· PDF filewas meeting Effortless English fans and Effortless English members, including a few...

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Mental Strength 1 & 2Hello VIP member, I’m back. I’m back in San Francisco. You probably recognize behind me my old San Francisco apartment, so I’m back in my old place in San Francisco.

I had an amazing trip in Southeast Asia, it was incredible. And, of course, the best part was meeting Effortless English fans and Effortless English members, including a few VIP members.

I met Intan Zana in Malaysia. She’s a VIP member, fantastic person, and Kate who’s a VIP member. She’s from Malaysia, but she’s living in Singapore and, actually, I was lucky enough to meet Kate in both places. She came to our event in Kuala Lumpur, which was really fun, and then we saw her again in Singapore. So it was a fantastic, wonderful trip.

Also met Panoo; Panoo is one of our great VIP members. He was our first host; our first sponsor for our first event in Bangkok and he did an amazing job. It was a great event and everything was wonderful. It was fantastic. And, so, now I’m back and it’s time for our next VIP lesson.

Now this lesson is about an important topic and an interesting topic. This topic is something I have been studying recently. I’ve been reading a lot about this topic. It’s something that I’m always thinking about and the topic is ‘Mastery’, Mastery. The question I have is how can we create mastery in any different topic or field or skill?

For example, how does someone become a master golfer? I don’t mean Tiger Woods, you know, there can only be one number one golfer in the world, of course. I mean by definition, if you’re number one, there can only be one of you. That maybe requires something very, very special, but I believe that anybody, almost anybody, can become a master golfer.

A master golfer is really any professional golfer. I mean if someone is making money from playing golf, you know, maybe they’re playing in the PGA Tour or even some other tours around the world, that’s a master golfer. They’re world-class golfers. They’re better than 99.9% of golfers in the world. Those are master golfers. So how do those people become masters at golf?

Or, we can look at another sport let’s say football or soccer. We say soccer in America, football everywhere else. In football or soccer how does someone become a master at soccer, you know, someone who can play at a professional level, for example?


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Or let’s think of something besides sports. What about music? How does someone become a master guitar player, a master piano player? Or, of course, we can think of our topic which is language.

The first question, how did you become a master of your own language? How did I become a master of English when I was a baby, when I was a small child? And how do we become masters of a foreign language, for you, English as a foreign language? So it’s an interesting question.

You know, I know a lot about language teaching and language learning, but recently I have been interested in this more general topic of mastery. Because as I’ve been reading more and more about mastery, I realize that, of course, each of these areas is different – soccer, football, baseball, music, piano, guitar, learning languages – that there are specific things you must do in each of these areas.

However, what I’ve also begun to learn is that there are some general strategies of learning and practice that produce mastery and it doesn’t matter, it works for any skill, any topic. So I began to see that, in fact, our brains have certain ways for learning that work better. Our brains prefer to learn in certain ways. We learn faster, we gain skill faster and better when we practice in a certain way, when we learn in a certain way, and we go more slowly if we try other ways.

So this is always the question I have for anything is how can we get better results faster and enjoy it more? This is the question I always have when I’m teaching you. As a teacher I’m thinking, how can I help you, especially my VIPs, learn more English, learn it faster, learn it more deeply, remember it longer, use it better and enjoy the process more.

That’s always my goal, so that’s why I’ve been reading, reading, reading like crazy. On this trip, reading all these books about brain science, for example, all these studies and all these scientists who are studying our brains and how our brains work; how our brains create connections and when we learn something new what’s happening in our brain, what’s happening in our nervous system.

When we know what’s happening, we know how all of this works, then we can look at, okay, how can we learn and practice in a way that helps our brain create connections better and faster so that we learn faster, we learn better and we, eventually, perform better.

Very interesting subject, very interesting topic and let me tell you what I’ve learned because I’ve learned some very interesting things that will, hopefully, help you improve the way you are learning with Effortless English.




Now, number one, the number one strategy I have found and it works for any topic is that we must practice deeply with CANEI. That’s that Tony Robbins word again. CANEI means constant and never-ending improvement. So let me talk about how we practice is very important.

You know in my email course I talk about deep learning. You know, it’s one of our rules, one of our seven rules, deep learning. And in that email and the video that goes with the email, mostly I’m talking about repetition, right? I say learn a smaller amount of stuff – English, for example – but learn it very deeply. Repeat it a lot until you know it completely, until you understand it 100%.

So in that email, I’m really emphasizing repetition, repetition and, guess what? Of course that’s important. It’s important for any skill. If you’re learning to play golf, guess what? You have to practice that golf swing again and again and again. You have to repeat that golf swing many, many times.

If you’re practicing tennis, you have to practice your basic tennis strokes and swings again and again and again and again. You repeat it thousands and tens of thousands of times. Any master tennis player has done this.

And, so, with language, we must hear the most important, most common, words and phrases and grammar and pronunciation again and again and again and again, thousands and tens of thousands of times. And, of course, in the Seven Rules Course, I tell you that one of the weaknesses of schools is not enough repetition.

They go too fast. You learn the past tense a little bit, you learn it, but then in a couple months later they change and then they’re focusing on the future or then they’re focusing on the present perfect and you did not get enough repetition with the past tense. The past tense is important; it’s probably the most common tense that we use in normal English conversation.

So repetition, I really emphasize repetition a lot, all of you already know this, but I want to emphasize something else about deep practice, because repetition, just repetition is not enough and I realized, after learning and doing this research the last few months, I’ve realized that I missed something -- that I need to emphasize something else besides just a lot of repetition. Because just repeating again and again and again it’s great, but you have to have a couple other things if you really want to learn quickly and to really master English.

Here’s one of the important points. It’s not just repeating a lot, it’s how you repeat that is very important. When I talk about learn deeply or deep practice, the quality of the practice is also important. It’s not just the quantity, it’s not just how many time you




repeat it, repeat something 30 times, repeat something 100 times, that’s great, but it’s only great if you do it with total attention, total focus, total concentration and good energy. This is something I’ve learned from all of these studies of mastery.

They looked at how people practice; let’s say golf, for example. Let’s talk about something similar, golf. Well, some people do repeat their golf swing a lot, but there are a lot of mediocre golf players. They do their golf swing again and again and again and again every day, maybe they swing it 100 times and they go out and they practice it a lot, but here’s the difference between them and a master like Tiger Woods or Ernie Els or someone like that.

The mediocre player is not focusing totally every time. A lot of times the mediocre player, while they’re repeating, they’re not really paying attention carefully. They’re just doing the same thing again and again and again, but, you know, maybe their mind is thinking about something else or maybe they’re trying to hurry. They’re thinking okay, today I must swing 200 times and they’re in a hurry to finish, right?

Maybe you’ve had this with English sometimes. You think okay, today I must study English one hour or every day I will listen to English one hour and you do it almost every day, but the problem is when you’re doing it you’re kind of hurrying. You’re looking at the clock. You know, oh, 30 minutes, only 30 minutes more. Okay, only 15 more minutes. So your mind is not totally focused and totally there, in the moment, listening very deeply, focusing all of your attention, right?

I know you’ve done this, because I’ve done it too. I’ve done it with music. I’ve done it with singing and base. I’ve done it when I’ve practiced many other things. Sometimes I’m totally focused and other times I’m not. Well, guess what? What the research shows, the brain science shows, is this. When we’re totally focused on something when we’re practicing, our brain makes a lot of new connections. The nerves actually make more connections with each other.

Also, something else happens, there’s something called myelin.

What is that? Myelin is something that wraps around nerve fibers, nerve cells, and whenever you are doing a new skill it will wrap around the nerves that you use to make that skill. If it’s a language it wraps around the nerves in your brain and body for understanding and using the language. If it’s a sport then it wraps around different nerve connections. What is does is when it wraps around these nerve connections it’s like insulation and it helps the nerve impulses, the signals, travel faster and more efficiently.

Now you don’t need to know all of this, it’s not so important, but what you need to know is that it happens much more when you are really focused and concentrating. More




connections happen, more insulation happens and what that means is you learn faster, you remember it longer or forever and, eventually, you can use it much better.

If you’re not focusing…see, some people have this dream that they will play their Effort English lessons in the background while they’re cleaning the house, while they’re watching TV, while they’re talking on the phone or the perfect dream that all of you have and I know you do is that you’ll play it while you’re sleeping and somehow it will all be absorbed. Maybe you’ve looked and found some little study on the Internet that says oh you can learn while you sleep. Well you might be able to get a little bit that way, but let me tell you the hard truth. The hard truth is uh-ah. That is not a very good way to learn.

When you’re distracted, when you’re trying to pay attention to two things at the same time, the research shows that you’re not learning either thing very well and it all just goes into short-term memory. So if you’re talking on the phone and you’re hearing your Effortless English a little bit or you’re cleaning the house while you kind of listen to the lessons, but not very well, with not a lot of focus, you’re getting some of this, you’re remembering it, you’re hearing it, you’re understanding it, but it’s only going into your short-term memory.

This is a problem, it’s only short term. That means, guess what? That long term you don’t remember it. It means it gets forgotten quickly. It doesn’t become a permanent connection in your brain. To create the permanent connections, the long-term connections, those deep connections so that you remember forever and you can use it and master it, you must be totally focused, totally concentrated. That means the best way to listen to your Effortless English lessons is to have your iPod on or playing it in your computer and that’s all you are doing.

Now I do recommend you can do it while you walk. You could go outside with an iPod and that’s fine, because walking doesn’t require a lot, a lot, a lot of concentration. You can still be focusing your mind totally on what you’re listening to as you walk and the walking will give you a little bit of energy, so that’s quite nice.

In fact, walking may give you more concentration because by walking you’re going to have more physical energy and that will help you have more concentration, more focus. So by walking as you listen, you can probably concentrate for a longer period of time and that is very important. Here’s what the research also shows. Twenty minutes of total concentration is better than one hour of distracted, half concentration. So it’s not just about the amount of time, it’s about the amount of concentrated, focused time.

So some of you, I know you get focused on how much time you’re listening to English. That’s great, but you also need to focus on the quality of that listening and to realize that just listening for four hours a day is not very helpful if you’re not really focused and




concentrating while you do it; in fact, not only while you do it, but the entire time you’re doing it.

The moment your concentration goes away, the moment your focus drops down a little bit, you’re no longer getting long-term memory. It’s just going to short-term memory and it’s really wasting your time. So what I want you to do this month, especially, is to really focus on how you are listening to English and practicing English -- how you’re doing it and to focus on the quality of your focus, the quality of your concentration.

So it’s not just the amount of time, but it’s how well you are using that time. Don’t try to be doing something else with your focus or your mind. Do not be trying to clean the house while you listen. It’s not really that helpful, to be honest. It’s better to sit down for 10 minutes and really focus than to be listening to an hour while you’re doing something else. You won’t get the same benefit if you’re distracted, okay? So this is very, very important.

Now I know this is tough because, guess what? We now live in a culture which goes against mastery, which goes against concentration and focus. I mean we’ve all seen this, especially with children. I see this with my little young cousins, for example. That they’ve grown up with television and Internet and all this stuff. Everything is always changing-changing-changing all the time and these kids have a very tough time focusing and concentrating for a long period of time.

You know I find it’s true even with adults now. A lot of adults I have, a lot of friends I have, they can’t focus and concentrate for a very long period of time, certainly not as long as I can and it drives me crazy sometimes. I’ve noticed now that it’s hard to have conversations with a lot of people because they’re always distracted, you know?

I want to sit down and focus on a topic and talk about it and I can do this. When I’m focused on a topic I can talk about it for hours and hours, right? Thinking about something, talking about it, thinking of all the different ideas and really looking at it and focusing on it in a deep way, but I find that a lot of people cannot do this and after 10 minutes or 20 minutes they’re looking at their iPhone and doing text messages or they’re looking away or they’re changing the topic or they just can’t focus so much.

This is a result of television and Internet, to a degree, but it’s just kind of our whole world culture now. It’s all about distraction. It’s about everything very fast and easy, fast and easy, fast and easy and always, you know, don’t want to focus, always something changing. Oh, I’m doing a text message on my thing, now I’m talking on the phone. Now I’m looking at this, now I’m talking to someone. It’s just like everyone’s attention is going everywhere all at the same time and nobody is really focusing deeply on something for a long period of time.




And, so, when I talk about this topic of deeply focusing and concentrating for a long period of time, longer and longer periods of time, people are kind of like oh A.J., that’s difficult. It’s boring. It’s tough. Well, it’s not. You know, actually, I find it’s very relaxing, there’s something great about it. You know, it’s almost like a kind of meditation when you do it, but it’s something that you must practice and you build it step by step.

So if you do have trouble concentrating for a long time, if you try to focus and after five minutes oh, your mind is going everywhere and you feel really tired or you start getting sleepy or you get bored, you know, don’t say I can’t do it. Just realize that right now you’re brain is not trained for concentrating and focusing very much because you haven’t been practicing it, so you just gotta’ practice it.

So maybe today it’s only five minutes and maybe this week it’s only five minutes. Well, remember constant and never-ending improvement, right? All you need to do is say okay, I need to improve this. I’m going to practice it. Next week I’ll try to focus for 10 minutes. Total concentration, total focus for 10 minutes on English or whatever it is you’re trying to practice and you do that until 10 minutes is easy.

And then, of course, what do you do? You increase it again to 15 minutes and then to 20 and then to 30. You keep doing this and, actually, in a few months you’ll find that you can concentrate for one hour and it’s not a problem and, in fact, you’ll find that you enjoy it more and more.

In the beginning it might feel boring, you might feel sleepy. That’s your brain just being lazy because you haven’t been practicing this, but if you keep focusing on it, you keep trying, you keep going a little longer, a little longer, eventually your brain gets stronger. It’s kind of like a muscle and you are able to concentrate more. You can go deeply. You can remember things more deeply. You can concentrate better and then you’ll begin to love this deep practice. Then you’ll be able to repeat a lot and you’ll be able to do it with total focus and concentration.

Those are the two magic things about deep practice. You must have both. You must have both. You must focus totally, with total concentration and, of course, you must do it in a repetitive way so that you’re doing the same thing again and again and again, many times, with total concentration. So you need to do this, again, total concentration and very repetitive.

Now this a common problem and question and I’m going to say it again and again because I see this comment on our forums all the time. I see it in the VIP social site. Students ask me about this all the time. The thing that always happens is people say yes, A.J., but I start to feel tired. I get sleepy when I’m listening to something, you know, in English, especially if I’m listening to it many times. I get tired and sleepy or bored when I’m trying to focus a lot on something.




This is a problem, but you know what? You need to think of your brain like your body, because we also need to make our brains stronger. Like I said, we live in cultures now, in a society that makes our brains kind of weak and lazy. You know everything is always changing really fast and we don’t have to focus so much anymore and that’s not good.

It’s the same thing that’s happening to us physically in our societies, because now we’re seeing more and more and more people in countries everywhere in the world getting fatter and lazier, fatter and lazier. Everything’s too easy, you know? We just sit around on our butts all day in chairs, working on computers maybe or when we go to work we’re always driving in cars or sitting in trains or sitting in buses.

A lot of people don’t walk very much anymore and they certainly don’t do heavy, difficult lifting, you know, and hard physical work like we used to in the past. You know just 100 years ago, most people were farmers and they were doing a lot of hard physical work. Of course if you go back thousands of years, as humans evolved, as our species evolved, we were hunting and gathering and we were doing very physical things all the time, so our bodies were more healthy and stronger, but now in our societies people are becoming very kind of soft and lazy physically.

And, so, the same thing happens physically, right? I see this. I see this with my mom, for example, who’s trying to lose weight, but she doesn’t like to exercise and she complains oh, I don’t want walk too much. Oh, I feel tired when I walk a lot or, you know, my knees hurt when I walk a lot.

So it’s exactly the same kind of phenomenon or situation, which is if you don’t use your body enough it becomes tired and lazy and then, if try to use it again after that, you feel very uncomfortable. Sometimes you feel some pain, but often you just feel really tired very quickly. Tired and ah and uncomfortable and ah, you know, walking too much doesn’t feel good or having to do hard physical work oh, my God, I don’t want to do it, right?

You see this. I know you know people like this. Maybe you are a person who’s like this. I’ve had periods in my life like this. In fact, just recently I feel like I haven’t been working hard enough physically and I know I need to get out there and exercise. I need to lift some weights. I need to do something hard and challenging so that my body doesn’t become weaker and weaker.

This happens as we get older. We think its age that’s causing it. Oh, well, I’m 40 now, I’m 50 now, I’m 60 now, that’s why I’m weak. Bullshit! That’s not why you’re weak. The reason you’re weak is because you haven’t been using your body very much for 10-20-30 years. You haven’t been challenging your body for 10-20-30 years. You




haven’t been using a lot of physical energy and doing things that are difficult for 10-20 or 30 years.

That’s why you get weak. That’s why you start getting sick more and more. That’s why you feel more tired more easily. That’s why you’re energy drops and drops and drops as you get older. It’s not the number, it’s not the age, it’s not the years it’s neglecting your body. What does this have to do with English learning? Well, it’s the same thing with our brains, because this happens with our brains. People stop challenging their brains as they get older.

When we’re young we’re learning, learning, learning, all the time. We’re in school. We’re constantly being challenged with new things, more difficult things. After you learn to add and subtract in Math class, you don’t stop, next you learn to multiply and divide. Then they make you take Algebra classes and Trigonometry classes and Geometry classes and if you keep going they make you take Calculus and more advanced Geometry. You’re constantly being pushed to do something a little more difficult, a little more difficult, and a little more difficult.

So when we’re younger, in elementary school, middle school, high school, university, grad school, we’re constantly being physically and mentally challenged, especially mentally in school. Therefore, at that age, our brains are learning and growing and they’re not so tired, ah and we kind of have to concentrate more, especially in the past.

You know kids are getting lazier now too, unfortunately, but what happens, though, then we get in our 20’s and maybe we start a new job and, again, that’s a lot of learning. There’s a learning process that’s happening. We’re being challenged a lot, but what happens with a lot of people is they get comfortable. They eventually get into some career or some job or some situation where it’s familiar and after a few years they feel very confident and comfortable and they know it very well.

They feel confident and that’s great, but what happens is you get a little too comfortable and then you just stop challenging yourself so much. It’s not as intense as it was when you were younger and, you know, you don’t notice this very much when it’s just a few years, but after five years, eight years, 10 years, 15 years, 20 years of being a little too comfortable, the brain also gets weaker and weaker and weaker.

Your memory will start to go down a little bit, a little bit, a little bit, each year if you’re not using it and challenging it. Your ability to concentrate and focus will get less and less, just a little bit. You don’t notice it so much. In one month you won’t notice it, in six months you might not notice it, but after a year, five years, 10 years, it definitely starts going down and then, as people get older in their 40’s, 50’s and 60’s, they start complaining. Oh, I’m forgetting things a lot. Sometimes even younger people say oh, I




can’t concentrate too much, I get tired. I get sleepy if I focus on English too much, if I concentrate too much.

Well that is a bad sign. That’s like being fat. Your brain has become fat and lazy and you gotta’ train it, right? You don’t want to be a 60-year-old person getting Alzheimer’s disease. I know you don’t. I know you don’t even want to be a 30-year-old person feeling tired and uncomfortable and just a little bit lazy and you don’t want to focus and oh, it’s too much, I’ll do it tomorrow. You don’t want to be one of those people physically and you don’t want to be one of those people mentally and so you gotta’ workout mentally also.

That’s really what this topic is about today, it’s about pushing yourself mentally, especially with your concentration, your attention and it’s so, so important. So, like I said, just to wrap up, to finish here. To wrap up means to finish something, so I’m going to wrap this up now. I’m going to finish this topic and just give you the main point and the main point is this. The quality of your practice, the quality of your study, is just as important, probably more important, than the quantity.

So it’s not just the number of minutes and the number of hours that you are listening to English or studying, that is important, of course it’s important and of course more is better, but it’s also the quality, it’s how focused are you. How much concentration do you have? How long can you concentrate without being distracted?

However long that is, I want you to push it longer. So I want you to train your mind the way you would train your body. So if you can concentrate for 15 minutes deeply with total attention that’s great, but I want you to start pushing yourself to go 16 minutes, 18 minutes, 20 minutes.

If you have great concentration, if you can concentrate for one full hour and you can be totally concentrated and focused and really listening carefully or remembering carefully that’s great, but you know what? If you just stop there your brain will start to get a little lazy again, so I want you to push it a little more. Try to do an hour and 10 minutes. Try to do an hour and 15 minutes. Try to do an hour and a half.

Keep pushing yourself a little bit, so you’re a little bit uncomfortable, it’s a little bit difficult and if you notice yourself getting sleepy ah or you start feeling bored, don’t get upset about that. Just realize that’s your brain getting a little tired. It’s a sign of a lazy brain, okay? And that’s fine. Just try to push yourself a little bit farther, not a lot, a little bit. Remember, this is constant and never-ending improvement. Little improvement, little improvement, constantly, that’s the secret to mastery.

So if you can only concentrate for 15 minutes and then you get tired and then you get sleepy and then you get bored, don’t try to do two hours next day, you know, that’s too




much. It’s too much of an increase. Just try to do 20-25 minutes the next day, maybe for the next week and when that becomes possible then try to push yourself to 40 minutes with really intense focus and concentration and just keep extending that time longer and longer.

This is so good for your mental health. Yes, it will help your English ability, but there are also a lot of studies that I’ve been reading about, about aging in our brain and what happens when we get older and by doing this, what I’m suggesting, by pushing yourself and really practicing concentration and focus, you’re also keeping your brain in top shape.

It’s like good fitness and health for your brain so that as you get older you will not lose your memory, you will also be preventing Alzheimer’s when you get much older and you will prevent all the other problems that happen as people get older with their brains, you know? They have trouble remembering words or their balance isn’t as good. All of these things are signs of an aging brain, but all that means is that somebody has let their brain get a little bit too lazy and fat. Not really fat, but it’s kind of like being fat in your head. So this is good for your mental health. It will help all parts of your life.

By doing this with your English ability, you’ll start to notice that your general memory will improve for all subjects in all areas. You’ll notice that you think faster. You’ll notice that you’re able to learn anything better and faster, not just English. It will help you in your job. It will help you in your social life. It will help you in all parts of your life where you need to use your brain.

So, what are you going to do this month? You’re going to focus on focusing. You’re going to concentrate on concentrating. You’re going to try to push yourself a little bit, a little bit, to train your brain to focus more deeply and for a longer period of time and each week you’re gonna’ try to concentrate a little bit longer, a little bit longer, each time you listen to English, okay? Brain training this month.

Okay, I hope you enjoyed this topic. I’ll talk a little bit more about it in my extra commentary for you. So have a great day. Have a great month. Thank you my VIP. You know you’re special because you’re a VIP. I’m happy to be back in San Francisco where I have very fast Internet, so I’ll be giving you some bonuses coming soon.

All right, thank you my special VIP member. See you on the VIP social site. Have a great day, a great week and a great month. See you again soon, bye-bye.




Mental Strength Mini-StoryHello and welcome to the mini-story. Let’s get started.

* * * * *

There was a buffalo. There was a buffalo, his name was Brad.

What was the buffalo’s name?

Well, the buffalo’s name was Brad.

Now how old was Brad?

Well, actually, Brad was 32 years old.

But, when Brad was younger, he had a big problem. You see, by the time he was 12 years old, he still had not made any friends.

Now what had he not done?

Made any friends. He had not made any friends

By when had he not made any friends?

Well, by the age of 12. By 12 years old, he still had not made any friends. He had not made any friends by the time he was 12 years old. He was a lonely child. Poor Brad the buffalo.

Now Brad had a brother. Brad’s buffalo brother was named…what was his name? Ha, ha, I almost gave it to you.

What was his name?

His name was Tommy, Tommy the buffalo. Brad’s brother was named Tommy.

Now how old was Tommy? How old is he now? Because Brad, now, is 32 years old and how old is Tommy now?

Well, Tommy is 32 years old and five minutes, 32 years old and five minutes. Thirty-two years and five minutes old. Thirty-two years and five minutes old.




So what kind of brother is Tommy?

He’s a twin brother. Tommy is Brad’s twin brother.

Now who is Brad’s twin brother?

Tommy, of course.

Who is Tommy’s twin brother?

Well, of course, Brad, dah.

Which brother is older?

Tommy is older.

How much older is Tommy the buffalo?

Well, only five minutes older. He’s only five minutes older.

Did I say five minutes or 10 minutes? I’m already confused, so let’s say five minutes, okay? He’s five minutes older than Brad the buffalo. So Tommy is only five minutes older than Brad. They are twin brothers.

Now by the time he was 12, had Tommy made any friends?

Oh, yes. By the time he was 12, Tommy had made a lot of friends.

What kind of boy was Tommy?

A buffalo boy.

Well, Tommy was a popular buffalo boy.

So by the time he was 12, had he made any friends?

Well, yes, he had. He had made many friends.

For example, he had already made 20 buffalo friends.

Who had already made 20 buffalo friends by the time he was 12 years old?




Well that was Tommy. Tommy had already made 20 buffalo friends by the time he was 12.

How many friends had he made by 12 years old?

Well, 20 buffalo friends.

But he had made even more friends than that, because Tommy had also made 20 chicken friends. See chickens also liked Tommy.

So how many friends had he made total?

Well, Tommy had made 40 friends total, total. Twenty buffalo friends, plus 20 chicken friends.

So by when had he made all of these friends?

By the time he was 12 years old.

How many friends had Brad made by the time he was 12?

None.

How many chicken friends had Brad made by the time he was 12?

None. No chicken friends. Chickens didn’t like Brad.

Who did chickens like?

They liked Tommy. Ah, I see.

And how many buffalo friends had Brad made by the time he was 12?

Also none, poor Brad. Brad had not made any friends by the time he was 12. He had not made any chicken friends and he had not made any buffalo friends. He had not made any friends, at all, by the time he was 12.

So Tommy had not made any friends by the time he was 12, right?

No, wrong, not Tommy.

How many friends, total, had Tommy made by the time he was 12 years old?




That’s right, 40 total friends. He had made a total of 40 friends.

How many chicken friends had he made?

Twenty. He had made 20 chicken friends by the time he was 12 years old.

And how many buffalo friends had Tommy made by the time he was 12?

Also 20, so a total of 40 friends.

Well, of course, the brothers the got older and by the time he was 18 Tommy had made even more friends. He was even more popular.

How many total friends had he made by the time he was 18?

One hundred, 100 total friends. By the time he was 18, he had made 50 chicken friends and he had made 50 buffalo friends.

So how many buffalo friends had Tommy made by the time he was 18 years old?

Fifty.

How many chicken friends had he made by the time he was 18 years old?

Also 50.

How many chicken friends had Brad made by the time he was 18 years old?

None. None, in fact, still, by the time he was 18 Brad had not made any friends at all, none.

So how many chicken friends had he made?

None.

And how many buffalo friends had he made?

Also none. Brad had not made any friends at all by the time he was 18. Poor Brad.

Well what about girlfriends? What about girlfriends? Had Brad gotten any girlfriends by the time he was 18?




No. No, he had not. He had not gotten any girlfriends. He had never had a girlfriend by the time he was 18. He had not gotten any girlfriends at all.

What about his brother Tommy?

Oh, Tommy had had a lot of girlfriends already by the time he was 18.

How many girlfriends had Tommy had by the time he was 18 years old?

Seventy-two already, 72. He was an amazing buffalo, Tommy. Tommy had already had 72 girlfriends by the time he was 18, just 18.

How many girlfriends had Brad had?

Brad had not had any girlfriends.

Had he gotten any girlfriends at all?

No, he had not. He had not gotten any girlfriends at all by the time he was 18 years old.

So who had gotten a lot of girlfriends by the time he was 18?

That was Tommy, Tommy his twin brother. Tommy had gotten a lot of girlfriends by the time he was 18.

What kind of girlfriends had he gotten?

Well chickens, actually. Chickens loved Tommy so much, especially chicken girls. Yup, chicken girls. They liked to sit on his back when he walked around. So Tommy had had a lot of chicken girl friends. In fact, all 72 of his girlfriends had been chickens, girl chickens, of course.

So who had had a lot of girl chicken girlfriends, girl chicken girlfriends?

That was Tommy. Tommy had had a lot of chicken girlfriends.

Had Tommy had any buffalo girlfriends by the time he was 18?

No, no, he had not. He had not had any buffalo girlfriends by that time.

But how many chicken girlfriends had he had?




Seventy-two. Now he didn’t have them all at the same time. It’s just from the time he was young, a small child, until 18. During that time period, he had had 72 girlfriends at different times during that period.

So, poor Brad, how many had he had by the time he was 18?

None, zero.

Why? Why had Brad never had a girlfriend by the time he was 18 years old? Why not?

Well, sadly, because he was a dork. Brad was a dork. Poor Brad, he was a dorky little buffalo.

Now what’s a dork? A dork is someone who’s not cool. It’s usually like a smart person. They’re very intelligent, maybe, but they’re not cool. They’re not popular with girls. Maybe their social skills are not very good. They’re not good at talking to people. They’re not confident. They’re not good with emotions.

They’re good with their brain. They maybe get good grades in school. They’re very smart. They like science or math maybe, but they’re not cool. They’re not popular. They’re kind of dorky, dorky. Another word for this is nerdy. These are the adjectives, nerdy or dorky; nerdy or dorky, same meaning.

So you can imagine someone with big thick glasses and they’re always reading science and math books, but they can’t talk to a girl. They get nervous and ah-ah-ah-ah, right? They’re not cool. They’re not so interesting. They’re not good with emotions. Now the noun is dork. A dork or you can also say a nerd, a dork or a nerd. These are people who get very good grades, for example, when they study, maybe a computer nerd or a computer dork.

So who was a dork?

That was Brad. Brad was a dork when he was younger. Oh no, poor Brad.

Was Tommy a dork?

Of course not. He had had 72 girlfriends by the time he was 18 years old. Obviously, Tommy was not a dork.

What was Tommy?

Tommy was a stud. Tommy was a stud.




What’s a stud? A stud is a strong, handsome, cool guy, a sexy guy, in fact, a very strong, handsome, sexy guy, a stud. Now when he was younger, Brad Pitt was a stud. Maybe he still is now, I don’t know -- girls, you have to tell us -- but a stud, a strong, handsome, sexy man or sexy guy.

So which brother was a stud?

That was Tommy. Tommy was a stud.

Was he popular?

Oh, yes.

Was he a sexy buffalo?

Oh, yes, he was.

Was he cool and handsome and strong?

Yes, he was.

Was Brad a stud?

No, poor Brad. Brad was a dork. Brad was a dork.

So why had Brad not had a girlfriend by the time he was 18?

Because he was a dork.

Which brother was a dork?

Brad. Brad was a dork.

How many girlfriends had he gotten by the time he was 18?

None. None, poor Brad.

How many girlfriends had Tommy gotten by the time he was 18?

That’s right, 72. Seventy-two girlfriends.

And what kind of girlfriends had he had by the time he was 18?




Well, they had all been chickens, all chickens. Chickens really loved Tommy. Buffalo girls also loved Tommy, but chickens went crazy about Tommy.

So Tommy was a stud. He was very popular. And the boys got older. The buffalo boys they got older. The brothers got older. One day, when he was 25 years old, Brad got upset. He was very upset.

Why was Brad upset when he was 25?

Because he still had not gotten a girlfriend and he still had not made any friends by the time he was 25. He felt lonely.

Had Tommy gotten girlfriends by the time he was 25? Had Tommy made a lot of friends by the time he was 25?

Oh, yeah. In fact, he had made even more friends by then. By the time he was 25, Tommy had 100 chicken friends and he had made 100 buffalo friends and he had made 100 dog friends.

That’s right. He started to make new friends with dogs. So, by the time he was 25, he had 300 friends. He had made 300 friends.

Which brother had made 300 friends by the time he was 25?

Tommy, Tommy. Tommy had made 300 friends by the time he was 25 years old.

And what kind of friends were they?

Well, he had made dog friends, he had made chicken friends and he had made buffalo friends.

How many chicken friends had he made?

One hundred.

How many buffalo friends had he made?

One hundred.

How many dog friends had he made by the time he was 25?

One hundred, also.




So how many total friends had he made?

Three hundred, 300.

And who had made a total of 300 friends by the time he was 25?

Tommy the buffalo. That’s right, Tommy the buffalo.

And who had not made any friends at all still by the time he was 25?

That’s right, poor Brad. Poor Brad still had not made any friends.

Had he made any buffalo friends?

No.

Had he made any dog friends?

No.

Had he made any chicken friends?

No. He had not made any friends by the time he was 25.

What about girlfriends? Had Tommy gotten more girlfriends by the time he was 25? Had he had more girlfriends by the time he was 25?

Yes, he had. Tommy had had 30 buffalo girlfriends by the time he was 25 and, of course, he had also had 72 chicken girlfriends by the time he was 25.

You see when he was 18, Tommy stopped dating chickens and he started dating buffalos. Ah, obviously, right? It makes sense. So, you know, as he got older, Tommy decided, you know, I don’t want to date chickens any more. I think I want to date just buffalo girls from now on. Because I’m a buffalo, so I’ll only date buffalos. I am attracted to buffalos. I like buffalos. This was what Tommy was thinking.

And, so, by the time he was 25, how many buffalos had he dated? How many buffalo girlfriends had he had?

Thirty. That’s right, 30.




I think 30. Is that the right number? Sometimes I forget these numbers in the stories, so we’ll say 30, okay? He had had 30 buffalo girlfriends by the time he was 25 and, of course, by the time he was 25, up to that time, he had also had 72 chicken girlfriends.

Was Tommy still a stud at the age of 25?

Oh, yes, he was.

Was Brad still a dork by the age of 25?

Yes, he was.

Who was still a dork?

Brad.

Why was he a dork?

Well, because he didn’t know how to talk to other people or other buffalos or other chickens or other girls. He didn’t know how to talk to other people or other animals.

Who didn’t know how to talk to other animals at the age of 25?

Poor Brad. Brad didn’t.

Now, luckily, Brad and Tommy had a very nice grandfather. Aha, they had a grandfather and, of course, their grandfather was a buffalo. Well, their grandfather was very nice and here’s some information about the grandfather.

You see, when their grandfather was a small child, he also had been a dork. That’s right. Their grandfather had also been a dork when he was younger. So their grandfather had not made any friends by the time he was 12 and he had not made any friends by the time he was 18 and he had not had any girlfriends by the time he was 18 and by the time their grandfather was 25 years old, he also still had not made any friends and by the time he was 25, he also still had not had a girlfriend, not even one.

Why had he not had a girlfriend? Why had he not made any friends by the time he was 25, the grandfather?

Well, because he also had been a dork when he was younger, aha. So he understood poor Brad.




Now, luckily, their grandfather changed. He learned how to talk to people. He learned how to be charming. He learned how to become cool and interesting and fun and friendly with lots and lots of people and buffalos and chickens. And, so, he decided to help poor Brad.

He talked to Brad. He said “Brad, when I was your age, age 25, I also had not made any friends and when I was your age I also had not had any girlfriends by that time. You see, Brad, I also was a dork at that age. That’s right. When I was younger, I also was a dork.”

He says “But you can change. I can help you.” And, of course, Brad was very excited. He said “Really? I can change?” His grandfather says “Yes, absolutely, you can change.” He said “In fact, I want you to read a book. This book helped me to change. This book helped me to change from a dork into a stud, into a friendly, fun, handsome, popular buffalo.” And he gave him a book.

Who gave Brad a book?

Of course, his grandfather gave him a book.

Now did his grandfather give him a movie?

No, he didn’t give him a movie.

What did he give him?

He gave him a book.

What book did he give him?

Well, the name of the book was ‘How to Win Friends and Influence People’. It’s a real book.

So which book did the grandfather give to Brad?

‘How to Win Friends and Influence People’.

Now when did he give him this book?

Well, in fact, he gave him this book on his 25th birthday, remember? By the time he was 25, he had not made any friends. By the time he was 25, Brad had still not had a girlfriend, so on his 25th birthday his grandfather gave him a book and the name of the book was ‘How to Win Friends and Influence People’.




Now Brad was very excited, of course, and he read the book cover to cover. He read the book cover to cover, not just one time.

How many times?

Two thousand and twenty-two times. He read that book 2,022 times.

And he didn’t just read it, he used the information. He began to change the way he listened to people. He began to change the way he talked to people and to buffalos and to chickens and to dogs. Here’s the good news, by the time he was 30 Brad had made a lot of friends. That’s right, Brad had made 300, 300 friends by the time he was 20. That’s right. And he got help from his brother, because Tommy introduced him to some of his friends.

Now was Tommy jealous of Brad?

No, no, he wasn’t jealous of Brad. He was a good brother. He wanted to help his brother, so he introduced his brother to lots and lots of chickens and buffalos and dogs. So by the time he was 30, Brad had made 300 friends.

There’s even better news. By the time he was 30, Brad had gotten a girlfriend. That’s right. In fact, at the age of 30 he had a girlfriend.

Now how many girlfriends had he had by the age of 30?

Well, in fact, just one, just one.

What was her name?

Her name was Suzie, Suzie the buffalo. So he had gotten a girlfriend named Suzie and he was still dating her on his 30th birthday. When he became 30, he was still dating her. So, by the time he was 30, he had gotten a girlfriend. He had gotten one girlfriend and he still had her.

Was Brad happier?

Oh, yes, he was much, much happier.

Was Tommy happy?




Yes, Tommy was happy too. He was happy to see his brother succeed. He didn’t want his brother to be lonely. He wanted his brother to be happy. He wanted his brother to have a lot of friends and he was very happy that his grandfather helped him.

Who helped Brad?

Well, his grandfather did. Their grandfather did.

And so, now, how old is Brad?

Well now Brad is 32.

How many girlfriends has he had up until now?

Well, still, up until now, he has had only one girlfriend. You see, he is still dating Suzie. He loves Suzie so much, so he had had only one girlfriend in his whole life. From the past until now, he has had only one girlfriend.

How many girlfriends has he had until now?

Only one. He has had only one girlfriend until now.

What about Tommy, Tommy the stud? How many girlfriends has he had in his life from when he was young until now?

Tommy has had 420 girlfriends in his life. Not at the same time, but from when he was younger and through his 20’s until now, if you count them all, total, he has had 420 girlfriends. He has dated a lot of girls.

Has Brad dated a lot of girls in his life?

No, no, he hasn’t. Brad hasn’t dated a lot of girls. Brad has dated only one girl.

And what is her name?

Her name is Suzie.

So, now, Brad’s 32 and how old is Tommy?

Well, he’s 32, plus five minutes.

And are they both happy now?




Yes, they are. They’re both very happy now.

Why are they happy?

Because they both have a lot of friends and they both have girlfriends and they’re very, very happy.

Is Brad’s grandfather happy?

Yes, of course. He’s happy too, because he helped Brad. He’s very happy to see both his grandchildren succeeding and enjoying their lives.

* * * * *

And that is the end of this mini-story. I hope you enjoyed it. You got a lot of practice with the past perfect in this one and I hope you’re starting to get the feeling for how it’s used, when it’s used. You’ll notice I changed a little bit at the end and I hope you understand why, but don’t think about it too much. Just listen to this many times, answer the questions every day and you will get better and better with your grammar.

Alright, I will see you next time. Goodbye my special, wonderful, VIP member. I’m so, so happy to teach you. See you again soon, bye-bye.




Mental Strength POVHello, welcome to the point-of-view lesson, my special VIP member. This is for May 2010. Let’s get started. Are you ready to rumble? Let’s do it.

Okay, remember Brad? Remember our friends Brad and Tommy and their grandfather? Well let’s change the time period for these stories. First I’m just going to talk about it like it’s just in the normal past.

* * * * *

So there was a buffalo and his name was Brad and Brad didn’t have any friends. That’s right. He had not made any friends. He didn’t have any friends, poor Brad. When he was young he didn’t have any friends, when he was in his 20’s he didn’t have any friends and, until recently, he didn’t have any friends.

He didn’t have any chicken friends, he didn’t have any buffalo friends, he didn’t have any girlfriends, but Brad had a brother. He had a twin brother and his twin brother’s name was Tommy.

Now Tommy had always been popular growing up. Tommy had a lot of friends. When he was young he had a lot of friends, when he was a teenager he had a lot of friends and when he was in his 20’s he had a lot of friends. Right up until now, he has always had a lot of friends.

Now why didn’t Brad have friends when he was younger?

Well, because he was a dork when he was younger. When he was younger he was a dork.

Was Tommy a dork when he was younger?

No, he wasn’t. Tommy was never a dork. Tommy was a stud. He was a stud as a teenager, he was a stud in his 20’s and he still is a stud.

Now what is Brad? Is he a chicken?

No, he isn’t. He’s a buffalo. Tommy and Brad are buffalos.

Well, one day, on his 25th birthday, Brad’s grandfather came to him and gave him a book. He said “Brad, I want to help you.” He said “I used to be a dork too. I used to be a dork. When I was younger I also was a dork, but then I changed. I




became stud.” He said “So I want to help you.” And he gave Brad a book. The name of the book was How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie.

Now Brad read that book 2022 times and he didn’t just read it, he used it. He used all the information. He changed the way he listened to people, he changed the way he talked to people and he became a stud.

Brad finally got a girlfriend. Brad finally made a lot of friends. And, of course, Brad was very happy, his brother Tommy was very happy and their grandfather was very happy.

* * * * *

And that’s the end of our first point-of-view story. Now let’s just tell this as if it’s happening right now.

* * * * *

There is a buffalo and his name is Brad. Brad doesn’t have any friends -- oh, no, that’s terrible -- and Brad doesn’t have a girlfriend. In fact, he has never had a girlfriend in all his life.

Who has never had a girlfriend?

Brad. Brad has never had a girlfriend.

Now Brad has a brother named Tommy, a twin brother.

Has his brother ever had a girlfriend?

Oh, yeah, yeah. In his life, you know, right up until now, he has had girlfriends in the past, of course he has. His brother’s name is Tommy and his brother has had many girlfriends in his life, but Brad has never had a girlfriend, not in the past and not now.

So Brad is lonely. Brad is upset. Brad doesn’t feel good. Brad wants to have friends. He would like to have a chicken friend, he would like to have a dog friend and he would like to have buffalo friends, but he doesn’t have any friends at all. He doesn’t have chicken friends. He doesn’t have buffalo friends. He doesn’t have dog friends.

But, luckily, one day his grandfather comes to him. Brad’s grandfather comes to him and says, “Brad, I want to help you. You need help.”




He says “Grandson, I’m sorry, but you are a dork. You’re a dork and I know you’re a dork because I also used to be a dork when I was younger. I used to be dork when I was younger. I didn’t have any friends. I didn’t have any girlfriends, nothing.” He says “But I changed and a book, a special book, helped me to change.”

And, so, then on his birthday, he gives him the book. His grandfather gives him the book and, of course, Brad is excited. Brad is very, very happy. He immediately opens the book and starts reading. In fact, he reads that book 2022 times. He reads it and then he starts to use all the ideas and all the information in the book.

He uses it when he talks to girls, he uses it when he talks to chickens and to dogs and to other buffalos too. He uses all of this and he tries and tries and gets better and gets better and keeps practicing until, finally, he does make a lot of friends. Yes! He makes a lot of friends and even better, he finally gets a girlfriend.

He meets a girl, a buffalo girl, named Suzie. And he falls in love with her and she falls in love with him and so he dates her and she dates him and now she is his girlfriend. So now he has a girlfriend and now he has a lot of friends and now Brad is a very, very happy buffalo.

* * * * *

And that’s the end of our second point-of-view story. Let’s change the time again. Let’s imagine that this is something in the future. Maybe we dreamed about it and we could sort of imagine this is going to happen. So here we go.

* * * * *

In the future there will be a buffalo named Brad and he’s gonna’ be -- going to be, gonna’ be, he’s gonna’ be -- an unhappy buffalo, unfortunately. He’s gonna’ be a very unhappy buffalo. He’s going to be. Gonna’ means going to, as you probably know.He’s gonna’ be a very, very unhappy buffalo, because he’s gonna’ be a lonely buffalo.

Why will he be a lonely buffalo?

Well, because he’s not gonna’ have any friends. He’s not gonna’ have any friends and, in fact, he’s also not gonna’ have a girlfriend. In fact, he will never have had a girlfriend, not in his whole life. He will never have had a girlfriend. At no time in his life will he have had a girlfriend. Poor Brad, that’s terrible, so he will be unhappy.




Now he will have a brother, this buffalo in the future. He’ll have a brother, a twin brother named Tommy. Now Tommy will be a stud, not a dork. He’ll be a stud. He’ll be very popular. He will have a lot of girlfriends. He will have a lot of friends and in his whole life he will have had lots and lots of friends and he will have had a lot of girlfriends.

So in the future he will have had, from when he was little until he’s older, at the time of his age in the story, he will have had a lot of girlfriends and he will have made, of course, a lot of friends. So Tommy will be a stud. Brad will be a dork.And they will continue going along like this. They will continue their lives, Brad being a dork and Tommy being a stud.

Until one day, finally, in the future, Brad’s grandfather will come to him and he’s gonna’ help him. He’s finally gonna’ help Brad. He’ll say “Brad, I used to be a dork too. I used to be a dork, but I changed and I changed because of one special book and I’m going to give you this book now.” And then he’s gonna’ take out the book and give it to Brad.

And, of course, he’ll feel excited. Brad will feel excited. Brad’s gonna’ feel very excited. He’s gonna’ read that book again and again and again and again and again.

How many times will he read that book?

Two thousand and twenty-two times, of course. He’ll read that book 2,022 times.

He’ll read that book. He’ll memorize that book. You hear the ‘ll’, ‘ll’, that’s the future, will, he’ll memorize that book and then he’ll use all of the information in that book whenever he meets new people, new buffalos, new chickens, new dogs.

Until, finally, he’ll succeed. He’s gonna’ make lots of friends and even better, he’s gonna’ get a girlfriend. Finally, Brad will get a girlfriend. He’ll get a girlfriend and her name will be Suzie.

Is she gonna’ be a chicken?

No.

Is she gonna’ be a dog?

No.

Is she gonna’ be a person, a human?




No.

What’s she gonna’ be?

Well, of course, she’s also gonna’ be a buffalo. So Brad is gonna’ get a buffalo girlfriend and her name will be Suzie.

And how will he feel?

Of course, he’ll feel very, very happy.

How will Tommy feel, his brother?

Well, he’ll also feel very happy.

And how’s his grandfather gonna’ feel?

He’s gonna’ feel happy too. They’re all gonna’ be very, very happy.

* * * * *

And that is the end of our point-of-view stories. See, we’ve mixed in a little bit of different grammar in this one. Don’t think too much about it. That future one had something very complex, actually, but don’t worry about it. It’s something that’s quite difficult, but you don’t need to think about it.

You don’t need to think of the grammar terms, just listen to that future story again and again. Listen to the other two also. Every day listen to them, one time, two times, three times, four times. Just get a feeling, a feeling for the grammar, a feeling for how it changes with the different times.

Remember, verb tenses in English, basically, help you to get a feeling for time. Sometimes it’s one point in time, sometimes it’s a range in time, something that starts maybe back in the past and continues until now or starts at a time and then continues for a while.

So we have these different feelings of time in English and our verb tenses help us get a feeling for that. So you just need to feel, feel the grammar, not think about it too much. How do you do that? By listening to these stories again and again and again and again until they feel natural and easy and you understand and feel the different time changes.




And that’s all. I hope you enjoy this point-of-view story my special VIP. Because you’re a VIP I’m giving you some more advanced grammar in these stories, so just relax and enjoy it.

See you next time, bye-bye.




Mental Strength CommentaryHello my VIP member. Welcome to the commentary for ‘Mental Strength’ which is our topic this month.

Now another way to say mental strength would be brain fitness or mastery and this is the topic I’ve been focused on for the past several months. I’ve been doing a lot of research and a lot of reading on this topic. What I’m really interested in is what is actually happening as we are mastering a new skill. I mean what is happening physiologically, you know, in our brains. What changes our happening in our brains, in our nervous system and how can we make that process more powerful and more efficient?

And, so, this the question I’ve had and the questions I’ve had and what I’ve been reading about and trying to answer and I’ve found some interesting answers and some interesting research about what happens when we learn, what happens when we practice.

Now, of course, the simplest way to explain this is that as we learn something, especially a new skill of some kind -- that might be a new language, it might be a musical instrument, it might be a skill like teaching English, which is a skill that I’ve been focused on learning and mastering, it could be anything, it could be a sport -- what happens? Well, there’s kind of a process that everybody goes through.

Now the first part of the process could be called incompetent. When we’re incompetent it means we suck. To suck at something means to be very bad at it, so, of course, when we first start anything new we’re very bad at it.

When I first started teaching English, I was a really bad teacher, you know? I didn’t have any confidence. I didn’t know what I was doing. Even when I wanted to try something new or different, I didn’t do it well. I didn’t know how to do it skillfully. I wasn’t a good public speaker, so standing in front of a group of people and keeping their attention and keeping their focus; keeping their interest was difficult for me. I didn’t know how to do it.

These are all skills that I had to learn and I learned them through practicing them and by being up in front of groups of people again and again and again and again. Doing it, though, with concentration and intention and constantly trying to improve. So after every class, every speech, I would look at it and think about it and think okay, what was good, what was bad, how can I improve it. Then the next time I gave a speech, I tried to improve it a little bit more. Sometimes I worked on my energy level, so I could have more energy when I was speaking and teaching. Sometimes I worked on my physical movement so that I used my hands more,




my arms more and my facial expressions more. So that I just didn’t stand still, that I would actually move around and walk around.

Sometimes I had to work on my eye contact so that I looked at people in the audience; you know my students or the audience members as I spoke. I mean all of these are skills that I had to think about and learn and practice and get better and better and better at them, until they became effortless and automatic.

And then, of course, there was actually the content of my lessons, my actual teaching technique, like the story technique and some of the other techniques I use, such as the movie technique. I had to practice those as well. Those were not just automatic and natural in the beginning.

And, so, this is true for any skill. In the beginning you’re going to feel incompetent. You’re going to feel foolish. You’re going to feel very uncomfortable because you’re not good at it, you know? There’s no avoiding that.

And, of course, next we’ll enter a stage, sometimes people call this the plateau and I’ve talked about this before. Where you’re a little bit good, you’re not terrible, you can kind of do it, but you’re not great, you’re not a master and this is where a lot of people get stuck.

A good number of people drop out in the beginning when they feel really foolish and they say oh, this is not for me, but then an even bigger group get stuck in the second phase, the plateau phase, where they become kind of good, but not great, but they become comfortable and they stop.

Now this is what I have seen with most English teachers, for example, that I have worked with in the past at different schools. Most of them become, I would call it, proficient. I would use the word proficient. Proficient means you can do something fairly well, but you’re not great at it, you’re not a master. You’re good, you’re a little bit good, but you’re not really good and you’re not excellent and you’re certainly not a master.

That’s where most teachers reach. That’s the level of skill they reach. You know, they’re good enough at using standard textbooks and doing standard activities. They feel comfortable, they feel fairly confident, but they haven’t really become masters or experts at teaching English.

This happens with people in so many fields where they just get stuck, because they can do it good enough. Good enough for their job, so they keep getting their paycheck or good enough to feel comfortable and then they just stop and that’s what happens with, I’d say, probably the largest number of people. Then a very, very, tiny few will continue to practice deeply and keep improving and actually become masters, become truly




excellent, truly great at what they do, whether it’s being a speaker or a teacher or learning a language or learning a musical instrument, whatever it is.

So what is the secret, though, to getting through those different periods? Getting through the first period is really about motivation. When you feel incompetent, when you feel foolish and stupid, when you’re no good, well so much of that is just psychology, right?

In that beginning phase, you just need a lot of encouragement. You need to be really motivated, because it’s tough to feel stupid and foolish and incompetent. It’s not easy. It’s hard. You don’t really see yourself becoming good. It’s hard to imagine it, because you feel so terrible and bad in the beginning.

And, so, the biggest problem in the beginning is feeling really discouraged and that’s where you just really need a lot of motivation. You really need to use all these motivational ideas and tricks and techniques and strategies that we talk about here in the VIP Program and that Tony Robbins talks about so that you can push through that difficult period when you just don’t see the success coming and when you do that, eventually, you will get to a point where hey, things start to feel better and you actually start being able to function.

Now as VIP members, most of you are in the second phase. You can already understand a good amount of English. You speak English fairly well already. Some of you speak it very well, some of you decently well, but most of you are not what, I would say, could be called true masters. Where you have excellent pronunciation, where you speak just effortlessly, where you feel super confident as you speak English.

Some of you, maybe a lot of you, have gotten a little too comfortable, because you can communicate fairly well with English now. You know, maybe you can do your job fairly well with English, but you have bigger dreams.

You have bigger dreams for your life, bigger dreams for your job, bigger dreams for your family, bigger dreams for traveling, bigger dreams for meeting people, bigger dreams for helping people and these bigger dreams require a much higher level of English mastery and, maybe, these bigger dreams require a much higher level of mastery in other skills as well. And, so, now your challenge is to go beyond being comfortable and good and to get to the point of mastery.

Now you have a different challenge in this phase where you are now. You feel fairly confident, so your challenge is not feeling stupid and foolish for most of you. Most of you are okay, okay, I know enough English. I can kind of communicate. I feel pretty good and compared to a lot of people, you probably are very good with your English ability, but here’s the problem.




Again, you want to be a master and really get your dreams. Not just be good, you want to be great. You want to have a great life and you want to be really great with English. So your problem now is pushing beyond being comfortable. Your problem now is how do you increase your attention? How do you increase your concentration? How do you deepen your practice even more?

See the problem is, in this middle phase, you get stuck. You get stuck doing the same old things again and again. You get stuck doing the same old things that worked for you in the past that got you to where you are now. The problem is you’re trying to go farther now and you may need newer, different, strategies and you certainly may need to push yourself even farther than you thought you needed to.

So here’s what the brain research shows. The number one most powerful thing for your brain, the number one thing that makes your brain stronger that makes your learning better that improves your memory that improves your ability to perform any skill, the number one thing is attention, concentration, focus.

These are all words for the same thing. It’s your ability to focus on one thing deeply, completely, for a longer and longer and longer period of time. There is no substitute for this skill, for this ability. This ability is the mother of all other skills and abilities.

See, we live in a culture now that emphasizes and celebrates multitasking. You’ve heard this word, right, multitasking? Multi means many and, of course, task means job. Something you do, maybe action, so many actions, many jobs, at the same time. So we love the idea now in our societies, in our cultures, around the world of doing a lot of different things at one time.

So you can be talking on your cell phone at the same time that you’re typing an email and people think that’s just great. Wow, you’re so talented. You can do five things at the same time and if you’re a mother, oh my God, then you really gotta’ do this a lot, right? You’re trying to work and talk on the phone and take care of your kid and cook the dinner and you’re trying to do them all at the same time. That just feels like it’s so efficient and wow, I’m getting so much done. I’m so productive, but…but, the brain research shows that that, in fact, is not good for your brain.

Because another word for multitasking is distraction, because when you’re trying to do two things at the same time or four things at the same time, what it really means is this -- you are not focused on any one of them very deeply. You are not mastering any one of them deeply. You are not practicing any one of them deeply and you most certainly are not focusing enough to improve any of them deeply.




So if you’re listening to Effortless English while you try to do something else, guess what? You’re not really improving your English very much and you’re probably not doing that other thing very well either. And, so, maybe this sounds a little old fashioned, I don’t care, because it’s true. This is what the research shows.

The power comes from doing one thing with total concentration and attention. That’s when the brain connections start happening. That’s when the neurons, the neurons are the ends of the nerve cells and it’s where the signals, the information, is passed from one nerve cell to another, they go across neurons, neurons.

Anyway, when you learn something or when you’re practicing something, your bran creates more connections between nerve cells, the ones that you’re using, but it only does this when you’re really focusing with a lot of attention and intention too, actually. Both of those are important, but when you’re giving a lot of attention to what you’re doing, your brain realizes ah, this is important. This is important because he or she, the master of the brain, is really, really paying attention to it a lot.

Your brain responds to attention. The more attention you give to something the more your brain creates connections and will perform better and faster and remember more, everything works better. That’s when you learn best. The more attention you give, the more focus you give to something, the better you learn it. This is true of golf. It’s true of tennis. It’s true of English. It’s true of relationship skills. It’s true of speaking and teaching skills. It’s true of anything and everything.

And, so, when you’re trying to do two things at the same time or three things, guess what? Your brain does not really make very many deep connections. They’re just very shallow connections which disappear, which means they go into short-term memory and then they’re gone again. This is why you don’t become a master by being distracted.

Imagine Michael Angelo, you know, he painted the Sistine Chapel. Do you think he was trying to do three different things while he was painting? Was he listening to his iPod and talking on his cell phone while he was painting the Sistine Chapel? I don’t think so. Do you think Mozart was writing emails while he composed symphonies? Was he doing that? Or just chatting with somebody else in the room? Having a little conversation while he, you know, kind of half paid attention as he wrote down his music? I don’t think so.

We all have a picture of a master. I could be a martial arts master or it could be a musician, whatever it is and we instinctively know that a master is super focused, that they possess the incredible ability to focus in a deep and powerful way, totally, on one thing for an incredibly long period of time. We can see, we can imagine in our mind the great artist, Picasso, Michelangelo, Leonardo Da Vinci.




We can see them for hours and hours focused on one sculpture, focused on one painting, maybe for 10 hours, 12 hours, days and days and days doing this. They’re not distracted. They’re not bored. They’re not tired.

You know we read these great stories of masters in music and art, for example, you know, they forget to eat. Because they’re concentrating so much on what they’re doing they forget to eat. They forget to sleep. We know this with sports too, with our truly great sports people. When we watch somebody like that practice, they’re not distracted.

Tiger Woods is not listening to his iPod while he practices his golf swing. I guarantee he’s not. He is totally and completely 100% focused on every single swing and he swings his club, by the way, I think someone told me about 800 to 1,000 times a day. It’s the same with musicians. It’s the same with anybody.

It’s the same for me. When I do a seminar, for example we did a seminar in Bangkok two days or I do a workshop, I can get up there and speak and teach for six hours or eight hours or 10 hours in one day and you know what? I don’t need a break, usually. People at my workshops sometimes they’re like oh my God, when are we gonna’ take a break?

Because I’ll be up there and I’m so focused on what I’m doing as I’m teaching. I am so focused that I just forget the time and I’ll forget that I’m hungry, you know? So I’ll go and then suddenly, you know, the people in the back room are waving at me like A.J., we gotta’ take a break. A.J., we need to take a break. And the students in the class, you know, they’re like oh my God, I need some food. A.J., I need to go to the bathroom. But I’m just so focused when I’m doing that, that I don’t need a break. I can do it for hours and hours and hours and hours.

This is mastery. This is mastery and it’s something that must be practiced again and again and you’ve gotta’ push yourself and it can be developed. We’ve gotta’ get out of this lazy culture that is being, you know, sold to us on TV and the Internet constantly, where everything should be quick and fast and easy in terms of we shouldn’t need to do anything ourselves.

You know I talk about Effortless English, Effortless English and people think that means lazy English and it does not. You know I need to emphasize this again and again. Effortless English, that name comes from the feeling of effortlessness that happens when you master something. When you master something it feels effortless.

When I’m teaching on stage, when I’m speaking to a large group of people, it feels effortless to me. I’m not working hard. It doesn’t feel like I’m trying hard and, yet, I’m using a lot of energy. I have total focus and concentration and I can go and go and go for hours and hours and hours and hours and hours and hours and hours without




stopping, without a break, without feeling tired. So you say well, A.J., that’s not really effortless, you’re actually using a lot of energy. Well that’s true, but it feels effortless to me because I have mastered it.

So that’s what I’m talking about with Effortless English. It doesn’t mean lazy English. It doesn’t mean you sit around and you don’t need to concentrate and you can just, you know, not focus and be half asleep while you listen. That’s not what Effortless English means. Effortless English means you use the best methods possible, you develop your power of concentration so that, eventually, when you speak English and hear English it feels effortless because you have totally mastered it, totally and deeply and powerfully. That is what effortless means.

So, I hope I sold you. I’m trying to sell you on this idea, okay, because it’s important. It’s important for your whole life, okay? You know I don’t like this whole sort of, you know, quick, fast and easy idea that our cultures are giving us now because there’s now power in that. There’s no personal power. There’s no mastery. There’s no ability to be a great leader. There’s no ability to help other people. When you’re a master at something, you then gain the ability to help other and I think this is maybe the biggest benefit of mastery.

When I was a bad teacher, in the beginning, I really didn’t help people very much. You know I was a friendly person and my students like me and I like them, but I really didn’t help them so much. I didn’t contribute to them very powerfully, but now that I have a much higher level of mastery, I can help so many more people and I can help them in a much more powerful way. I can help other people achieve their dreams. That’s an incredible feeling for me and mastery has given me that opportunity.

Because I have mastered this topic, this area, this skill of teaching, it has also helped me learn how to master other things. I am gaining more and more mastery with the more general skill of leadership and communication, for example. That is helping me contribute to other people even more powerfully, help other people even more. So you can see that mastery creates more mastery.

The most powerful thing about it and this is what’s so great, in the process of mastering one thing, let’s say English speaking for you, you make your brain and your concentration stronger and stronger and stronger and when you do that it then becomes easier to master any other new skill that you want to learn. You gain the ability to learn anything faster, to master anything better.

This is why, for example, people always say that if you learn one language well, if you master one language, then learning another language is actually much easier -- that the second foreign language is easier to learn than the first one. Why is that? This is the




reason, it’s because the process of learning the first foreign language requires your brain to get stronger, to become more fit.

It requires you to develop more and better and deeper concentration. You’re memory improves. You also just learn better and better learning strategies. You figure out how to remember new words and new phrases. You figure out how to improve pronunciation. So you gain these new strategies also and so with new strategies, plus a brain that works better that has better concentration that is just more focused means that the next time you want to learn a language, guess what? You can do it much more easily.

There’s even better news, you can also learn other skills, not just languages, better and more easily. If you want to then go on and learn a musical instrument, guess what? The focus and concentration that you developed from mastering English will help you learn a musical instrument more quickly and more easily. Or, let’s say you have a new skill you want to learn at work, maybe its computer programming, maybe it’s the ability to do public speaking.

So now you mastered English, but now you want to be able to stand in front of large groups of people and speak powerfully and effectively and have them listen to you, have them respect you, hold their interest, inspire them, maybe even convince them to do something, to take some kind of action. That’s a whole other skill, but guess what? The mental power, the mental strength, the focus and concentration you developed by mastering English, totally mastering it, not just being good, being great, that concentration and focus will then enable you to master public speaking much more easily.

So I want you to think about this. That as you develop more mastery and as you develop more focus and concentration through the VIP Program, through listening to Effortless English, through using this system and this method, I want you to realize and remember that you are also developing your brain and that this development will help you in all other aspects of your life.

So I hope that you’ll also go out and try to learn some new skill, maybe a musical instrument, maybe a physical skill, some kind of sport or activity, maybe a job-related skill or something like public speaking or maybe something just fun like acting. Whatever it is, I hope you’ll go out there and just pick something that’s interesting or useful to you and start using this same process with that new skill as well, developing your concentration, developing your focus. It could even be something just like meditation.

As you do this here’s what’s going to happen and here’s the really good news. In the beginning it’s going to feel difficult. In the beginning it feels like oh, this is tough. It’s not




comfortable. In the beginning you’ll feel bored after a while. In the beginning you’ll feel tired after a while. But as you do this more and more and develop it better and better, you will reach a point where suddenly it starts to feel good.

You will master the process of mastery. You will master the process of deep practice and when that happens, it will start to feel really good. You’ll start to really enjoy concentrating and focusing deeply on one thing. It will feel a little like meditation. You’ll discover you have a feeling of calmness, a feeling of strength and power when you do this and you’ll begin to really enjoy it.

It becomes addictive in a very positive way and so then you’ll start to be addicted to the process of learning, addicted to the process of growth, addicted to concentration and focus. It’s a wonderful feeling that will help you gain confidence and success in everything you do.So there’s my lesson for you, my little bit deeper lesson for you, for this topic this month and that is this – use the VIP Program. Use English and Effortless English to learn the process of deep practice, to learn the process of mastery to train your brain and then use that same focus that same concentration that same mental strength, use the same process to master other things in your life too. That will give you amazing success in your life in anything you do. It will help you become a better and better leader; it will help you contribute more and more and more to other people.

Okay, I hope you enjoyed this topic and I hope you’ll actually do this and really start working out that brain, focusing it and getting more and more attention. Don’t be distracted. I hope you will commit to being a total master at English speaking and anything else that you really care about.

Okay, I will see you again. Thank you my wonderful VIP member. See you on the VIP social site. Go to the VIP social site, say hello, read some of the posts on there, encourage other people and say hello to me too. I’ll see you there, bye-bye. PAGE 9




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