“You don’t burn out by going to fast…”

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Pronunciation Guide

Today’s tweet is a great for practicing blended sounds. All of the words are short and easy to pronounce, so do your best to say it just like the recording.

What sounds are difficult to hear? I think that the [t] in ‘don’t’ and ‘out’ will be dropped by many speakers. It will sound more like a very short pause.

Also, the phrasal verb ‘burn out’ is blended together and sounds like one word. If you didn’t know this phrase, you might be trying to understand what word the sound ‘burnout’ is.

Finally, the ‘ing’ in ‘going’ and ‘getting’ is dropped to an ‘in’ sound as is usual for casual speaking.

Be careful with the word ‘ancient’ as well. It sounds like it has a ‘ch’ sound, ‘ancient’, so don’t forget to say it like this.

Listen to the audio and write your own notes. Then click ‘Compare’. Practice shadowing the audio with your notes.

Compare

Explanation

I’d like to focus on ‘burn out’ today.

A few common ways to use ‘burn out’ in a sentence are:

(he/she/it) burns out.

(he/she/it) burned out.

[something] is burning (him/her/it) out.

When a candle burns out, it has burned all the way down to the bottom and the fire goes out.

While ‘burn out’ is used to talk about fires in a literal sense, we also use it to talk about our ability to do something like work or a project. When a person ‘burns out’, they have nothing left, they feel exhausted, and just need a break from everything.

Today’s tweet is a quote. The person who said it is saying the opposite of what people normally think. Most people think burn out is going to happen when we work non-stop, going as fast as we can. This quote says that we burn out when we go too slow at something. Feeling bored also creates a feeling of having no motivation to do something, so this is when people will burn out.

What do you think? I think it may be a little of both, but I’d like to hear your opinions. When and why do people ‘burn out’? Share your thoughts in the comments.

We might also use the phrase to talk about something someone has done in that person’s history. For example, “This is a Michael Jackson song that dates back to his Thriller days.’

Lastly, note how ‘getting bored’ is used instead of ‘become bored’. When we express ‘to become’ something in English, we usually use ‘get’ when speaking or writing casually.

Situations & Examples

Read the situations, but write down your own sentence using today’s target. When you finish, click ‘Show Example’. Share your own sentences in the comments!

Situation #1

You are having coffee with a friend you haven’t seen in a while. She recently started her own catering business and has been incredibly busy. You think she looks really tired, so you want to give her some advice about taking more breaks to relax and refresh. You say,

Show Example

Situation #2

Your boss calls you in for a private talk. He tells you that your performance is not what it used to be. He is wondering why that is and asks you a lot of questions. You want to tell him how you don’t have any energy, so you say,

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Situation #3

You’re worried about your mother. Your grandmother broke her hip and needs a lot of help doing everyday chores. Your little brother is also involved in many sports programs so she has to take him all over town. You are talking to a friend about this and say,

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Situation #4

You work at a graphic design company. Recently, you just don’t seem to be having any good ideas, and your clients aren’t happy. You decide to call your mentor from college and talk to him about how to prevent losing creative energy when working so hard. You ask him,

Show Example