Beliefs

BELIEFS

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

Beliefs are another part of managing your psychology, of strengthening your psychology so that you will learn English, or in fact, much faster. And there are two kinds of to general categories of beliefs. Limiting and empowering.
Let’s talk about limiting first. Now limiting means, limit is something that stops you. It’s like a boundary. stops you from going ahead. So a limiting belief is belief that stops you from improving, a belief that stops you from getting better. I’d say most English students have limiting beliefs and many English students have very strong limiting beliefs. call these beliefs English trauma and I got that name from a few of Japanese students. They would tell me “AJ, I can’t speak English well because have English trauma.”
What is English trauma? What is that, what are they talking about? Well, trauma some kind of injury, some kind of hurt. Emotional hurt, deep emotional hurt. So what they is that they had some very negative, painful experiences with English in the past. In other words, when were in school in English classes, even as adults going to other English schools, they very negative experiences. And all these negative experiences have created some very negative beliefs, very limiting beliefs. For example, they say “I am good at English.” Well, that’s a belief. It may be true, it not be true. But it’s an opinion, it’s a belief they have.
Another belief, a very common belief, English is difficult. Or, is complicated. Well, that’s just a belief. For me English very easy, I’m a native speaker, just like your native language for you is easy. Tomoe can speak Japanese fluently because she’s Japanese, so I might say “Japanese is difficult,” and would say “No, Japanese is super easy.” These are just beliefs that come our experiences. The problem is these limiting beliefs limit us. They in fact do limit us. They stop from
getting better. They cause a lot of for us as students, as learners. I have them, too. I try to learn Japanese, for example, I have lot of these limiting beliefs I realize. I think “Oh, Japanese so difficult.” Japanese is complicated, just look at the writing system. It’s different from English. And these beliefs hurt my motivation. lower my energy, and in fact they’re wrong.
They’re not true. Japanese does not to be difficult, it does not have to be compli- cated. A small child, even a small child, could learn Japanese very effortlessly, very easily. And the reason is, the number one is, they don’t have the limiting beliefs. They can sing songs play games and enjoy the language, and they’ll learn so quickly, so easily, they’ll say “Japanese is easy.” Well, it’s the same with English with you. You learned a very painful, difficult way in the past. And so you developed, you these beliefs in your head. English is difficult. English is boring. English is painful. I’m good at English. I’ll never speak excellent English. These are just beliefs.
how do you eliminate these beliefs? Okay, you have beliefs. You know they’re negative, you know they’re not helping you. we have to figure out, how can we get rid of the limiting beliefs? That’s the step, you have to weaken them. You have to make them weaker weaker and weaker. You have to cut them down. Well beliefs stronger from references. And reference is just an experience a memory. Sometimes it’s just something you imagine, actually. But it’s a specific experience or a specific imagination, specific moment, that makes the belief stronger or weaker. So, for example, have this idea “English is painful and boring.” And when you of this belief, where does it 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 the bad grades you got on test or all the red marks on your English papers. you start adding more and more and more memories, more of these experiences, these negative references. And if you get enough, will develop a very, strong, deep, powerful belief “English is difficult. is painful. I’m not good at English.” So to weaken these, you just have question the references.

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

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

English can be fun and effortless. That’s an empowering belief it’s also true. You can think of a lot examples 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. English can be fun effortless. That’s an empowering belief you want to choose you want to remember it every day.

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

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

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

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