How to Talk About Instinct and Thinking in English [578]

🚨Improve your English with structured online lessons.

Book a free trial and get clear feedback on your level, pronunciation and speaking. Book here ➡️  https://www.englishlessonviaskype.com/trial

In this episode, you’ll learn useful English expressions for talking about instinct, reason, and the way people make decisions. 

This is the kind of vocabulary that helps you explain not just what you decided, but why you decided it. It is especially useful in everyday conversation when you want to talk about personality, habits, choices, and reactions in a more natural way.

After this lesson, you’ll be able to talk more clearly about how people think, feel, and decide in real-life situations.

If you often hesitate, make mistakes, or feel unsure when speaking English, book a trial lesson. We assess your level, correct you clearly, and give you a focused plan so you know exactly what to improve. 

Book a free trial here: https://www.englishlessonviaskype.com/trial

If you prefer to study on your own, explore our online courses. They give you structured lessons to build stronger grammar, clearer pronunciation, and more confident speaking step by step

Discover all courses and guides: https://englishlessonviaskype.com/confidence

Transcript

0:09

Hi there, this is Harry and welcome back to Advanced English Lessons with Harry where I try to help you to get a better understanding of the English language. So anything that you need, you know where to contact me, www.englishlessonviaskype.com. I'm always very, very happy to hear from you. So in this Advanced English lesson, we're looking at expressions and phrases and words about thinking, okay, everything connected with thinking. So I'll give you them and then I'll give you an example as to how you might use them. We've got 10 in total and so I'll go through them one by one. And as I said, at the end of the lesson, you'll get the address. If you need to contact me, then you can use that. Okay, let's get going. Number one, a rational thinker. Well, when we refer to somebody as a rational thinker, they think everything through logically. It's not irrational. They think it through logically. They see what the implications are, and then they make the decision, then they plan. So rational means something that is well thought out, something that will work, perhaps, it may not always work, but it's done in a very logical way, very rational, not somebody just thinking off the top of the head. So they give it a lot of thought, a lot of consideration, and a lot of planning. So somebody could be described as a very rational thinker who takes a bit of time before he gives an answer, but he doesn't like to give quick answers because he likes to consider the situation from both sides and then give his view or opinions. And therefore, he could be described by colleagues and classmates or family as a rational thinker. He never makes quick decisions. Number two, on a whim. When we do something on a whim, we usually do it without really thinking or considering. Ah, I just woke up one morning and thought it's time I had a holiday. So I booked a holiday and I left the next day and it was the best thing I ever did. I just did it on a whim. I don't know, I must have been dreaming about it. But when I woke up and I told my wife, just get the bags packed, we'll go to the airport, we're heading off for the weekend and we'll really enjoy ourselves. And I don't usually do things on a whim, but I thought I would be a little bit spontaneous this time. So to do something on a whim is to do it very quickly, without thinking, without having any planning. You just get this notion in your mind and off you go. You do it on a whim. People can resign from their jobs on a whim. They have a row with somebody or they're just not, they haven't been feeling happy in the job for a long time. So they just suddenly decide, that's it. I've had enough. I'm going to do, I'm going to travel for six months or I'm going to just give up working for a while and then I look for something that really, really suits me. So they go in and they hand in their resignation and the boss says, well, this is very quick. Yeah, I know, I've done it on a whim, but I really think it's the best thing for me, okay, to resign, to hand in your resignation, do something on a whim. Number three is gut instinct. Well, a gut is another word and it's a slang word for our stomach. So it's the feeling we have deep inside. We've all had that feeling from time to time when something isn't right. We have a gut instinct. Something tells us. We're not sure why, if there's no perhaps rational thinking behind it, but it's just a feeling we have. We shouldn't go here. We shouldn't go there. We shouldn't answer this. We shouldn't answer that. We shouldn't apply for this job or that job. It's a gut instinct that you have. Something tells you that it's not right. Something tells you that it would be the wrong decision to make. So you make the decision based on gut instincts. Number four, a spontaneous decision. Well, something similar to on a whim. When we make a spontaneous decision, it's very, very quick. No planning, no thinking, no pre-thought about it. We just do it. What made you do it? Ah, just a spontaneous decision. It came into my mind when we were sitting there having coffee. I just thought, you know, that's what I'd like to do. That's exactly what I'd like to do. So he sold his car, got the cash and gave it to a charity. It's a spontaneous decision. You know, if I want a car, I can rent a car. I don't need it. I go every day to work either on foot or by bicycle or the metro is a great system, you know. And if I need to drive somewhere outside of the city, I can rent a car. I don't need it. And anyway, I've always wanted to make some charitable act, some donation. This was the best thing that I could think of, a spontaneous decision, something very quick, very sudden. And for those of you and your friends or family who want one-to-one lessons, well, you know what to do. Just get in touch, www.englishlessonviaskype.com and you can apply for a free trial lesson and we'll be very happy to hear from you and very happy to help you. Number five, to know sub-consciously. Well, when we have a sub-conscious thought, it's something that is there, but we're not so sure how it came into our mind, but we just know that it's the right thing to do. So we know sub-consciously. Okay, so we've decided to change the way we do our work. We've decided to change how we approach different people, how we approach situations. So it wasn't a conscious decision. You just didn't sit down, someday said, right, this is it. I'm going to deal with my boss in a different way. That would be a very conscious decision. But when you do something subconsciously, something tells you inside, some message comes into your mind. You know, a good way to deal with the boss, to get on better with him, would be to approach him in a slightly different way. So subconsciously, that's what you do. Just something tells you, you might even say a little bird tells you that this would be the best way to do it. Number six, to weigh up. And usually we weigh up the options or the choices that we have. Weigh up means to balance one against the other. Perhaps we've got two options we have to consider. Perhaps we have more than two options. So we weigh them up, means we weigh up, we look at the pros and the cons, the positives and negatives, the pluses and the minuses, and then we come to a conclusion or a decision once we've weighed up what our options are. We could be weighing up the options to accept job A or job B. We could be weighing up our options to decide on college A or college B, university A, university B, whatever the decision is that's in front of us, we're going to weigh up all of those positives and the negatives to try and work out what is the best for us, to weigh up. Number seven, deep down, again, a bit like your gut instinct, deep down inside of us, we know what to do. We think about a problem for a long, long time. We weigh up the options for a long, long time. But really deep down, we know the decision we have to make. It might not be a good decision, but, or it might not be an easy decision, but at the end of the day, we have to do it. So for example, you've got somebody in your team that just isn't working out. So you weigh up the pros and cons, what he or she is good at, what he or she is bad at. You try to find something that's going to help you to make the decision. You don't like having to tell people that they're not really fitting into your team. It's not an easy decision to sit somebody down and tell them, I think you should look for another position. No, it's not easy at all. So you look for all of the options before you come to it. But deep down inside, you know that's the best decision to make for you, for the team, and funnily enough, for the other person, because they're not really happy either. So deep down. Number eight is a good phrasal verb to mull over just with the pronunciation M-U-L-L-M. Mull over. And when you mull over something, you think it about it for a period of time. It could be hours or days. There's no specific period allotted for this, but to mull over means to think about it. So in a situation, leave it with me. Let me mull it over for a few days. Perhaps over the weekend, I'll give you my answer on Monday. So Thursday evening or Friday, you have this particular situation presented to you by your colleagues or your boss or somebody, and you want a bit of time to think about it. Leave it with me for a few days. I'll mull it over. I'll talk to my partner about it and I'll give you my answer on Monday, to mull something over. Number nine, to think twice about something, to think twice about something. This means that we don't give a quick knee-jerk reaction. Somebody asks us to do something, somebody makes a suggestion, and we give an instantaneous response. No, that's not this situation. The situation here is to think twice about something. You know, I really would like to say yes, but you know, I've given it some thought and I don't think it's for me. So to think twice. Yeah, sometimes people say to have a have second thoughts. It means exactly the same. First reaction perhaps is to say yes, but when you think it over and you think twice about something, you realize that it's not really what you want. So you turn it down. Sometimes regrettably, but you know, things happen for a reason. So to think twice about something means just to give it a little bit more time and you'll probably come up with a better solution, a better fix for you rather than that knee-jerk, something that you do at a whim. Okay, so to think twice about something. And then finally, number 10, to have a hunch. Well, a hunch is a feeling inside. There's no logical reasoning for this. There's no information written down. You just have a general feeling. I have a hunch that he's not going to turn up today. Why do you say that? I don't know. I mean, he's usually here at 8, 8.15 at the latest, but it's 9 o'clock now and nobody's heard from him. So perhaps he's sick, but I have a hunch he's not going to turn up. And you were right, he didn't turn up. Or you have a hunch that the board are going to make some announcement. And you've seen people coming and going for the last couple of weeks. And you just get a funny feeling that this is not the normal practice for them, meetings behind closed doors. So you have a hunch that something's going on. You're not sure what it is. Nobody has said anything to you, but you have a hunch. You have this feeling that something's going to happen. And yes, of course, the next week there's an announcement that they're going to merge or they're going to be taken over or something serious is going to happen to the business. To have a hunch. Okay, so we've got 10 ways, 10 different adverb advanced co-locations that will help you to talk about different situations when you're thinking. So advanced words and phrases connected with thinking. So let me give them the 10 of you, 10 of them again to you. Number one, rational thinker, a rational thinker, somebody who thinks rationally. Number two, something on a whim, okay, something you do suddenly without planning. A gut instinct, some feeling inside, something tells you it's a gut instinct. Number four, spontaneous decision, like on a whim, something very quick, very sudden. Number five, to know subconsciously, deep down, you know it. It's not a conscious decision. Weigh up, weigh up the options. Number seven, deep down, you have this particular feeling. Number eight, to mull over something, to think about it for a few days, whenever, mull over. Number nine, think twice about something. Yeah, give it a second thought. Make sure you're making the right decision. Think twice about something. And then finally, number 10, to have a hunch about something. Okay, so 10 particular advanced vocabulary and phrases that will help you to discuss and think about and plan about different situations. And these can be used in your English. As I always say, you have to practice them. You have to try and drop them into your conversations, see how you use them. If you need any additional help, come back to me, www.englishlessonviascab.com. Very happy to hear from you. Very happy to help you. Very happy to give you some other examples if you need them. Okay, this is Harry saying goodbye. Thanks for listening and join me as always for the next lesson.