AEE 2689: Don’t Want to Sound Harsh? Soften the Blow with These Phrases

This is an All Ears English podcast, episode 2689. Don't want to sound harsh? Soften the blow with these phrases. 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 hosts, Michelle Kaplan, the New York radio girl, and Aubrey Carter, the IELTS whiz, coming to you from Arizona and New York City, USA.

To get real-time transcripts right on your phone and create your personalized vocabulary list, try the All Ears English app for iOS and Android. Start your seven-day free trial at allearsenglish.com forward slash app.

Do you worry about sounding too harsh when you say something in English? Today, find out phrases you can use to make what you say less blunt. Listen in to find out how to be softer so you don't break the connection.

Has this ever happened to you? You're mid-sentence and you hear yourself slow down. You simplify. You avoid the word you actually want. That moment adds up in meetings, interviews, and everyday conversations.

It weighs on you and makes you feel isolated. It becomes harder to make real connections. Our free two-minute fluency quiz helps you identify what interrupts your flow and your connections and how to fix it. You'll get your English level, B1, B2, or C1, and you'll figure out where to go from here.

Start now at allearsenglish.com slash fluency score. That's allearsenglish.com slash f-l-u-e-n-c-y-s-c-o-r-e. Hey, Michelle, how are you today? Hi, I'm good.

How are you? Excellent. I have a question for you. I know you're not a person who is normally harsh or blunt, but have you ever said something and immediately thought, oh, that sounded way too harsh?

Oh, yeah, of course. It definitely happens. Sometimes I'll, you know... If I'm... I don't know. I'm trying to think of a specific situation, but there are definitely times where you say something and you're like, oh, God, I wish...

I hope that they didn't take that the wrong way or... You know when this happens to me the most is in... Spanish or French because in English, you know, in your first language, you know a little better how to soften things and all of the words to cushion everything with. But when you're learning a language, so for example, we were in Mexico and there was a World Cup game and I wanted to ask, there were little taqueria. We wanted to ask them to turn the TV on.

And I'm trying to think, I'm like, how would I say like, can you like, please let me know if the TV's working at? All I knew how to say was like, turn the TV on, please.

Like that probably sounds... blunt i'm like trying to say it nicely i'm like i need to look up like the nicer words to couch that in right uh yeah yeah we're always i think in english we soften things quite a bit yeah um so we're gonna be talking about that today um we are answering a question from a listener today, a really good one. Um, the question is, is there a phrase I can say before something that might be taken as harsh or blunt to soften the blow?

And that comes to us from pay. Yeah. So thank you so much for that question. Yeah. I mean, we definitely do have phrases for this. So this is about saying something, um, before, um,

right so it's not like i mean we could also talk about what to say after at another point right like oh if you think that you said something that sounded harsh um but this is about what to say before to soften the blow what does it mean to soften the blow yeah so that anything that makes it not feel so direct or blunt or harsh Just like soften the blow, if you were to literally soften a blow, that would mean that if you're like punching something and you don't hit quite as hard, you would be softening the blow. We also use this idiomatically, metaphorically with language. Something that might come across as really harsh or strong, we'll soften it by using a lot of language, phrases that we use to soften.

And I also want to give Pei Yao a little bit of a shout out. She is in our community. She comes to Q&A every Wednesday. Awesome. And I think that's where she asked this question was in Q&A or maybe at one of our other live speaking events.

She's amazing. So hello and shout out to Pei Yao. Thank you for always all of the great questions. But yeah, I'm excited for this because this is very cultural too, that you might want to make sure that you're not being too harsh or too direct.

And you might want to know like, what phrases can I use to make sure if I feel like something might come across a little harshly, how can I soften it? Yeah. Yeah, this is a really good question. Yeah.

And so, yeah, we're going to go over some phrases that you can use. They're just, I think they're so good for connection. Absolutely. You know, and so let's go through them.

Before we do, we want you to hit the follow button wherever you're listening to the podcast so you never miss anything from us. Wherever you're listening, hit follow. Or if you are watching on YouTube, definitely hit subscribe. Yes.

Awesome. All right. Let's go into the first one here, which is to say no offense. And this is one of these phrases. We can either use it when we want the other person to know we're not trying to offend them with our comment.

Or, you know, it's interesting. We will say this at the beginning or the end. We'll say no offense, but I found that presentation a little confusing. Or we might tack it on at the end if we're worried someone will take offense and then we'll say no offense.

Right, yes. I mean, no offense, but that comment seemed a bit out of pocket, which... Yeah, out of pocket's an interesting phrase. I am hearing that more and more. It kind of means... Are you really?

That it's like unexpected or not inappropriate, really. It just means like... Not necessarily, I think, just unexpected and maybe not ideal. I'm trying to think of how else we would say that.

It's to say that something is not necessarily the best thing for the situation. So not inappropriate, but just sort of not ideal. Okay. Interesting. Um, yeah.

So, but sometimes I, I personally think sometimes when we say no offense, it is offense. It's to me, sometimes no offense in itself sounds a little harsh, but not always. Do you know? I know what you mean.

Yeah. This is like, of course it's better to just not say something offensive than to like say something offensive and then be like, no offense. Yeah. Yeah.

Usually when you say this, you know you're saying something offensive. Right. The better move is to just not say the offensive thing, right? Right. Exactly.

That's funny. Yeah. Especially if you're saying it before, like, no offense, but... you know it it no offense it's hard because your shoes right exactly don't say anything offensive right exactly if you have to say no offense before something then maybe consider why you're saying it's all about the first place right we use this phrase and the delivery

Yeah, that's true too. Like if you think something might come across as harsh or mean or intense, but you really don't intend that, maybe you would soften it with this, right?

You want the other person to know that you're not angry, that you're not intending offense. It sort of prepares the other person for what's coming. But yeah, I agree, Michelle, that I think often it's tricky because it's almost like a phrase that could trigger people. They're like, how about you just don't say anything offensive?

Yeah, so but if you do want to use it, you could say something like no offense, but and then whatever you're going to say that might be blunt. So like no offense, but that outfit might not be appropriate for the event or no offense, but I don't think that plan will work.

Um, what's another way that we could use offense? Yeah, we have sort of a longer phrase where you might say, you know, please don't take offense to this, but and that is softening it even more, right? Because it's true that no offense, but is still pretty as kind of blunt. So this is like adding more words to make it softer, right?

Don't take offense to this, but your message came off. a bit rude. So this is where you're trying to call someone out for something you maybe found offensive. And then you're trying to start that in like a respectful way.

Like, you know, I don't mean to be offensive, but I'm going to say something that I think we need to talk about. But you are offensive. Yeah, exactly. Not to be offensive, but you offended me.

But I do think that, yeah, don't take offense to this is a little bit softer than no offense, right? If you say no offense, but your message came off a bit rude, it's almost like a little more argumentative. It's like not really cooling things down, in my opinion. Interesting.

All right. We're going to share a couple more ways to say this because yeah, no offense is not the softest, right? There are a lot that are even more polite. So for example, I don't mean anything by this, but, and then you'll say something that there is a chance someone would consider blunt or direct, right?

It's trying to keep the conversation light. It's not overly emotional. So you might say, I don't mean anything by this, but you seemed a little angry when you were talking earlier. So it's interesting because if you're going to tell someone like, are you mad?

You're going to ask them like, are you mad at me? You would maybe want to say something to let them know like, this is a polite, friendly conversation.

Right, right. Or I don't mean anything by this, but that joke didn't really land. And this could be if someone tells like an inappropriate joke, maybe it's racist, maybe it's off color. And you feel like you don't want to just not only are you not going to laugh, but you don't want to let it lie, right?

You feel like you need to say something. And then it's tricky because when we say I don't mean anything by this, it's kind of is saying that you don't maybe stand by what you're saying. So if you really do want to be clear with someone and let them know, I'm not okay with what you said, then you probably would just say, you know, I didn't love that joke. Right.

Right. Sometimes we do need to just be blunt. Right. It depends. It depends on the situation. It's who you're talking to. How bad is their offense? Right.

Because a lot of these phrases, you're undermining what you're saying by using this phrase that softens. So it depends on if you want to do that or not. Right. Right, right.

So you have to really think about that and how you want to come off and how strong you want to sound. But it is good to have these tools. Yes. Do you ever start speaking English and suddenly the words disappear?

You pause too much, you hesitate, you know what you want to say, but only later, not in the moment when it matters. This is where your fluency is breaking down and it's fixable. That's why we created our two minute fluency quiz. It shows you your exact English level right now, so you know what to work on next.

Are you B1, B2, or C1? Find out. Go now to allearsenglish.com slash fluency score and get clarity on your English level and how you can improve this year, starting today. One more time, go to allearsenglish.com slash f-l-u-e-n-c-y-s-c-o-r-e.

All right. We have two more. The first one is, please don't take this the wrong way, but very similar to, I don't mean anything by this, right? And this will emphasize that, of course, your intention is not to anger or offend someone.

So please don't take this the wrong way, but I think you could be more organized. Yeah. Yeah. Or please don't take this the wrong way, but your tone sounded a bit too serious.

So this is interesting. This is if you're giving feedback to someone or correcting someone's behavior, you're using a phrase like this to soften it because if you say it by itself, it would feel very harsh.

this one is my favorite um this one to me sounds the most polite um like the most but what do you think i agree i like this please don't take this the wrong way you're not backing off from what you said you're not saying i don't mean this i don't mean anything by it right that's remote you're trying to remove any possibility that they would think that you are angry about something right yes um Or here, we'll do one more. For the record, I'm not upset, but... So this emphasizes that you're okay, but something negative did happen.

So for the record, I'm not upset, but I wish you had told me earlier... Yeah. And if you just say, I wish you had told me earlier, then we would assume you are upset, right? So we preface with this in order to share that like, yes, I'm sharing my feelings.

I'm talking about this, but I'm not upset. So only use this if you really aren't upset. Right. Right. Exactly. Like I also might say like everything's okay, but right.

Or like it's okay, but I wish you really are. If you are still upset, right. You want to be honest about the emotions. Like I'm fine, but I want to talk about this.

Yeah. So for the record, I'm not upset, but that caught me off guard. Or you could say everything's fine, but that caught me off guard. Yeah. Yeah. Okay, should we do a role play before we head out?

Let's do it. You and I are friends here. And we just met up with a mutual friend, Sarah. And I came off a bit rude in our conversation. So you want to start us out?

Okay. Um, hey, I noticed something a little earlier. Please don't take this the wrong way. But I think you cut Sarah off a couple times. Oh, wow. Really?

I didn't notice. Yeah, and no offense, but it came across as a little intense. Got it. I definitely didn't mean to do that. I know. I don't mean anything by this, but maybe just pause a bit more next time.

Yeah, that's fair. Thanks for telling me. Of course. Thanks for being so receptive. I know you didn't mean any of it to come off that way. I could totally have this conversation with people because I do.

I tend to get excited about something I want to share. I might interrupt or talk over someone. You guys have heard me do this on the podcast. And so I could totally see a friend letting me know this, be like, you're interrupting me a lot or like someone else.

I'd be like, my bad. Thank you. Yeah. So I said, please don't take this the wrong way. But I think you cut Sarah off a few a couple times. Yeah. So this is nice to say, don't take this the wrong way, right?

You're just sharing like, I don't want to hurt your feelings. I don't want to offend you. But I'm sharing something with you that I would want you to share with me, right? This is a good phrase that...

that does a lot of work there to save the connection if you're going to give some kind of feedback. Yes, I agree. And no offense, but it came across a little intense. So you're feeling like it's bigger than, you know, it's not enough to just say, hey, FYI, this happened.

You would then want to say like, and I don't want you to take offense, right? No offense, but it came across a little intense. So here you're you're digging in more, right?

You're wanting them to know, like, I don't want you to be offended, but I need you to know that probably some kind of correction needs to be made. Right.

And then I said, I don't mean anything by this, but maybe just pause a bit more next time. So this is interesting because to me, I'm like, all right, like...

I don't feel like I would say this last one. I think it's a little too much. It's like, oh, all right. I already said it. I would just lay off. We're wanting to use all of them in a role play here.

But I agree. If in a regular conversation, you probably would not use all three of these because then you're piling on. right yeah like and you smell bad and and i don't want to be friends anymore no offense and i don't like your outfit like it's like so you probably just would use one like use one correct something and then let it go because otherwise the yeah at this point it kind of felt uncomfortable with the other person like okay sorry I'm going to leave now.

Like, all right, why don't I... How about if I go? Yeah, like maybe... Yeah. Exactly. So I would recommend just one. One in a conversation of any of these.

And this is, you know, according to someone's own style. But for both you and I, Michelle, we would use one of these. We would share the feedback. And then we'd change the subject and move on.

Even the second, if you have to, it was okay. But certainly the third was where I was like, all right, lay off. Like, I'm sorry. I get it. But... And it's funny because it's like, you know, we're talking about how to not be blunt.

And yeah, you can use as many as these nice, you know, ways to start it off as you want. But you're still being critical over and over. Yeah. So like overall, it just it kind of defeats the purpose of using the nice language.

because it's just a little too much. But for the purpose of the role play, we want you to have it. But it's also important to let you know that that would just be piling it on. Now you're just blunt.

I think that's actually a really great takeaway for this episode because like you said, Michelle, this is a really important connection skill on both sides, right? So yes, we want to soften our phrases whenever we are pointing out something that might feel mean or critical, but also you want to really be careful about how much you do that because no matter how much you add this softening language, it's still something critical. It's still a correction.

So we want to kind of minimize how much we do that or the person will kind of feel attacked, right? Yeah. Yeah. They might feel like pretty embarrassed.

Like, so, so yeah, we have to think about that in that way as well. Um, don't overdo it with the, with the critical feedback. Yeah. Um, so, all right, but let's give an episode for you guys to check out.

Just recently we did 2686 of the always English podcast. It was joke pun or prank. What's the difference on this is really interesting because these are, these are all a little bit different. And good to know.

That was really fun. If you missed it, scroll up and check it out. I shared a couple of real zingers, some good jokes on that one. So don't miss it. Okay, I want to listen.

Yes, you should. All right. Well, all right. I'm glad we talked about this today. And no offense, Aubrey, but I think it's time to go. Sounds good. We'll see you guys next time.

Bye. See you next time.