Hello and welcome to The English Like a Native Podcast. My name is Anna and you're listening to Week 33, Day 2 of Your English Five a Day. This is the series that helps you to increase your active vocabulary and improve your listening skills. We focus on five items every day of the working week, and you can see all of the vocabulary covered in every episode of The Five a Day series by accessing the Master Sheet. I'll leave a link in the description. Let's start today's episode with the noun, jitters, jitters. We spell this J I T T E R S, jitters. Having the jitters. Well, the jitters refers to a feeling of nervousness that you experience before something important happens. A bride or a groom might talk about having wedding jitters just before they get married. That feeling of nervousness before they make this huge commitment. So, to have the jitters. Here is an example sentence,"Oh, I always get the jitters before I have to give a speech." What gives you the jitters? Next on the list is a verb and it is to loom, loom. We spell it L O O M, loom. If an unwanted or unpleasant event looms, then it's probably going to happen very soon, and it causes worry. So for example, if I am about to move house, but I'm not very excited about moving house, let's say moving day is next week, it's getting very close. I would say,"Oh, moving day is looming." Or,"moving day looms," meaning that it's getting closer and it's making me feel very anxious. So, it's all about something that you don't want necessarily, or you're feeling anxious about getting closer to happening and making you feel increasingly worried. Here's an example,"Final exams are looming, and you can almost feel the stress on the university campus." Next on the list is the adjective profound, profound. We spell this P R O F O U N D. Profound. Profound, if something is profound, then it shows a clear and deep understanding of serious matters. So, here's an example sentence,"The teacher gave her extra marks for the profound insights she shared in her essay." So, you tend to see the word profound coupled with statements. So, profound is usually used to describe insights, statements, things that we say if they are really deep and meaningful. For example, if I were to say something along the lines of,"The past is gone, the future has not yet happened, the present is a gift. That's why we call it the present." Or whatever that quote is. I'm sure I'm misquoting it. But that quote, whoever said that first, must have blown people's minds. They must have gone,"Wow! That is really deep. That is really clear thinking, profound. I am blown away by your depth of understanding of the world and time and how we should treat time and be present in the moment and not be dwelling on the past or living for the future. We should live for the here and now. It's a very profound thing to say." Some people are full of profound sayings. Every statement they come out with is profound. Do you know someone like that? Okay, let's move on to our next item, which is a noun, and it is turmoil, turmoil. We spell this T U R M O I L. Listen to the pronunciation again. Turmoil. Turmoil. Turmoil is a state of confusion, uncertainty, or disorder. Here's an example sentence,"The country is in turmoil after the president's assassination." We recently found out that we may be moving to another country, and when we first found that out, my partner and I were both in turmoil. I felt like it turned our world upside down a little bit, the idea that we would have to give up everything we've built here and start again somewhere else, not knowing how long that was going to be. But I will tell you more about that as and when it becomes a reality. So, turmoil. Have you ever been in turmoil? Last on the list is the expression lighten the load. To lighten the load. So, we spell lighten, L I G H T E N. Lighten. The load. Load. L O A D. To lighten the load is to make a difficult situation or responsibility that you have easier. So imagining that someone is literally carrying lots and lots of items. They are loaded up. If someone comes and takes something away from you, it makes your load easier to carry. It's lighter. So, if this burden that you are carrying is not physical items in your hands, but perhaps a bunch of responsibilities, like you are responsible for working your part time job as well as looking after the children, as well as doing the grocery shopping and looking after the household, doing all the cooking, all the laundry. That's a lot to deal with. You have a lot on your plate. So, your sister might come in and say,"I'm going to help you out a couple of days a week. I'm going to take the kids after school and give them dinner. And so you can just have an evening to yourself to catch up on whatever it is you need to catch up on. And I'll have the kids stay over at my house so I can do the morning routine with them the following day. I'll do that a couple of times a week for you to help lighten the load.""Thank you so much sis, that's just amazing, thank you." To lighten the load. Has anyone helped you to lighten your load at any point? Here's an example,"The manager was so busy that they hired an assistant for her to help lighten the load." Alright, that's our five. Let's do a quick recap. We started with the noun jitters, to have the jitters, to feel nervousness in advance of something important happening. Then we had the verb loom, which means that something unwanted or unpleasant is getting closer and it's making you feel anxious. Then we had the adjective profound, when something shows clear and deep understanding of serious matters. We had the noun turmoil, meaning a state of confusion, uncertainty, or disorder. And we had the expression, the idiom, lighten the load, which means to make a difficult situation or responsibilities easier. So, let's now do this for pronunciation. Please listen very carefully and then repeat. Here we go. Jitters. Jitters. Loom. Loom. Profound. Profound. Turmoil. Turmoil. Lighten the load. Lighten the load. Very good. Okay, if I make a statement that shows that I have deep understanding about a serious matter, how would you describe this statement? Profound. Yes, it's profound. And if this profound statement makes you question everything about your life and leaves you in a state of confusion, uncertainty, and disorder, I could say, you are in a state of what? What noun is this? Turmoil."Oh, you are left in turmoil by my profound statement." Now, you are getting married, you're engaged to get married, but you're not really in love with the person that you're engaged to, and it's not what you want. But the wedding day is getting closer, and that's making you feel anxious. What verb could we use here? The wedding day is what? Looming. Yes, the wedding day is looming and now as you approach the church or the place where you will be married forever to this other person, you're feeling a real deep nervousness about what's about to happen. You have what? What noun do you have? The jitters. You've got the jitters. Oh my goodness me. Oh, your life is in such turmoil. Your wedding day is looming and you have the jitters. But talking to your best friend about your concerns and how you want your life to pan out from this point. That really helps to make this difficult situation easier. Just talking about your concerns makes it all feel easier. What expression could I use to describe this removing of weight that's on your shoulders? It lightens the load. And that is often the case. Sometimes just saying things out loud, sharing your problem with another person can help. There's a famous saying that goes,"A problem shared is a problem halved." And I think that's relatively true. Okay, fantastic. Let's now listen out for these items in today's storytime. The library buzzed with pre-exam jitters. Every chair was taken, every face bathed in the glow of phone screens and textbooks. Among them was Maya. Her brow furrowed as she ploughed through a heap of notes. Maya was usually a top student, but this year, the pressure felt unbearable. Expectations, both self-imposed and from her parents, loomed like a mountain. She found herself unable to concentrate, her mind a whirlwind of'what-ifs' and worst-case scenarios. One night, after a fruitless study session, Maya stumbled upon a tattered book in the library's secluded corner. Its title,"Quiet Your Mind, Conquer Your Fears." Intrigued, she brought it home and started reading. The book emphasised a profound truth: overcoming exam pressure isn't just about studying harder, but managing the emotional turmoil that comes with it. It advised practising mindfulness, acknowledging anxieties without letting them take charge. Maya decided to give it a try. She began her study routine with deep breathing exercises, focusing on her breath, calming her mind. She learned to recognise her anxieties, accept them without judgement, and then gently guide her thoughts back to studying. She found that short breaks for walks, music, or gazing out of the window, helped clear her mind, allowing her to return her studies with renewed focus. Talking to her parents about her fears also lightened the load. It wasn't a quick fix, but it helped Maya regain control. The pressure remained, but she felt better equipped to handle it. The air in the library still crackled with tension, but Maya, with her calmer mind and newfound strategies, was no longer a part of it. And that brings us to the end of today's episode. Remember, you can access this vocabulary from today's episode and from all the previous episodes in the Master Sheet. The link is in the show notes. Until next time, take very good care and goodbye.