Beliefs

BELIEFS

Hello, welcome to the lesson. This one is called “Beliefs.” Let’s get started.

Beliefs another important part of managing your psychology, of strengthening psychology so that you will learn English, or anything in fact, faster. And there are two kinds of beliefs to general of beliefs. Limiting and empowering.
Let’s talk about limiting beliefs first. Now limiting means, limit something that stops you. It’s like a boundary. It you from going ahead. So a limiting belief is a belief that stops from improving, a belief that stops you from getting better. And I’d say most students have limiting beliefs and many English students have strong limiting beliefs. I call these beliefs English trauma and I got that from a few of my Japanese students. They would tell “AJ, I can’t speak English well because I have trauma.”
What is English trauma? What is that, what are talking about? Well, trauma means some kind of injury, some kind hurt. Emotional hurt, deep emotional hurt. So what they mean is that had some very negative, painful experiences with English in the past. In other words, when were in school in English classes, even as adults to other English schools, they had very negative experiences. all these negative experiences have created some very negative beliefs, some limiting beliefs. For example, they say “I am not good at English.” Well, that’s a belief. It be true, it may not be true. But it’s opinion, it’s a belief that they have.
Another belief, a common belief, English is difficult. Or, English is complicated. Well, that’s a belief. For me English very easy, because I’m a native speaker, just like native language for you is very easy. Tomoe can speak Japanese fluently because she’s Japanese, so I might “Japanese is difficult,” and she would say “No, Japanese is super easy.” These are just beliefs come from our experiences. The problem is these limiting beliefs limit us. They in fact do us. They stop us from
getting better. They cause lot of problems for us as students, as learners. I them, too. As I try to learn Japanese, for example, I have lot of these limiting beliefs I realize. I think “Oh, is so difficult.” Japanese is complicated, just look at writing system. It’s so different from English. And these beliefs my motivation. They lower my energy, and in fact they’re wrong.
They’re not true. Japanese not have to be difficult, it does not have to be compli- cated. A small child, even a American child, could learn Japanese very effortlessly, very easily. the reason is, the number one reason is, they don’t have the beliefs. They can sing songs and play games and enjoy the language, and they’ll it so quickly, so easily, they’ll say “Japanese is easy.” Well, it’s the same with English you. You learned in a very painful, difficult way in the past. And so you developed, created these beliefs in your head. English is difficult. English boring. English is painful. I’m not good at English. I’ll speak excellent English. These are just beliefs.
So how do you these beliefs? Okay, you have these beliefs. You know they’re negative, you know they’re not helping you. But we to figure out, how can we get rid of limiting beliefs? That’s the first step, you have to weaken them. You have to make weaker and weaker and weaker. You have to cut them down. Well beliefs get stronger references. And reference is just an experience or a memory. it’s just something you imagine, actually. But it’s a specific experience a specific imagination, a specific moment, that makes the belief or weaker. So, for example, you have this idea “English is and boring.” And when you think of this belief, where does come from?

Well, you think of all these past experiences. You think the time in middle school where your teacher corrected mistake and you felt terrible. And you think of maybe bad grades you got on the test or all the marks on your English papers. And you start adding more and more more memories, more of these negative experiences, these negative references. And if you enough, you will develop a very, strong, deep, powerful belief “English is difficult. English is painful. I’m good at English.” So to weaken these, you just to question the references.

You have to question the experiences. the power away from the experiences. And an easy way to that is just to ask questions about them. For example, let me this question. Your past English schools, were they excellent? Were they just English schools with fantastic, amazing, fun, positive English teachers? Did you have a great time day? Well, I know for most of you the answer is no. So that’s interesting, so your schools were not excellent, maybe the school was the problem. Maybe it’s you. Maybe your English is not great because you not go to great schools. And did those schools that you went to, or the books you used, they use proven methods? Did they use research-based methods? Did they know a lot the research about English learning, English teaching? Did they only the best methods? Or did they just use the textbook that else uses?
Well, I know from my experience a teacher, most schools just use the same textbooks. They don’t know why. the boss tells them “We must use this book.” But they’re not choosing very, very best methods. They’re not choosing the very, very best books. And so maybe the reason believe English is difficult is because you used difficult methods in the past, or your teachers did. Maybe think English is boring because in the past you boring methods. You went to boring schools. You had boring teachers. Maybe English isn’t problem. Maybe it was these past experiences. Maybe it the way you did it or where you did it. Ask yourself these questions. Think about in detail. Weaken your limiting beliefs. Challenge your limiting beliefs. Another question, in school did you deeply? For example, did you take one chapter in your book and learn it a long time so that you totally mastered it, so that you it completely, 100% and never forgot it? Probably not, most schools I seen and the ones I have taught in, it’s quite the opposite. The go very, very, very quickly. You learn one chapter your book, boom, after one week on to the one, and the next one. Each chapter has so many new words, much new grammar.
For example, my experience with Spanish high school and university, I took Spanish, I’ve had a total of two years of Spanish, but I forgot it all. Because we never deeply. They just tried to make us learn as many words as possible, lot of words, a lot of words, a lot grammar, very, very fast. And then, of course, I forgot everything. How you? Did you learn deeply in your schools? If not, maybe that one of the problems. Maybe English feels difficult because you never deeply. Maybe English is not the problem.
Finally, did you with a grammar translation method? Did you study a lot of rules? Did you take a lot of tests? Did feel good about that? Again, maybe the method was problem. Maybe the school is the problem, not English. So think about these questions and think them every day. Think about them a lot, especially this week you listen to Lesson Number 4. I want you think about these questions again and again and again. And really honest about it. And start to destroy these limiting beliefs. Get rid of them. They’re wrong. English not difficult. English is not painful. English is not boring. It’s only a belief. It’s a past experience. You can change that now and in the future. let’s do that.

Let’s talk now about empowering beliefs, the positive side. to empower, the verb, to empower means to make stronger. means to give power to another person. Or in this case, it the beliefs give you power. An empowering belief is a belief makes you feel powerful, that gives you power. That’s the kind beliefs you want and you need to choose them. must decide which beliefs will make you stronger. For example, here’s an belief. You can replace your old limiting belief, add this one instead. You can say “My brain a natural language learning machine.” Because that’s what all of the scientific research shows, our brain learns languages. It is designed to learn language. It should be easy. It be effortless. It should feel good. You learned your native language that way. It wasn’t was it? English was easy for me to learn, I did it in a totally natural way. And more naturally I tried to learn Japanese, for example, or Spanish, the it feels. So this is a new belief and you should write it down, about it. Write down this idea, this belief “My brain is a natural language learning machine.” Think it every day. Decide to choose that belief. Here’s belief you might decide to choose “English can be fun effortless.”

English can be fun and effortless. That’s an belief and it’s also true. You can think of a lot of for this. Some of these mini-stories you’re listening to, right? They’re fun. They’re stupid, sometimes. They’re crazy, sometimes. But they’re not serious. can be fun and effortless. That’s an empowering belief you want to choose and you want to remember every day.

And to make these beliefs stronger, you experiences. Remember, you need references, you need examples that the belief. So I’m going to give you some examples and you can more. Go find people who speak English very well. Or maybe even that have learned another very well. I’ll give you one of my favorite examples, Steve Kaufman of The speaks, I believe, twelve languages now. I want you to find these and look at their beliefs. I’ll tell you some of beliefs because he’s a friend, I’ve talked to him a of times, and Steve believes, for example, that language learning is easy and effortless. That’s belief. He’s a native English speaker, he speaks Cantonese, he Mandarin, he speaks Japanese, he speaks Russian. These are all, supposedly, difficult languages. For they’re not difficult. They’re easy and effortless. That’s a very strong belief has.

Another belief he has is that you must language naturally and you must focus on meaning. So other words, he doesn’t focus on the grammar. He’s not focusing on textbooks. He’s reading interesting things that he enjoys. He’s to interesting things that he enjoys. So, for him, language learning is interesting. What’s really interesting for is that these are the same beliefs that all of my best students have. all have these same ideas. The best students, the ones who the fastest, the ones who have the best test scores, the ones with the best speaking, they all these things. They all believe that English is fun, interesting and effortless. They all believe language learning is natural. They all believe that they should on the meaning, not on the grammar and the little pieces of the language. So if you to be like these successful people, you need to think like them. You need have the same beliefs as them.
So here’s what I want you do. Here’s your homework. This is the last thing, the last part this lesson. What I want you to do is down two, three, four empowering beliefs, beliefs that give you power about English. “My brain is a natural language learning machine.” Maybe “English can fun and effortless.” Maybe “I love English.” I don’t know, write down, two, three, empowering beliefs about English. And every day you’re going to do an incantation. That’s good word, that’s a new word, incantation.
An incantation is a or sentence that you say again and again. It almost a magic idea, it comes from magic. An incantation is a magical sentence. It’s a sentence, you the sentence something will happen. That’s where it comes from. But for us an incantation is just a you are going to repeat again and again and every day.So here’s what you’re going to do. For example “English can be fun and effortless.” You’re going say that out loud every day while you’re walking and you’re doing your posture. And you’re breathing and you’re smiling. Well, you’re going add one more thing. As you walk, as you’re getting ready for the lesson, you’re going to repeat out loud. You’re going to say “English can be fun effortless.” You’re going to say it with some emotion. Say it feeling so you’re smiling, you’re breathing deep, you’re moving body, you have good posture and now you’re also saying strong beliefs. English can be fun and effortless. You repeat it again. English be fun and effortless. And then you say it again. English be fun and effortless.

You can do this in your room and fine. You can do it outside and make everyone look at you and you’re crazy. Why not? It’s better than feeling powerless, right? It’s better being bored. I promise you will learn so much faster if you do this. So do incantations every day just before you do a lesson. Get body strong, peak emotional state, and then say these incantations. English can be fun and effortless. English be fun and effortless. Now your body, your mind, your beliefs, they’re together, very strong. Then you’re ready to learn.

Okay, is the end of the main story for “Beliefs.”