The Journey and the Challenge

hello there it's drew and i am back from

my trip to Hawaii. i was out visiting

just the landscape I really wanted to

enjoy Hawaii with my family so I went to

Oahu and got to enjoy some nice beaches

down there and some great food and it

was really just a fantastic opportunity

to leave Nagasaki and Japan for a little

bit but of course there are many

Japanese people in Hawaii's I did

actually speak quite a bit of Japanese

while I was down there even helped a

japanese couple maybe some grandparents

that were at a clothing store trying to

find some clothes for their

grandchildren so that was a fun

experience in another great way to use

my language even when i'm outside of the

country

it's interesting actually I find myself

practicing my Japanese more when I'm not

in Japan I don't know why that is I

think it's more I feel like more

stronger connection to the country when

i'm outside of it when i'm outside of

japan so I'll often find my myself

speaking and practicing Japanese more in

those situations so this is kind of

another reason why it's it's not a i

guess a hindrance or a real problem if

you don't live in an english-speaking

country because you can find your way to

connect to english even if you don't

live in an english-speaking country

anyway one of the things that I thought

a lot about over the vacation was the

youtube channel and how as just like a

part of what we do we can really do a

much better job for learners and helping

people get excited about learning and so

one of the things i want to do is kind

of do i get something different i guess

maybe all maybe i'll go back this might

be a long video we'll see but the long

and short of it is and this is another

great phrase for you the long and short

of it

this just means if you have maybe

something long you want to say or a long

explanation you use this before you're

going to give a shorter explanation just

too may be communicated in a faster and

more simple way so the long and short of

it is I was thinking a lot about you and

how I can help you get fluent and really

I wanted to kind of open up the channel

you see I've got maybe a slightly

different orientation here in the studio

excuse me I don't have a lot of options

in here for you know nice backgrounds

and things but i want to i don't know i

guess like like thinking a lot about

the channel and how I can help you

improve help others like you improve one

of the most important things that helped

me was just the ability to stick to the

learning process and I know a lot of

people come through this channel and

it's not just about my channel or even

other language learning channels online

people maybe maybe this is you like you

get some kind of idea something happens

to you where maybe you should learn

English or maybe you know for your

career you're thinking about learning it

or it could be whatever reason maybe

you're clicking on videos and then you

come to this one and you watch a little

bit of it and you're okay I'm like

excited to learn but then maybe watch

two or three of my videos or something

else and then maybe you don't come back

and it's maybe not because the videos

are bad but because you know that the

learning process is a long thing and not

a lot of people do like make it through

to the end they don't stick through to

the end

so a lot of what I do on the channel is

really two things the first one is

giving you tips about how to learn how

to think about things in a different way

and i spent a lot of time talking about

psychology so how the way you think

effects the way you learn in your

confidence and all of these things and

it becomes a very important part of the

learning process

the other thing i do is giving or give

specific tips about maybe you should

learn this phrase or that phrase are all

work on a particular grammar point

something like that but all of these

things are kind of individual videos

that anybody could come to the channel

at any time and watch and you probably

notice that unless we're maybe talking

about our beginning English series for

learners may be like beginning learners

whether they're adults or kids so this

series as a particular order of things

but almost everything else on the

channel can be viewed independently so

you can watch one or two videos and it

doesn't really matter what were you

watch them in and I thought a lot about

this and it's kind of the opposite of

really what you should be doing for

learning and I'm not doing a very good

job of making the learning environment

here on YouTube really suitable for

people to do that that stick to it that

stick to witness being able to continue

doing something because you've got to

spend more

time then what you really think is

required especially for fluency almost

everything that takes time to do well

and to get really good at it's going to

take more time than most people think

and so if you have a very quick passing

idea about yeah I'd like to learn

english today and then you watch two or

three videos and then you stop and find

something else to get interested in i

probably won't be able to help you but

what i can do is try to make the channel

a bit more of a place where people that

struggle can you know enjoy watching my

journey as well as i'm also starting to

you know I guess look at different ways

for improvement beyond fluency so I'm

obviously also learning japanese and

improving my fluency in that language as

well but i really wanted to give people

the opportunity to kind of follow me on

a journey and go with me on a journey in

the way that i am an English fluency guy

and so I wanted to talk about part of

that today and I thought that if I

created something or kind of evolved the

channel where we're more taking a

journey with me and I'm giving you more

of like the insight into my personality

and what I do in my everyday real life

and like I'm trying to talk my wife and

getting on the show with me hopefully

she says yes and maybe if you put down

in the comment below like yes like yeah

drew your wife should definitely get on

the program her name is Ted to meet er

um I and she's a little bit shy but if

you put a comment down below that says

yes we want you to get on the program

and talk with Drew and you know get more

involved in the channel then she just

might decide to to do it I can't make

any promises but anyway make comment

down below and like this video and maybe

she will get excited to do that but

anyway so I thought it would be I kind

of brought this up maybe a couple of

videos ago about making a certain

challenge and giving myself something to

to look forward to in to work towards in

the same way that you're working towards

fluency and I didn't want to do

something where I'm trying to lose

weight or do other things I am trying to

dunk so I'd like been working on

stretching my legs and improving my leg

strength so i can do that but you know I

really wanted to do something a bit more

practical and i know that a lot of

people are interested in

self-development and self-improvement in

general so most people maybe you two

you're learning a language not just for

life but also because it's an

interesting goal to have it's a it's an

interesting skill to develop and when

you it's one of those really cool skills

that when you go into an environment you

can speak a different language it's

really giving you the key

almost to another world and I can walk

around in japan in the same way that I

walk around in America and I don't feel

nervous about getting into a taxi or

asking people for directions or even

offering help like I was helping that

couple back in america in Hawaii and

when I when I experience those things

especially after I struggled for so long

to learn that really became a motivating

thing for me to help other people

experience that as well now what you

probably don't know about me is that I

actually struggle with communication in

general and this is a weird thing

because I'm an educator and I i spent a

lot of time talking in an environment

like this and i think i was attracted to

you tube in the first place and just

being able to connect with people in

this way because I like i tend to move

around a lot so I've lived in lots of

different places and maybe you know it

whether I'm in America or Japan or

someplace else i'll be there for maybe

two or three years and then I'll move to

another location maybe another city in

the same country or something like that

but i notice I've gotten very good at

having lots of good friendships with

people at kind of a shallow level so

especially i'll be with people for a

little while and then I get to know them

fairly well but you know the these

relationships with people take time and

then I find I'm moving to a different

location and my problem is that i don't

really do so well communicating with

people like over the internet and now

that the scenes again like a weird thing

here i am saying i don't communicate

very well and the other thing is I don't

really communicate very well over the

internet and this is exactly what I do

like right now I'm speaking with you in

a way over the internet so i can't visit

be physically with every

body although i wish i could but this is

something that kind of as a challenge

for myself it's something that i'd

really like to improve and so one of my

things is like like I really post

anything on facebook personally and even

further like the English any 1.com

facebook page when i'm posting things

there i'm not like as excited to do it

as I am to speak with people in person

and I don't know exactly how to bring

that more personal connection to things

like Facebook maybe it's just not it's

not a skill that I'm really good at and

when I'm not living in a physical

location with someone I I rarely have

contact with them so you can imagine up

made friends and lots of different

places around the world and have lots of

learners like yourself that are also

learning with me but I have very little

personal contact with them i live in a

small town in japan and i got like

really wish i had up didn't did a better

job of that and so there are other

things like this that I'd like to work

on for myself and I thought it would be

a really great opportunity because we're

learning a language here you're learning

English I'm trying to improve my

japanese and really what we're going for

is communication and it's something that

requires the adoption of habits so

changing the way you think changing the

way behave so for me myself making more

of an effort to communicate with people

back home in Chicago or Seattle or other

places where I've made friends and again

because i'm not in that physical

location anymore I kind of lose that

connection with people i really miss

being in college for that reason

actually it was a lot of fun being there

and I've got lots of people to interact

with and I'm very social but when I'm

not physically with people i find the

internet to be almost cold in that way i

just don't really find myself making as

much of an effort and I don't really

know why that is but this is anyway kind

of one part of my communication problem

and I don't want to talk about too many

things in this video this is more just

kind of an introduction of that but I

thought it would be a great idea to have

kind of a challenge like this and maybe

change the youtube channel and you know

change where we're going with it in an

effort to like i don't i don't really

care so much about getting like more

reviews but it's really important for me

to have people at that moment where

you're trying to learn the language and

you arrive at this video you're watching

it especially if this is the first video

of mine you've ever seen that you think

okay like I'm prepared i'm i'm going to

stay with this guy i want to like see

where he's going to go where he's going

to take me and as you're learning with

me as you're moving with this you know

kind of journey this adventure with me

then you're picking up the language

naturally the same way a native speaker

would so I don't want to do the thing

where I have the whiteboard behind me

and I'm just writing out a list of

phrases that most people are going to

forget anyway I gotta challenge you to

go back and look at some of the videos

maybe like that other people are

producing that give you list of things

to remember written up on a whiteboard

and look at it even you know an hour two

hours later and see how much you

remember really what you remember

stories and so these are the kinds of

things I'd like to do more of

and these are the kinds of situations

that i think would make a really great

series here and kind of changing and

evolving the youtube channel in that way

so i may you know go back and see about

you know doing some other things while

I'm teaching specific phrases but really

what I'm trying to do is create

something have a journey that you can

follow along with me and if you're also

interested in personal development about

how we can really communicate better

with people become better people i know

it sounds a little bit weird but like

that's important to me and i really want

to be able to connect better with people

and have stronger deeper relationships

with people so I thought in addition to

the language the language is really just

a means of communication but how we

communicate all of these things it's a

much deeper topic more interesting one

and this is something that if we can

develop these skills together these are

the things that help us more in our

interpersonal relationships so if it's

just friends or other people in your

family or your neighborhood or if it's a

professional thing where you're trying

to speak more with the people at your

work or at your school or other you know

professional situation so all of these

things like following following me on a

journey and me getting to actually have

a conversation with you so I'm looking

at the comments and seeing what people

are interested in learning about and the

channel involves that way

but i think this is really what we need

to do and I need to like kind of show

more of myself and get kind of beyond

the professional looking of like okay

and maybe it's not like so professional

looking but what I mean is the

professional way of like okay we're just

going to like stop at the language we're

going to talk about how to learn the

language and here tricks to help you

learn it faster and these are things

that get clicks you know people are

interested in how you can learn a whole

bunch of words but the real thing that

gets you fluent is the journey itself

and continuing to stick with the channel

whether it's my channel or somebody else

I really want you to actually get fluid

and know what it's like to be able to

communicate in English the way you do in

your native language so anyway I will

leave it here if you have any questions

think this is a good idea or even a

terrible idea to let me know down in the

comments and i look forward to hearing

from you into to seeing where the

channel goes in to see what this kind of

challenge looks like because it's just a

new idea and I don't know exactly how it

will work but I think it'll be very

interesting anyway do let me know in the

comments section below be sure to like

this video if you'd like to see more of

these and you know become a subscriber

if you're not already and we can follow

you know this journey together anyway

have a fantastic day and i look forward

to seeing you in the next video bye bye