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hi everybody welcome back to ask Alisha
the weekly series where you ask me
questions and I answer them
maybe maybe I don't know maybe first
question this week comes from City High
City City says hi Alicia what is the
difference between figure out and find
out in terms of meaning and when to use
etc okay nice question so first let's
look at figure out to figure out means
to solve we use figure out when we have
a challenging problem or we have like a
complex puzzle something that we need to
do research on or we need to investigate
into a little bit in order to find a
solution so to figure out means to solve
for example I can't figure out what's
wrong with my computer I figured out why
the house smelled so bad someone forgot
to take out the garbage we need to
figure out why the software isn't
working so let's compare this to find
out to find out means to discover
especially when we're talking about a
secret or a surprise or something else
that we need to hide for some reason you
may also hear it used as a neutral way
to say discover but you can kind of tell
depending on the context so to find out
means to discover especially when you're
talking about a secret for example my
parents found out I left the house late
last night my boss found out one of our
employees has been stealing hey I found
out about a great new restaurant in the
neighborhood want to go so we don't use
these words interchangeably in some to
figure something out means to solve
something like a puzzle or you're
finding the solution to a challenge to
find out means to discover and it often
has a negative meaning as when someone
finds information that they were not
meant to find so I hope that this helps
you understand the difference thanks for
the question ok let's move on to your
next question next question comes from
Jerry song hi Jerry Jerry says I
usually watch TV shows to practice
listening but sometimes I can't clearly
hear what the characters say even though
I know the words when I see them in the
subtitles so how do I improve this and
it's a good question
keep in mind that there are a few
reasons why it might be difficult to
understand a character especially in
unscripted TV like reality TV where
people aren't always speaking clearly
the words that people choose and the way
that they make sentences may not be
perfect so please keep that in mind
people and unscripted TV shows often are
not speaking clearly or maybe they have
a specific accent or a special way that
they speak they may also just be
stopping and starting in the middle of
sentences and that can create some weird
sounds too so try to keep in mind that
unscripted TV in particular might not
sound as clear as scripted TV it might
not sound as clear as like this YouTube
channel either so those are a couple of
things to keep in mind other things that
you can consider though are reductions
in speech and just speed of speech so on
this channel we speak at a slower rate
than native pace and we also make an
effort to speak very clearly to help
people as they learn English but native
speakers don't do this usually something
in general to consider like even though
characters may have accents that are
difficult to understand even for native
speakers something that you can consider
for your English learning is to consider
reductions in speech so by that I mean
the connections that we make between
words and the ways that we make words
shorter for example I'm going to go to
the store to pick up something for
dinner that sentence said by a native
speaker at native speed would probably
sound something like I'm gonna go to the
store to pick up something for dinner so
we've reduced a lot of those sounds
together these words like I'm going to
go that are very commonly used together
are often reduced to I'm gonna go or I'm
gonna go to that so think about these
common reductions that you hear on TV
and in movies and so on and try to
practice those in addition to
considering how it looks on the page so
yes it's I am going to in the subtitle
or I'm going to but at native speed it
doesn't sound like that in many cases
I'm gonna go to the is how I'm gonna go
to the or I'm going to go to the sounds
in native speech so another point about
reductions in speech is prepositional
phrases so those words like to and at
and by and even conjunctions like and
and but and so on those words tend to
get very very short when we're speaking
quickly because they're kind of giving
us the structure of the sentence so you
can think of these sort of structure
words as being sort of the background of
the sentence and the content words like
the nouns and the verbs are kind of
taking the focus those are sort of the
highlights so these are some other
things that you can think of as you're
practicing your listening and you're
speaking with reductions so please keep
these things in mind and also keep in
mind as I said people speak with
different accents to people from
different areas of the u.s. speak
differently people from different areas
of the world speak different kinds of
English too so please keep in mind that
in some cases it's actually difficult
for native speakers as well but another
thing that maybe you can work on to kind
of advance your listening and even your
speaking is to consider reductions so
listening for those reductions and then
considering how you can use those
reductions in your speech as well to
sound more natural so that would be my
suggestion for improving your listening
and improving your speaking as you
practice with these reductions in your
own speech too so I hope that that helps
you thanks very much for the question
okay let's move on to your next question
next question comes from juni IED Raza
Junaid Raza hello Junaid Junaid says
hello Alicia most people are confused
about the difference between motivation
and inspiration I know there are
definitions available in dictionaries
but can you differentiate these two
words in detail okay sure so inspiration
is something that gives us an idea so we
use inspiration to create some
new inspiration is something that comes
naturally it comes from within us so we
have an experience we see something or
touch something we hear something we
smell something taste something whatever
we have some kind of experience and it
gives us an idea so it comes from like
inside us this idea comes from inside us
based on this experience that we had so
for example my mother's stories were my
inspiration for this book or my
childhood by the seashore was my
inspiration for this dish so these are
the things that gave the speaker an idea
to create something else in the first
example they're the speakers stories
were the inspiration for this book so
that means the speaker's mother's
stories were the thing that gave the
speaker the idea in the second example
sentence we can imagine it's about a
chef so the chef's inspiration was a
childhood by the seaside so that gave
the chef the inspiration to create that
dish so it's something that happens and
there's a natural response in a person
that makes them think I'm gonna create
something in contrast then motivation is
something that comes from outside us
that gives us a push or that helps us to
continue doing something and motivation
is usually for something that we maybe
don't really want to do so like on this
channel we talk a lot about finding
motivation to study so maybe studying is
not something that many people want to
do but we can recognize the benefits of
that so we need to find different
motivations for our studies so some
examples
my mother's encouragement provided the
motivation I needed to finish writing my
book my motivation to create this dish
was to share my childhood with the
people who eat at my restaurant so in
these sentences that are kind of
slightly changed from the first pair of
sentences I introduced we're talking
about like the outside reason to do
something so inspiration refers to
something that kind of
comes naturally from within you
motivation is more external it's
something that's pushing you or causing
you to move forward or to start
something to continue something and it's
often for something we might not
otherwise have done if this outside
force had not been there I would also
say that personally I think I probably
use the verb forms more than the noun
forms here so that means I would use
something like this music really
inspired me and I hope to create my own
music one day or my promotion really
motivated me to work harder so
personally I think I tend to use these
as verbs a little more often than as
nouns but this is the difference in
terms of meaning between the two so I
hope that this helps you thanks for the
question okay let's move on to your next
question next question comes from Tom hi
Tom Tom says is it correct to say my
favorite song of all times or do you
have to use the form all time yeah a
nice point we always say all time we do
not use all times let's look at a few
more examples the greatest of all time
my all-time favorite food the most
popular songs of all time
so you'll notice in these examples there
are actually two patterns that we can
use the something of all-time pattern
and the all - time + adjective pattern
both are correct you can use both in
whatever situation you choose they have
the same meaning and the same feel just
note that these positions and patterns
are slightly different also note that we
always use the singular time there we're
not using times so please make sure it's
always all the time greatest of all time
and so on so I hope that this helps you
thanks very much for the question
okay let's move on to your next question
next question comes from miffed ahoy mr.
with the says hi Alicia I've heard the
idiom play Russian roulette how do we
use it
thanks okay nice one this is a very dark
idiom that refers to a very very
dangerous game so the origin of this
is a game an actual game called Russian
roulette so in the game of Russian
roulette one type of gun
that's called a revolver is removed of
all of the bullets except for one so one
bullet remains in the revolvers chamber
so this is the part of the gun where the
bullets are kept the bullets are held so
one bullet is inserted into the chamber
of a revolver and then the player spins
the chamber and closes the chamber and
we don't know where the bullet is
then the player points the gun at their
own head or at someone else's head and
pulls the trigger
so this is a very dangerous and very
risky game so this is of course not a
game I recommend in any way but this is
the origin of this idiom today this
idiom means to do something very
dangerous or to do something very risky
so it has a very dark origin so we tend
to use it to mean something very dark
for example he's playing Russian
roulette with his career by skipping
work all the time so in this example
sentence the item that is kind of in
danger is his career so playing Russian
roulette with his career so his career
is the thing that is in danger we know
that because it's connected to Russian
roulette so to play Russian roulette
with this thing in danger and the action
the risky behavior is skipping work all
the time so he's playing Russian
roulette with his career by skipping
work all the time that would mean in a
non idiomatic expression he's in danger
of losing his job at any moment because
he skips work all the time one more
example there playing Russian roulette
with their savings by making this awful
investment so again here after Russian
roulette we see with their savings so
here savings refers to like a savings
account or money in someone's savings so
that's thing in danger that is the item
of danger here and then the risky
behavior is by making an awful
investment or by making this awful
investment
so the they in this situation is making
this terrible investment this risky
investment and putting their savings at
risk so to play Russian roulette
means to do something very risky and
very dangerous and has a very dark and
negative feel about it so I hope that
this helps you understand this idiom
thanks for the question ok that is
everything that I have for this week
thank you as always for sending your
questions remember you can send them to
me in English class 101.com / ask -
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for some other things that can help you
with your English Studies thanks very
much for watching this week's episode of
ask Alisha and I will see you again next
week bye bye
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