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All Ears English Podcast
AEE 2533: What Are You Wishing For Your English?
00:15:35
Learn more about how to use the phrase wishing for
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- [00:00]
A
This is an All Ears English podcast episode 2533 what are you wishing for your English welcome to the All Ears English Podcast downloaded more than 200 million times. Are you feeling stuck with your English? We'll show you how to become fearless and fluent by focusing on connection, not perfection with your American host, Aubrey Carter, the IELTS whiz and Lindsey McMahon, the English adventurer coming to you from Arizona and Colorado, usa. To get real time transcripts right on your phone and create your personalized vocabulary list, try the Allears English app for iOS and Android. Start your 7 day free trial at allearsenglish.com forward/app.
- [01:00]
B
Do you know when to use the word wish versus Wishing in English? Find out today. What does comfort mean to you? For me, comfort is sleeping cool, especially in the summer as it gets super hot where I live in Arizona. No tossing, no turning, just deep refreshing rest. The Avocado Green Mattress is their best selling certified organic mattress that delivers luxurious comfort, ergonomic back support and naturally cool sleep. Plus it has three comfort, firm, medium or plush. Comfort is sleeping on organic materials like wool and latex that promote air circulation and moisture wicking without retaining heat. Say goodbye to night sweats. Mother Nature knows best. Better for you and the planet. Head to avocadogreenmattress.com today and check out their mattress and bedding sale. That's a V o C a d o G R e e n M a t T r e s s Avocado Dream of Better. Hello Lindsay, how are you?
- [02:29]
A
Good, Aubry. How's it going today? How's everything?
- [02:31]
B
Excellent. I'm curious. When you were a kid, did you make a birthday wish when you blew out your candles?
- [02:37]
A
I did. I wish for I wanted a horse when I was a kid and I was never going to get a horse.
- [02:42]
B
Several years in a row you wish for a horse?
- [02:44]
A
Yes. Like five years in a. And I was very sensitive about it, like no one could know what I was wishing for. I felt like I had to do it. All right. You know? Yeah.
- [02:55]
B
Do you still make a wish? Do you still blow up candles? But I feel like sometimes by the.
- [03:00]
A
Time I'm ready to blow up my candles now, I feel like I'm debating between two things. So it's much more vague. It's like, I don't know, it's just not as specific. It's not a horse.
- [03:09]
B
Peace and contentment in the world.
- [03:11]
A
What about you? Do you still make wishes when you. I mean, I feel like most, most adults do.
- [03:15]
B
Right. And I don't think I ever did. I just blew out the candles. I don't remember ever making a wish. I. I don't know if my family really talked about that. I saw in movies a couple times, like make a wish and I'm like, what? Okay. Interesting, right?
- [03:27]
A
It's not as universal as I thought, but that'd be a cool thing to add to our. Our survey today would be to ask our listeners if you like, is it cultural, is it. Some countries do, some don't.
- [03:37]
B
Yes, that'll be the Spotify poll. We want to know if you make a wish when you blow out birthday candles or is that just the States? I don't know. Very interesting. Today we're talking about this word wishing. We use it three different ways in English and it was inspired by part one of this series was actually on the business English podcast about. I was thinking and I was hoping and we shared that we don't use I was wishing in the same way. So in this part two, we'll share how we do use wishing and then stay for the end. We'll give you details about part one. You can definitely listen to these out of order.
- [04:10]
A
Yes. And we use it in different phrases. We don't directly say I was wishing, but we do say aubry, I'm wishing we had something.
- [04:19]
B
Right. To express regret. Right. So, yeah, this is going to be really good, but we want to make sure that you guys are listening on the app. You can have the free version to listen to the podcast. This really is the best way to listen to the Allers English podcast. Or as a member, you can follow along on the transcripts and choose keywords. Actually, we choose the words for you to just add to the app.
- [04:44]
A
Yeah, the cool thing about listening in the app as a free user is that you avoid ads, outside ads from outside companies. So that's a good option. But when you're a premium user, like Aubry said, you get to build your power list of vocabulary words. You see transcripts, you get so much value in there.
- [05:00]
B
It's also the best way to search older episodes, either by episode number or keywords if you want to listen to past episodes, which we have a lot of.
- [05:09]
A
So as we're getting into the very last few days of 2025, think about your plan for 2026. If you love this podcast, how could you listen to it differently to make it even better? Right. You only have 15 minutes to listen. Try the app. It'll double your learning for each episode.
- [05:25]
B
Okay, totally. You can get@allersenglish.com app or just wherever you download your apps.
- [05:31]
A
All right, good stuff. So, Aubrey, how do we use wish or wishing in English then?
- [05:37]
B
Yeah. So first we say I'm w. To express regret. For example, I'm wishing I had brought a jacket. It's colder than I expected.
- [05:45]
A
Yeah, it's interesting. And I suppose you could interchange that with I wish, Right? I wish I brought a jacket. Yeah. Or this traffic is awful. I'm wishing I had checked the Ways app before leaving. That happens sometimes. Yeah.
- [05:58]
B
Yeah. So what's interesting for both of those, we could say, I wish I had checked traffic. But what's interesting. The second one we're going to talk about here is I wish, which is also used for more general things that are always true instead of in this moment. So, for example, I wish I could be there to celebrate with you. In this case, we wouldn't say I'm wishing I could be there because it's sort of this more general hope for something.
- [06:23]
A
Yep. Or I wish we had left earlier. We're definitely going to be late.
- [06:27]
B
Exactly. So both of those work for expressing regret. And then for other meanings, if you're wanting to say something else that you wish were true, then you wouldn't necessarily use I'm wishing. You would probably just say, I wish I wish that were true.
- [06:40]
A
Yes. And then there's a third way that we use it to express something that you hope happens especially for someone else. Exactly.
- [06:49]
B
Like wishing you the best on your exam tomorrow.
- [06:52]
A
Yeah, yeah. Or wishing you a speedy recovery. This is kind of in line with when you write something like best wish, best wishes for a speedy recovery. It's the same idea.
- [07:01]
B
Exactly. Very similar meaning. And the grammar is really interesting here, where we don't usually write or say I'm wishing for these chunks, we just drop the subject and verb and we just use that verb ing or that gerund. Right. We'll just say, wishing you good luck. Wishing you a speedy recovery. Especially if we're writing a note. Really interesting.
- [07:22]
A
You want it to sound close and casual and a little bit intimate. Right. When we're writing a card. So, I mean, you could add, I'm wish. No, actually, we wouldn't.
- [07:32]
B
We wouldn't say, I thought about this a little bit. I'm like, it would feel so strange if someone wrote, I'm wishing you a speedy recovery. I think, like you're saying Lindsay, it creates such more of like an intimate feeling. Whereas if you write, I'm wishing you the best, I'm wishing you good fortune, you're putting up this wall of formality that we've talked about before. You don't want that. Right?
- [07:53]
A
Yeah. It makes it more of an objective phrase rather than a saying. Right. This is a saying. It's a. It's a just a chunk kind of that we know evokes a sense of I care about this person.
- [08:05]
B
Right.
- [08:06]
A
I'm sending wishes out into the universe.
- [08:07]
B
Yeah. It's one of those chunks that sort of idiomatic that way. It's an expression that if you don't use it word for word, then it would sound sort of strange or off. Right. So if ever you're going to write this on a card or say it to someone to wish them luck, then drop that I'm and just say wishing. Wishing you good luck. Wishing you the best. And this isn't even something we usually would say to someone's face. In that case, they maybe would just say good luck, good luck tomorrow. It's more likely to be written on a card to be sort of formalized that way.
- [08:41]
A
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- [10:34]
B
You're describing the fall festivals in the northeast of the United States, which are so superior to the fall festivals here in Arizona.
- [10:41]
A
Yes.
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B
I miss cider donuts. We don't have that here.
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A
I know. Are they. They just kind of hot and just like. What are they like in. In Arizona, the fall?
- [10:49]
B
Yeah, they try, but we don't have the changing leaves, and it's never quite cool enough. I don't know. It just doesn't have that same vibe. I went to a fall festival the other day with my kids that the neighborhood tried to do, and they had some little booths and, like, bouncy houses, and it was like 90 degrees. It was not the same.
- [11:07]
A
Oh. And you're like, I just want to go back in the air conditioning.
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B
Right, right. If you can't be wearing a sweater. Is it really a fall festival?
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A
It's not.
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B
It's really not.
- [11:16]
A
All right, so we're at a New England fall festival. How about that?
- [11:19]
B
Yes. All right, I'll start us out. I'm wishing I hadn't worn these shoes. They are not very comfortable.
- [11:26]
A
I wish I had grabbed my coat before we left. It's freezing out here.
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B
It is so cold. Honestly, I'm wishing for a hot chocolate right now.
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A
Oh, good idea. Let's see if any of the food trucks have one.
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B
By the way, isn't your interview tomorrow? Yep. 10:00am well, wishing you luck. I'm sure you'll do awesome.
- [11:45]
A
Nice. Yeah. Very typical conversation, going in and out of different topics. Right. This is how we speak. This is how we connect.
- [11:53]
B
Yeah. But I'm gonna start with the last one there because it's funny, as I was writing this role play, I was having a hard time fitting that one in, and I sort of didn't think about why until we had this episode. And I realized we just don't really say that. I would instead say, well, good luck or great, you know, good luck. You're gonna do great. To say wishing you luck is really reserved for, like, a written card.
- [12:16]
A
Yeah, mostly. I agree. Yeah, for sure. So it fits the scenario. It's just that usually it's written, not spoken.
- [12:24]
B
Exactly. And there are. That happens sometimes with English. There's like, spoken English and written English, and some phrases like this are really only written. It felt as I said it there. I'm like, this feels weird. I would just say, well, good luck.
- [12:38]
A
Yeah, good luck. Good luck. So I'll go upwards here. So I said, you said, it's so cold. Honestly, I'm wishing for a hot chocolate right now.
- [12:46]
B
So before that, though, I started, I said, I'm wishing I hadn't worn these shoes. So this is the one expressing regret. Right. These are uncomfortable. I'm wishing I hadn't worn these. And this. Like you were pointing out, Lindsay, both would work. I wish I hadn't worn these shoes or I'm wishing I hadn't worn these shoes. We use those interchangeably. They. They both are used to. To show regret.
- [13:08]
A
Yeah. Maybe saying I'm wishing instead of I wish in this moment is a little bit more visceral. Right. Like you're interested your pain a little bit more. I'm really wishing. Especially if you had really. I'm really wishing I hadn't worn these shoes. Look at this.
- [13:21]
B
And we do that a lot. I love that you that out. I think when we do this, because we're wanting to really emphasize how much we're thinking this in this moment. I'm really wishing this.
- [13:32]
A
Yeah, exactly. And I also wonder if it sounds a little bit less complainy and more just like more real. I don't know. I don't know. Interesting. That's a theory. Anyways. Then I said, I wish I had grabbed my coat before we left. It's freezing out here. And I could also substitute in the ing here, I'm wishing I had grabbed my coat. But I probably wouldn't because you just said I'm wishing, so it'd be kind of weird if I repeated the same structure. Yeah.
- [13:56]
B
And it's interesting how we do that. We really try to avoid repeating exactly what someone else said. Even if we want the same meaning, we'll try to say it a different way if we can. So if someone just said, I'm wishing this, and you might want to build on that by saying, like, I have a regret too, but instead you might change it up a little and say, I wish I had grabbed a sweater.
- [14:16]
A
I'm old. Exactly. Exactly. Okay. That brings us through all of it, Aubrey. Wow. That's the whole role play, I think.
- [14:23]
B
And I had said, I'm wishing for a hot chocolate. You had pointed this out. This is that it's very similar this to be wishing for something that's like a desire or. Or a hope and that regret. Right. Because it's. They're so related. Right. I'm wishing I had a hot chocolate. I have this desire for a hot chocolate. I wish I was holding a hot chocolate right now. It's kind of related to that. Like, I regret that I don't have a hot chocolate in my hands right now.
- [14:47]
A
Right. 100, 100. Good stuff. Very nuanced differences here, but I think our listeners are ready for it.
- [14:54]
B
It absolutely. And we want to make sure you don't miss out on part two. Part one over on business English. It was 500 red letter episode. Congratulations, Lindsay, on 500 episodes of the business english podcast.
- [15:06]
A
Yeah, congratulations to you too, Aubrey. Big deal, Big deal.
- [15:10]
B
And it was called think or thinking which to use in business communication. And this was really interesting answering a question we were sent.
- [15:19]
A
Yes. Guys, be sure to follow the business english podcast. Just go ahead and open your search bar. Type in business english. You will see the yellow pop up. You know us, we're on the COVID Just go ahead and hit the follow button. Okay, good. Any final takeaway, Aubrey?
- [15:33]
B
Yeah, just a great way to connect with other people in English is expressing regret, expressing what you wish were different, what you would change. Right. And also sharing what you wish for someone. So this is really interesting. There are two very different things we do with this phrase that both are such great ways to build connections.
- [15:53]
A
Excellent. Good episode today and I'll see you back here very soon.
- [15:57]
B
All right, Aubrey, see you next time.
- [15:59]
A
Take care. Bye bye. Thanks for listening. To all ears English. Would you like to know your English level? Take our two minute quiz. Go to allearsenglish.com forward/fluencyscore and if you believe in connection, not perfection, then hit subscribe now to make sure you don't miss anything. See you next time. And Doug, here we have the limu emu in its natural habitat helping people customize their car insurance and save hundreds with liberty mutual. Fascinating. It's accompanied by his natural ally, Doug.
- [16:47]
B
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A
Cut the camera. They see us.
- [16:52]
B
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- [17:00]
C
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