LIVE English Conversation Lesson Get out of your comfort zone
Vanessa: Hello, hello.
Dan: Hello.
Vanessa: Welcome to today’s live English lesson
here in our wonderful YouTube community in
the Speak English with Vanessa YouTube channel.
I’m Vanessa and I’m here with my husband Dan.
Dan: Hello everybody.
Vanessa: We’re going to be talking about a
really important topic today that everyone
encounters in life, so I hope that you’ll
be able to expand your vocabulary skills but
also test your listening skills because Dan
and I are both native English speakers and
I hope that the way that we talk together
is understandable, but also a little bit challenging.
Make sure you take notes and try to remember
some of the expressions that we talked about
and write some notes in comments or in the
chat so that you can use them as we’re talking.
Dan: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Vanessa: Okay, are you ready to get started?
Dan: I’m ready.
Vanessa: All right.
Dan: Let’s do this.
Vanessa: I have a question for you, Dan.
Dan: Yes, what?
Vanessa: I want to know when was a time that
you had to get out of your comfort zone?
Dan: Yeah, okay, we’re going to talk about
getting out of your comfort zone.
One might say I’m getting out of my comfort
zone right now.
Vanessa: Yeah.
Dan: Maybe, because you know it’s very comfortable
to just I don’t know, sit on the couch and
watch some videos on YouTube, hey, some of
you might be doing that now but sometimes
it makes me a little nervous to speak publicly
to people so it’s getting out of my comfort
zone to talk to a lot of people.
I would say probably the most intense example
in our life was when we taught in South Korea.
We taught English in South Korea and we really
got out of our comfort zone there.
Dan: One day we were in America, then we took
an airplane and then the next day, we were
teaching English, so that was not very comfortable.
Vanessa: You had never taught English before,
right?
Dan: Yeah, no, so that was a completely new
experience for me.
I’d never been a teacher before.
Nothing, it was just completely new so one
could say I really just gave it a shot as
well.
Vanessa: Oh, you gave it a shot.
This is an idiom that I’d like to talk about
so thank you for mentioning it, Dan.
What does it mean to give it a shot?
Dan gave teaching a shot.
He just gave it a shot.
Dan: Yeah, so that means you’re going to try
and just try your best.
Vanessa: Yeah.
Dan: To me, this sounds a little more risky
to give something a shot so maybe you’ll actually
fail so-
Vanessa: The kids could laugh at you.
Dan: Right.
Vanessa: Or you just start to cry because
you’re so scared.
Dan: Mm-hmm (affirmative), yeah, basically
it just means you’re going to try and you’re
going to try really hard.
Vanessa: Yeah, so I think this is a great
idiom that you can use when you’re trying
to give yourself courage to speak with someone
else.
When you want to speak with someone in English,
you need to get outside your comfort zone.
Dan’s examples have been perfect for that.
Doing something that’s a little bit different,
maybe a little bit more difficult or risky
than what you usually do.
Dan: It makes you nervous.
Vanessa: Yes, it makes you nervous so when
you’re sitting on the couch watching this
lesson, you probably don’t feel your heart
pounding but maybe right now Dan’s heart is
pounding because he’s getting out of his comfort
zone.
I make lessons and videos a lot, I still feel
a little bit nervous each time but maybe for
Dan, he’s getting out of his comfort zone
more to do this type of lesson but when he
or when we both went to do something new and
try something completely different, we gave
it a shot.
This means we’re just trying it.
Maybe we’ll succeed, maybe we’ll fail.
I want to know for you when was a time that
you gave something a shot, that you just tried
it, there was some risk involved but you just
tried it.
Dan: Yeah, and I would say we use give it
a shot for maybe smaller things too, like
if you want to try a new food, you’re just
going to give it a shot, which means maybe
it’s sushi.
Do you like sushi?
I don’t know but maybe you’re uncertain about
sushi.
Maybe you’re a little scared but you say,
“I’m going to give it a shot,” so you just
try a little bit.
Vanessa: Yeah, it doesn’t have to be a whole
new life experience like moving to a new country,
it could just be something new like trying
a new food or maybe if you haven’t been on
a date in a long time and you decide to go
on a date with someone and you feel pretty
nervous about it, you could say, “Okay, I’m
just going to give it a shot.”
This full expression sticks together.
I’m just going to give it a shot and see what
happens.
Maybe they’re a wonderful person, maybe I
am really annoyed and bored after three minutes
but I’m just going to give it a shot and try
it.
This is great.
Dan: Hey, when was the last time you gave
something a shot?
Vanessa: Well, I give stuff a shot a lot,
especially by teaching English, I’m always
trying new things, trying out new different
types of technology, new different ways to
create lessons for you but there’s one time
in the past that I can think about giving
something a shot and that was when I was living
in France.
The first week that I was in France, I needed
to do some official paperwork and I didn’t
know hardly any French, this was my first
week there so I was really lost, but I had
to go to these government offices and fill
out this paperwork.
Vanessa: First, I needed to find the office,
then I needed to communicate with the officials
at the office, and then I needed to answer
their questions and fill out the forms.
There was a lot of things that were outside
my comfort zone and I just said, “Okay, I’m
going to give it a shot, I’m going to try
this.
I don’t have any French-speaking friends to
help me so I’m all alone, I have to do this.”
Do you know what?
At the end of that day, it was a long day,
there was a lot of mistakes that I made but
at the end of the day, I felt so good.
Vanessa: It was amazing because I had eventually
succeeded.
I gave it a shot and I found the office, I
talked to them, I filled out the forms, and
maybe for you if you do something outside
your comfort zone, you have that same experience.
That there’s a lot of mistakes along the way
but in the end, if you speak to someone else
in English and at the end of the conversation
you have this feeling of, I did it, I gave
it a shot, it feels really good.
Dan: It does, yeah, unless it goes wrong.
Vanessa: Unless it goes wrong.
Dan: Have you ever given something a shot
and it went wrong?
Vanessa: Yes, but I want to hear your story
about this because I know it’s quite interesting.
Dan: One time I tried to prepare for a speech
in college but I didn’t practice enough and
so I thought to myself oh, I’ll just give
it a shot, right?
I’ll just make this speech and-
Vanessa: Bad idea.
Dan: Maybe I’ll remember everything I need
to and I forgot everything.
It was really bad.
I stood up there and I had my paper and I
went like this, I don’t remember and I had
to leave the room.
It was really embarrassing.
I gave it a shot but I failed.
Vanessa: Yeah, so what happened after that?
Did you pick yourself up and continue after
that?
What happened after you failed in that speech?
Dan: That day?
The same day?
Vanessa: Oh, after that in general.
Dan: In general, well the next time I practiced
a lot more so I learned something about this
and I practiced for my next speech probably
10 days in advance and I was really prepared
and I made a really good speech and I got
an A-plus on my next one.
Vanessa: Great job, Dan.
As you were telling that story about some
time you gave it a shot and it didn’t go well,
I was thinking about one of the first times
that I ever interviewed another English teacher
for my YouTube Channel.
If you go back a long time ago in my YouTube
channel, I interviewed some other YouTube
English teachers and one of the first interviews
that I did like this, I’d never used that
technology to record an interview before so
the technology was kind of new for me and
I thought, okay, I downloaded the technology,
I think I can do it, I’ll just give it a shot,
but do you know what happened?
Vanessa: I recorded the whole interview with
only the audio.
There was no video, so I felt so embarrassed
and I felt so bad because he said, “You know
what, let’s just re-do the interview.
Let’s do it again and it’ll be fine.”
He was very forgiving and kind thankfully
but for me, I gave it a shot and it was pretty
embarrassing.
Dan: She messed up.
Vanessa: Yeah.
We have a great comment here from Vincent.
Oh, Vincent, thank you for using the Super
Chat and sharing money with us, wow, you’re
awesome.
Dan: All right.
Go Vincent.
Vanessa: He said, “The last time I gave it
a shot was when I had to present a lecture
about Chinese herb therapy.
I don’t know if I should’ve used a present
or shown a lecture.”
Oh, so maybe here you weren’t sure if you
should’ve physically shown something or given
a lecture.
“When I had to present a lecture or show a
lecture.”
Present a lecture is the best expression.
Dan: Yes.
Vanessa: “To present a lecture about Chinese
herb therapy.”
Just to let you know, when we use this expression,
we always use it in the middle, or we can
use that thing that’s getting out of your
comfort zone so let me give you a quick grammatical
example.
For Vincent’s sentence he said, “The last
time I gave it a shot was when I presented
a lecture.”
Or he could say, “I gave the lecture a shot.”
The word it is referring to the lecture, so
you could put lecture in the middle of this
idiom or you could simply put it.
No problem, so we’ve got two different grammatical
structures for this.
Dan: Yeah, we don’t just say give a shot.
Vanessa: Give a shot.
Dan: If you say that then you’re giving maybe
a shot of whiskey.
Vanessa: Oh, or a gun.
Dan: Oh, or maybe a medicine.
Vanessa: Okay, getting a shot, so there’s
other ways that we could use this, but we
need to say give it a shot.
Dan: Give it a shot.
Vanessa: Yeah, great way to use it.
Dan: Is there any other expression that kind
of is talking about getting out of your comfort
zone?
Vanessa: Yeah, so I want to ask you another
question, Dan.
When you were teaching in Korea, did you feel
like you were prepared for it or did they
just throw you in?
Dan: Ah yes.
I would say I was thrown in.
They threw me in.
Vanessa: Did they actually take your body
and throw you into the classroom?
Dan: Yeah, no, so it doesn’t literally mean
they picked me up and then threw me into the
classroom.
Vanessa: No.
Dan: No, it means that I wasn’t really prepared
but they expected me to teach, right?
I didn’t get a lot of preparation or training
like-
Vanessa: We had like one or two days of training,
kind of we shadowed the other teachers but-
Dan: Yeah, very, very little training.
That would mean you’re thrown in.
We use this a lot for jobs, right?
Vanessa: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Dan: Yeah, the best way to learn this job
is to be thrown in.
Some people might say that to you.
Vanessa: Yeah, I kind of feel like in some
ways teaching is like that.
Every job you need to learn as you go.
You need to learn with experience, so you
might say for Dan, he was thrown in on the
first day.
This is a beautiful phrasal verb that means
you were expected to do something that was
outside your comfort zone, probably without
training, without too much training or much
training.
I think for me, it was the same situation
when I was a teacher before that.
Vanessa: Before we moved to Korea, I was an
English teacher in the US for middle school
and high school American kids.
I wasn’t teaching English as a second language,
I was teaching American kids about grammar,
and Shakespeare, and essay skills, these types
of things that you learn in language class
but I had no idea what I was doing.
I was a complete newbie.
I had no idea about this type of teaching
style so on my first day in the classroom,
there was zero training.
No training.
I was completely thrown into the classroom.
Vanessa: Here we can imagine that I’m standing
in front of the students, thankfully I tried
to be really prepared but nobody helped me
to prepare.
Dan: Yeah, she prepared herself.
It wasn’t like training and that would still
be throwing you in.
Vanessa: Yes, so I’m curious for you, have
you ever experienced a time when you were
thrown into a new experience, thrown into
a new job, or maybe you are sitting at your
desk and your boss says, “Oh, the American
branch, some of the employees from the American
branch are visiting us today, can you take
them to lunch today?”
Dan: Go give them a tour.
Vanessa: Yes, and you immediately have to
speak in English with them, take them to lunch,
show them around the city.
You have no training, no preparation, you
were thrown into that situation.
Dan: Yeah, and that situation you may even
use the really strong term, they threw me
to the wolves.
Vanessa: Oh, I like that one.
Dan: Yeah, if you’re thrown to the wolves,
just imagine being put in front of angry and
hungry wolves, it’s really scary.
That means your boss or somebody puts you
in or threw you in a situation that you were
not ready for and maybe you got really scared,
or had a lot of pain, or you failed.
You’d say they threw me to the wolves.
Vanessa: They threw me to the wolves, so if
you have a first day at your new job, you
could tell your boss this as kind of a suggestion
or a request.
You could say, “I would like to have some
training for a few days so please, don’t throw
me to the wolves, or at my last job, they
threw me to the wolves so I appreciate that
you’re training me.”
You’re kind of showing that before it was
a really scary experience but you’re grateful
that they’re not throwing you in, they’re
giving you some training.
Vanessa: I think everyone’s experienced this
in some way but for English, it is very important
to get out of your comfort zone, just give
it a shot.
If you get an opportunity to speak English,
give it a shot.
Just do it.
Don’t think about it, don’t worry about the
failure, just think about the opportunity
being able to do it and maybe you haven’t
practiced, you just need to throw yourself
in and do that.
Dan: Yeah, somebody doesn’t have to throw
you in, you can throw yourself in.
Vanessa: Yes.
Dan: I just need to throw myself into this
work, just go at it.
Vanessa: Yes, I need to really just do it
myself.
If you enjoyed talking about getting out of
your comfort zone and this idiom, give it
a shot, and the phrasal verb, to throw yourself
in, Dan and I are talking about this topic,
getting out of your comfort zone during our
course, the Fearless Fluency Club this month
in the month of May, doing something that’s
a little bit risky.
Doing something that maybe takes a little
bit of challenge for you.
Dan: Courage maybe?
Vanessa: Yes, some courage.
We’re talking with our friend Mike who did
this.
He really took an opportunity that was outside
his comfort zone and it was quite different
than his live so we talk about his experience
getting out of his comfort zone.
There’s a good chance to learn about this,
maybe challenge yourself and expand your vocabulary.
Vanessa: What I’d like to do next is I’d like
to share my screen with you so that if you
would like to continue learning like this
with us, you can do that.
Let me share my screen with you here really
quick.
All right.
You can see that here we’re on the page for
the Fearless Fluency Club, which is our monthly
English subscription course where you can
expand your English, your conversation skills,
your vocabulary, your grammar, your pronunciation.
Vanessa: If you click on the link in the description,
you can go to this page and learn more details
about the course, and if you have any questions
about it, of course you can send me an email.
If you decide to join this month in the month
of May, you’ll be able to have access to the
course.
This is the course for the month of May.
We’re going to be talking with Mike.
Let’s take a look at the beginning of this
conversation.
Vanessa: You’ll be able to learn this lesson
with Mike about his experience doing something
outside of his comfort zone.
Something that I personally would never do,
but he decided to give a try and do it.
It’s a good chance to hear native speakers
talking together, but you’ll also get a chance
in the vocabulary lesson to do exactly what
we did today, which is learn vocabulary with
Dan and I.
Vanessa: Here we’re going to be talking about
all of the great vocabulary, this is a great
picture of Dan’s face.
Dan: Nice pause.
Vanessa: We’re going to be talking about all
of the vocabulary from the conversation with
Mike.
You’ll learn some important phrasal verbs
with Dan and I, and also with some extra clips,
like some clips from movies, some clips from
songs to be able to improve your phrasal verbs
including to throw someone in, the phrasal
verb we talked about, and we’ll also talk
about pronunciation so you’ll be able to step
by step practice your pronunciation skills
and imitate my pronunciation and imitate Mike’s
pronunciation in the conversation.
Vanessa: All right, we’re back.
I want to thank you so much for learning with
us and hopefully thinking about getting outside
your comfort zone.
In the comments below this video, I want to
know when was a time that you had to get out
of your comfort zone.
Can you use the expressions we talked about,
give it a shot or throw yourself in?
Can you use those?
Dan used them wonderfully.
Dan: I tried.
Vanessa: Yes, I-
Dan: I gave it a shot.
Vanessa: I hope that you can too, and I hope
that you will have a wonderful week.
If you would like to continue learning English
with me, make sure that you subscribe to our
YouTube channel and you’ll get notifications
every time we have a new lesson here on the
YouTube channel.
Dan: We have to show something off.
Vanessa: Oh, I want to to show you something
before we go.
Dan: She’s forgetting something.
Vanessa: Yes.
Something happened last week that I’d like
to share with you.
Let’s see, can we-
Dan: Oh, what could be in this box?
Vanessa: Open this up.
Oh boy.
Dan: Whoa.
Can you take it out?
Vanessa: Let’s see if I can take it out.
It’s a little bit tough.
Dan: Oh, it’s all shiny now.
Look at that.
Vanessa: Oh wow.
Dan: It’s a trophy.
Vanessa: Thank you everyone for one million
subscribers.
Dan: One million subscribers.
Vanessa: Yes, YouTube has sent us a Speak
English With Vanessa one million subscriber
plaque.
Thank you for subscribing and I appreciate
cool YouTube did this, pretty cool.
Thanks for sharing this plaque Dan, and you
can see yourself in here and the computer.
Dan: Yeah, infinity screen.
There we go.
Vanessa: Thank you so much for learning English
with us and I hope you have a wonderful week.
We’ll see you again next Friday for a new
lesson here on our YouTube channel.
Bye.
Dan: Bye everyone.