Future In The Past

Robby Kukurs
Author of the English Harmony System

The other day I had a chat with my workmate and he told me that he's planning to take some English studies and pay about $1000 per six months.

I was really surprised and said - 'Your English is fluent, pronunciation better than mine, what do you need that for?'

Then he confessed that he's having this issue of getting stuck when speaking English. He'd had a chat with some Irish guy the day before and got completely messed up and lost and that had made him feel very low.

He admitted he constantly catches himself thinking in 2 languages - English and his native.

'C'mon' I said, 'THAT is your issue, not that you should go and pay hundreds and hundreds for studies which are not going to help you
get rid of this speech issue!. You'll probably acquire more words and touch up your grammar, but that's not going to help you.'

'You know, Robby,' he said, 'I'm dreaming about having a perfect English and such situations make me feel like a total loser...'

'Well,' I started, 'I can see your problem. First of all - don't try to use very smart language. You can have that goal of a really sophisticated English set for you, but while you're having this problem, go for simpler words.

The second thing - slow down a little bit. I can hear you try to sound very well and maintain a fast and natural speech, but you
constantly stumble upon words. Slow down and you'll naturally feel your speech become better.'

'Hmm...' - he went, 'actually...maybe you're right, Robby. That makes sense!'

And so we chatted about the English speech and I set out the basics of the English Harmony System.

'Believe me, that's going to help you'

He was smiling - 'that sounds like as if I were mentally ill talking to myself!'

'Do you want to tell me  you don't have spare few minutes a day to practice with yourself? C'mon - it can't be!'

'OK Robby, I'll try that and see if it works...'

'You definitely should. And you'll save those $1000 for your new gaming PC!' - I laughed.

And now - another small English Grammar tip which is very often ignored among the non-native speakers.

Have you heard about the Future in the Past tense? Sounds difficult? Well, actually this is a very simple thing.

When you're saying about something that's happening in the past, let's say - "Yesterday I told you..." and then you mention an action that happens in the future from the first action's perspective - "...that I will go to London next week" this "will" changes to "would".

And the sentence sounds "Yesterday I told you that I would go to London next week". Another example - "I didn't know that you would do something like that to me" - not - "I didn't know that you WILL do something like that to me".

So if you didn't know about this - start implementing this into your everyday speech.

Next time - about another another aspect of the Future in the Past tense.

Happy speaking!

Robby Kukurs
Author, English Harmony System

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Are you ready to get on the fast track to spoken English fluency? Check out my English Harmony System HERE!