A Coffee Break with Mark

Know more than you can use?

How to close the gap between what’s in your head and what comes out of your mouth.

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What's on the sheet

You almost certainly know more than you can use. Studying builds knowing; speaking is a separate skill called using. More study won’t fix a using problem, only using will.

1

Lower the stakes, not the language

One sentence out loud, one message sent, one coffee ordered without slipping into English. Small and real beats big and imagined.

2

Expect the freeze, and go anyway

The pounding heart is normal, even for fluent speakers. It’s the feeling of doing the real thing, so open your mouth anyway.

3

Collect the moments

The words you use out in the world stick, because they’re attached to a face, a place, and a little “I managed that”.

There's a video too

The full episode walks through the whole thing over a coffee. There's a new one every week.

Watch the episode