Transcript: “Listening Time” Episode 44

Welcome to the Listening Time podcast. Hey everybody, this is Conner, and
you're listening to Episode 44 of the Listening Time podcast. I hope you all had a good
Christmas. Actually, at the time of recording this, it's not Christmas yet. I'm recording this
the week of Christmas, but this episode will be released after Christmas. So, I hope you
all had a good Christmas and that you're having a good end of the year and that you're
thinking of all the plans and things that you want to do in 2022.
So, since this is the last podcast episode before the end of the year, I wanted to
dedicate this episode to talking a little bit about my year, about my 2021. So, I can kind
of give all of you guys a review of what I did in 2021... the things that I did well, or the
things that I didn't do well... to just reflect on this year. When we use the verb "reflect"
like this in English, it means that we're thinking deeply about something, and we're
trying to analyze it. We're reflecting on something.
But before we get to today's topic, let me mention some news. So on the Patreon
Listening Time website, we have a new tier. Remember that the word "tier" just means
level. So, we now have a $4 level and the title of this tier is Family Members. So now, if
you donate $2 per month, you're a Member. If you donate $3 per month, you're a Super
Member, and if you donate $4 per month, you're a Family Member. So, Listening Time
Family Members have four things that they receive each month. So of course, they get
the new Listening Practice Seminar on the first day of each month. You'll also get one of
our old listening or pronunciation seminars on the 10th day of each month. And then of
course, you get the extra bonus podcast episode on the 15th day of each month. And
one new thing is that you'll also receive one of my Sound Training videos on the 25th
day of each month.
So, I just recently had the idea of creating these Sound Training videos, in which
I focus on one particular sound or one pattern in English, and I help you understand that
sound or that pattern better when you're listening. So, I've already posted the first
Sound Training video for Listening Time Family Members, and I also posted this one on
YouTube as well so that all of you can check it out and watch it and see if you like this
type of training. And if you like it, then you can sign up to become a Listening Time
Family Member.
So, you'll receive these training videos every month, and of course, you'll also
receive all of those other rewards that I mentioned. And if you're already a member, if
you're a listening time Member or Super Member, you can also upgrade your
membership to Listening Time Family Member if you want access to these Sound
Training videos. So, you can change your membership from Super Member to Family
Member, or from Member to Family Member if you'd like. These Sound Training videos
are short. They'll probably be a few minutes long each time, but it will give you... in each
video, I'll give you a lot of examples using this same sound or this same pattern so that
you can train your listening and you can start to notice this sound when you do your
own listening. So, in the first Sound Training video, I focused on questions starting with
"what". For example, instead of saying "what did you do yesterday?" native speakers
say "". We don't say "".
 So, if you're interested in that, I'll leave the link to this first Sound Training video
in the Episode Notes. So, you can click on that and check it out, and if you like it, then
consider becoming a Listening Time Family Member for just $4 per month. But of
course, if you want you can also just become a normal Member for $2 per month to
receive an extra episode and a new Listening Practice Seminar every month or a
Listening Time Super Member to receive a new seminar, an older seminar, and an
episode every month. Okay, thank you for allowing me to promote my membership a
little bit. I know that a lot of you are just here for the free content. That's okay. But of
course, I need to try to sell a little bit, and I really think that these things will be really
useful for you. So, that's why I'm mentioning them. And before we get started, just
remember that you have access to the transcript for this episode. That will also be in the
Episode Notes. And I think that's it. Okay, let's get started.
Okay, so let's talk about my 2021. So first, I'll talk about my professional life. So, I
had a lot of changes in this area. Because first of all, as many of you have probably
noticed, I'm no longer using the website polyglossa.com. This was the website that I
was using at the beginning of the year. And when I first created this idea of Polyglossa, I
had a completely different vision in mind. In this case, when I say the word "vision", I'm
saying I had a different idea for the future. Your vision is your idea of the future. So, I
had a completely different vision when I created the brand Polyglossa. I thought that I
wanted to create some type of school for multiple languages, not just English. But as I
started creating content for my website, and as I began to see what type of content
students really liked watching, I realized that the content that my audience liked the
most was my Listening Practice Videos on YouTube.
So, I continued making these types of videos. And I also had the idea of making
a podcast, right: the Listening Time podcast, because as I've mentioned before, I also
use these styles of podcasts when I study other languages, like French, for example.
So, I know that this method works when trying to improve your listening. So, I also
wanted to create a podcast and I decided to call it Listening Time. But for a while, I
continued with the website polyglossa.com where I sold my seminars, and then the
Listening Time podcast was like a separate project. But my podcast has become more
popular than any of my other content, and so I've decided to focus mostly on... not the
podcast, specifically, but on this style of content... so, on content related to listening,
and not as much grammar content or pronunciation content.
I still like pronunciation, and it's very similar to listening, so there's a lot of
crossover. In this case, when I use the word "crossover", I'm saying that there are a lot
of similar characteristics between English pronunciation and English listening. There's a
lot of crossover, but I'm focused primarily on helping people improve their listening. So, I
changed my idea completely, and I no longer use Polyglossa and that website. By the
way, the phrase "no longer" just means that I don't do it anymore. So, I no longer use it.
I don't use it anymore. So, I no longer use that website.
And now, of course, I have my Patreon page: www.patreon.com/listeningtime and
I think this is a much better model of business because in this way, you don't only have
access to my seminars for 24 hours and then they disappear. I had that model before,
but I like this model better. You become a member and then you have access to all the
content that I make available for that tier, or that level of membership. And so, you have
much more content and you can access it whenever you want. It doesn't disappear. So,
I think that's better for you. And it's also better for me, because I think it will help me
sustain my business better. In this case, the word "sustain" means to maintain support,
keep something going, okay? So, this type of model helps me sustain my business
more because it's a membership and not only a $1 purchase that someone makes one
time for example. Obviously, people can cancel their memberships whenever they want,
but I hope that you find this content useful and you'll want to continue your membership
into the future. So, I made this big change professionally, and I think it's going to be a
good change for me.
I also changed my Instagram name recently. I changed the name of my YouTube
channel. Everything is now "Listening Time". So, I mentioned Instagram. This is one
thing that I need to do a better job with. I haven't used my Instagram account in, like,
four or five months. And so, I'm going to start making more videos and more content for
Instagram that will be more listening-related. So, I'm excited to become more active on
Instagram as well. And of course, I still have my YouTube channel. So, these are all
things that will help me grow my business, I hope.
So, my vision for the future is that I want to be the best resource in the world for
English listening content and English listening improvement. I want to be the number
one source on the internet for listening-related content. And I hope that I can achieve
this because I think that this is a really important area of English that a lot of people
struggle with, right? They find a lot of grammar and vocabulary content on YouTube or
on the internet in general, but not many English teachers help students with the sounds
of English, with pronunciation or with listening, and I think that there is a need for this,
and I want to fill this gap. In English, when we say we want to "fill a gap", we're saying
that there is something missing, and we want to to fill that missing spot. We want to fill
this gap. So, that's what I plan on doing. And hopefully, I'm doing a good job so far. I
hope you're all enjoying this content.
Of course, as I mentioned in my last episode, I've had a difficult situation,
financially, recently. And that's why I can't produce as much free material because I
don't have the time to do so. I need to focus on the material that actually generates
money, and, of course, my classes, which is where I earn my normal salary. So, I
haven't had an easy situation, financially, this year. But I think that in the future, I'll be
able to produce more content for free once my my financial situation is a little bit better.
And hopefully, with the Patreon membership page, I'll be able to generate more income
for myself. "Income" just refers to salary, right, the money that you earn. So, I hope that
the Patreon memberships will generate more income for me so that I'll be in a better
position in the future to feel more comfortable financially and be able to produce more
free content as well.
So, now talking about my personal life... so in my personal life, two really big
things happened this year. One of them is that I moved to a new city. I think you all
know that by now. I talked a lot about that. So, I'm living in a different city now, and so
there are a lot of things that are challenging for me... alot of things that I need to adapt
to and get used to. And this has not been an easy transition for me. This has been a
very difficult process, but that's life. In English, we can use the phrase "that's life" to say
that life is hard and you just need to accept it. So, that's life. There are a lot of hard
transitions in life. And so, it's okay, I just need to give it more time and hopefully I'll feel
more comfortable later on.
 But the other big thing that happened in my personal life is that I had my first
child. I don't think I've announced that yet on this podcast. I announced it in one of my
bonus episodes, so the Listening Time Members already heard that. But for the general
public, this is the first time that you guys are hearing this from me. I think you've
probably heard my baby crying in the background in some episodes. I apologize for
that. I can't really do anything about that. That's probably a sound that you're going to
hear more of in the future. But yeah, I had my first child: a baby boy. And it has
completely changed my life, of course, in a good way. Obviously, there are many
sacrifices that I need to make now, and I need to work a lot harder, and I need to do
many things that I didn't need to do in the past. And I'm always tired now.
But all of that pales in comparison to the joy that I feel of being a father. In
English, when we use the phrase "pale in comparison", this just means that something
is not even comparable to something else, that it's so small or insignificant or minor
when compared to another thing. So, the inconveniences and the sacrifices and the
hard work... all of that pales in comparison to the joy of being a parent. It really does. I'm
not lying. I know that a lot of people like to talk about all of the difficulties and
complications that come with being a parent, especially when you have your first baby.
But I like to focus more on the positive things because, in my opinion, the
positives greatly outweigh the negatives. The word "outweigh" in this sentence... it
means that the positives are more significant than the negatives. They outweigh the
negatives. So, I like to focus on the positives because I really do feel a lot of joy now
that I'm a father, and life is very interesting now, now that I have a baby boy. So, that
has been a huge change in my life, and that of course was the best thing about this
year. And I can't wait to see my son get older and develop and start to walk and talk and
all of that in the future. Right now, he's still very young, so he doesn't do those things.
But I'm excited to see his development in the future.
And one last category of things I wanted to mention is my activities and hobbies
and things like that, that I did in 2021. So, one area that I really want to improve in next
year is doing more exercise. So, in the second half of this year, because my son was
born, I really haven't done much exercise at all. I haven't done a lot of outdoor activities.
I haven't done these things that I normally like doing. I normally like spending a lot of
time outside, doing activities outdoors, going to parks, you know, things like that. And
so, next year, I hope that I can spend more time outside and, in particular, doing more
exercise, because I feel like I'm out of shape now. The phrase "out of shape" means
that you're not physically healthy. It means that you're not strong or fast and you haven't
been exercising. So, I feel like I'm out of shape because I haven't been able to
exercise... especially since my son was born.
And so, in 2022, I want to do more activities. For example, I want to start playing
tennis again. When I was a kid, I played tennis and I liked it. I was actually pretty good
at this sport. But I stopped playing for many years, and recently, I had the idea to start
playing again. I said "why not?" I need an activity to do outside. I want to get some
exercise, and so, why not take up tennis again? In English, the phrasal verb "take up" in
this context, it means that you start a hobby or an activity or something either for the
first time, or maybe you're starting again after a long break like I'm doing with tennis. So,
I'm excited about doing that, and maybe I'll find some other activities that I can also do
outside.
 And lastly, one other important activity in my life is language learning. And this is
also something that I didn't do a lot of this year. Of course, I studied language this year,
but I didn't dedicate as much time as I would have liked to, and I wasn't as organized
about it. I didn't have a really good structure to my language learning this year. And so
next year, I want to be more organized and structured about it and really make more
improvements than I did this year. So this year, I focused on French, but like I said, I
didn't really improve that much. I improved a little bit, and my listening is improving a lot
in French, but I still have a long way to go. And so, next year I plan on really spending
more time listening, listening, listening. And once I get to the level where I can
understand conversations between native French speakers without much difficulty, then
I'll start speaking and having more conversations in French.
And at that point, hopefully, I'll be able to return to my Greek study. Because in
the year 2020, I focused more on Greek, and it's a language that I really love. It's really
fascinating for me. It's definitely the hardest language that I've learned. And I took a
break from Greek this year. And hopefully, in the second half of 2022, I can revisit
Greek, and I'll start to do a lot of listening practice with that language and hopefully, I'll
improve my comprehension to a level where I can understand Greek speakers speaking
to each other, and then maybe in the following year, I'll try to improve my Greek
speaking as well. So, those are my language learning goals for the future. But this year
wasn't the best year for me in terms of language learning. So, I hope to improve that in
the next year.
Okay, well, I think that we'll stop there for today. Remember that you have the
transcript for this episode available in the Episode Notes. So, just click there if you need
it. And of course, remember to become a member at www.patreon.com/listeningtime
You can either become a $2 Member, a $3 Super Member or a $4 Family Member,
depending on what content you want, and what type of material you're looking for, but
it's all related to listening. But of course, the higher tiers have more content available.
Thank you to all of you who have become members. I really appreciate that. And
remember that you also have access to my first Sound Training video. If you click on
that link in the Episode Notes, you'll see that. And if you like that, then you should
consider becoming a Listening Time Family Member for just $4 per month. Alright, well,
I hope you all have a good end of the year and a good start to the year 2022. I'll talk to
you again on the next episode of Listening Time.

*Click on this link to become a member, and you’ll receive my Listening Practice
Seminars and extra podcast episodes: www.patreon.com/listeningtime