process, check out my book,
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Master English Fast, An Uncommon Guide
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to Speaking Extraordinary English.
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It'll show you step by step the whole process.
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It'll walk you through improving your English
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as an intermediate to advanced English learner.
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Now, I said there were two things
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that are very important, and there are.
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If you are struggling to speak,
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if you're hesitating in conversation
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'cause you don't know the language,
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go back to the first point, what I just talked about.
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But if you are still finding it difficult,
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what you've gotta ask yourself is why?
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Why are you hesitating?
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Is it that you don't know the words?
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Is it that you don't know the phrases,
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the chunks that you need to communicate with?
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Or, is it that you have no idea what to say?
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Many people say, my mind went blank.
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I drew blanks, I didn't know what to say.
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Is it because you don't have anything interesting to say,
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no content in here?
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Because this is also an important part of speaking English.
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You need three things to speak English well.
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Of course, you need the language, that much is obvious.
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If you don't have the phrases and the expressions
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that you need to express the things
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that you want to express,
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you're not gonna be able to say anything
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that you want to say in English.
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But, you also need an understanding
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of the things that you're talking about.
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Background knowledge, content.
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If you are not speaking well,
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or hesitating because you've got nothing to say,
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well, you need to get out more.
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Do more things in English, or in your native language.
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Because often when people have this problem,
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and I'm sorry to say this,
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but often I'll talk to people and they'll say,
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well I don't speak English very well.
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But actually, no, they don't speak their own
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native language very well either.
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Because they're boring in both languages,
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and that's the problem.
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Get out there more, have more experiences.
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Do more things, have more stories to tell.
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Of course, you need the language
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in order to tell those stories,
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to talk about those experiences,
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but you also need the actual experiences.
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You need both of these things to speak well.
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And only when you have both of these things,
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as well as the third thing, culture.
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Culture is an understanding of the way that people think.
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Because by definition, when you are speaking in English,
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you are talking to people with a different culture to you.
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Meaning the way they think,
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and the way that they communicate
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is gonna be different to you.
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Only when you have all of these three things
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in balance will you truly be able
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to speak great English.
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Just something to think about.
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And, like I said, check out my book,
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Master English Fast, An Uncommon Guide
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to Speaking Extraordinary English.
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Just head over to MasterEnglishFAST.com,
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check it out, and I will see you in the next video.
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And oh, if you're new to this channel,
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don't forget to subscribe so you can get more videos
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and stuff just like this one, goodbye.