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Hey everyone and welcome back to
the Understandable English 

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Podcast. 
My name is Oliver and today we 

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are going to be talking about 
self improvement. 

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So in particular we are going to
talk about self improvement 

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books and content. 
So videos and media online, do 

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they actually help? 
And what can we do about them? 

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Today there are countless, so, 
so many titles or books or 

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videos promising growth, 
motivation, success, money, 

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health. 
And so we are going to look at 

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whether these resources, these 
videos or books truly help us. 

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Are they useful? 
First off, why are they 

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important? 
There are so many self 

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improvement books, podcasts, 
videos, and seminars and these 

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offer things such as advice, 
insights, so someone's view on 

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something and strategies to 
achieve personal growth and to 

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overcome or beat challenges and 
improve our health and 

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well-being. well-being simply 
means how we are. 

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I am guilty as well of listening
to lots of self improvement 

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books and podcasts. 
I like hearing about ways that I

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can improve my life, and this is
not necessarily a bad thing. 

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There is a lot of useful 
knowledge in books and videos 

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and motivational speakers, but 
there can also, in my opinion, 

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be a problem. 
So there's something we call 

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diminishing returns. 
So what this means diminishing 

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return is the more you do 
something or the more of 

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something, the less benefit, so 
the less good things that you 

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get back from it. 
So for example, for each hour 

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you spend on watching or reading
books about self improvement, 

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you are getting less value, 
you're spending more time and 

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listening how to improve and 
you're not actually doing 

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things. 
For example, if I was constantly

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listening to podcasts or books 
about how to stop 

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procrastinating, so about how to
stop not doing my work or the 

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tasks I need to do. 
What I've done is I have spent 

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more time not doing those tasks,
and this can apply to anything. 

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If we consume the content but we
don't actually do it, we aren't 

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improving. 
This is particularly true about 

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things like motivational 
speakers. 

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We all know the likes of Gary 
Vee or Tim Ferriss or lots of 

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these other motivational 
speakers that make YouTube 

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videos, and I'm sure there are 
many in your country too. 

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When we listen to motivational 
speakers, it can often make us 

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feel inspired. 
It makes us feel motivated. 

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And this can release a chemical 
called dopamine which makes us 

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feel really good because your 
mind. 

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So your brain is already 
imagining or thinking about the 

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things that you could do, almost
as if you have already achieved 

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these things and it feels good. 
But the more we listen and read 

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and do these motivational 
things, time passes. 

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And in reality, unless we 
actually do what we are reading 

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or consuming, nothing changes. 
You can simply find another 

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podcast or another book and the 
cycle so this continuous process

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can repeat. 
So if this sounds like something

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that you do, then you maybe are 
consuming too much self help or 

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motivation content. 
And what you should do instead 

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is think of the following steps 
that we will go through. 

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For a start, we need to identify
the things that we actually want

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to change. 
So I know each of you will be 

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listening or consuming things 
that you're interested in. 

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Maybe it is having a better 
diet. 

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Maybe it is about exercising, 
Maybe it's about learning a 

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language or improving your 
language skills. 

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And once we know what we need to
do, we should consume some 

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content about how to do it and 
then immediately figure out how 

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we are going to do it, how we 
are going to do it in our life. 

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There's one thing thinking about
it, but the hard part is doing 

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it. 
Once we have thought about what 

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we want to change and how we are
going to do it, now comes the 

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most important part, and that is
doing it. 

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So starting to do it. 
And this is the hardest part and

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the best thing to do. 
We talk. 

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I talked about this when I 
talked about actually a self 

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help book that I read the over 
week about building habits. 

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And the best thing to do is to 
start doing a little bit just to

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start. 
And once we start it becomes a 

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whole lot easier to continue. 
The hardest part is actually 

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starting and So what can we read
or consume to help us that isn't

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self help useful content. 
For example, if you want to 

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learn a language, better start 
consuming content in that 

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language. 
For example, this podcast don't 

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only consume content about how 
to become better at the 

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language. 
The same way if you want to 

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become better at business. 
So building a business or your 

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career or field that you work 
in, read and consume content 

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about that field, not only about
how to become successful or how 

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to become the best in the field,
Start learning about what you 

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are wanting to do. 
This means that we are not 

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focusing on necessarily how to 
improve. 

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We are actually starting to 
improve and it is still within 

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that topic that you're 
interested in. 

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Really the point is don't stop 
consuming content, but choose 

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what you're consuming. 
Choose things that help you to 

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achieve what you're motivated 
about. 

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There is no harm or problem with
consuming some motivational or 

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self help content, but once 
you've got that basic level of 

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understanding about how to do 
something, you should start 

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doing it. 
And let's take for example, 

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myself. 
I recently wanted to start 

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making some improvements to my 
diet. 

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So what I eat. 
I'm not trying to lose weight or

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anything like that, but I want 
to eat healthier foods. 

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I have a problem with eating 
lots of junk food because I 

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travel a lot. 
It's so easy to stop into a 

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Burger King or eat a takeout 
sandwich, and I it makes me feel

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quite bad. 
So I want to eat better. 

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I was reading books about diet, 
about processed foods, about how

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to improve your diet. 
I realized the more I read and 

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the more I was consuming the 
content, I hadn't actually 

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started doing anything. 
So I decided to stop and 

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actually make some small 
changes. 

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So for example, at the start I 
began to eat 2 pieces of fruit a

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day and have some healthier 
snacks. 

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I still continued to have my 
usual meals, but over time my 

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diet and what I eat has been 
getting better. 

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This is a great example or and 
way to start improving. 

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So if you're in that position 
with English language learning, 

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try to make small changes while 
you learn. 

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Don't just try to learn how to 
get better. 

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I hope this podcast was helpful 
for some of you, or at least 

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interesting to listen to. 
Thank you very much for 

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listening and I hope you have an
amazing day. 

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Goodbye.