Beliefs

BELIEFS

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

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

Well, you think of all these past experiences. You think of the in middle school where your teacher corrected your mistake you felt terrible. And you think of maybe the bad you got on the test or all the red marks on English papers. And you start adding more and more and more memories, more of these negative experiences, negative references. And if you get enough, you will a very, strong, deep, powerful belief “English is difficult. is painful. I’m not good at English.” So to these, you just have to question the references.

You have to the experiences. Take the power away from the experiences. And an easy way to do is just to ask questions about them. For example, let me ask question. Your past English schools, were they excellent? Were they fantastic 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. that’s interesting, so if your schools were not excellent, maybe the school was problem. Maybe it’s not you. Maybe your English is great because you did not go to great schools. did those schools that you went to, or the books you used, did they use proven methods? they use research-based methods? Did they know a lot the research about English learning, English teaching? Did they only use the methods? Or did they just use the textbook that everybody uses?
Well, I know from my experience as a teacher, most schools just use same textbooks. They don’t know why. Maybe the boss them “We must use this book.” But they’re not choosing the very, very methods. They’re not choosing the very, very best books. And so maybe reason you believe English is difficult is because you used difficult in the past, or your teachers did. Maybe you think English is because in the past you used boring methods. You went to boring schools. You had boring teachers. Maybe isn’t the problem. Maybe it was these past experiences. Maybe was the way you did it or where you did it. Ask yourself these questions. Think them in detail. Weaken your limiting beliefs. Challenge your 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 that you totally mastered it, so that you knew it completely, 100% never forgot it? Probably not, most schools I have seen and the ones have taught in, it’s quite the opposite. The teachers very, very, very quickly. You learn one chapter in your book, boom, after week on to the next one, and the next one. Each has so many new words, so much new grammar.
For example, my experience with Spanish in high and university, I took Spanish, I’ve had a total of two years of Spanish, but I forgot it all. Because we never learned deeply. They just tried make us learn as many words as possible, a lot of words, a of words, a lot of grammar, very, very fast. And then, of course, I everything. How about you? Did you learn deeply in your schools? If not, that was one of the problems. Maybe English feels difficult you never learned deeply. Maybe English is not the problem.
Finally, did you learn a grammar translation method? Did you study a lot of grammar rules? you take a lot of tests? Did you feel good about that? Again, maybe the method the problem. Maybe the school is the problem, not English. So think these questions and think about them every day. Think about a lot, especially this week as you listen to Lesson Number 4. I you to think about these questions again and again and again. And really be honest about it. And to destroy these limiting beliefs. Get rid of them. They’re wrong. is 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 the future. So let’s do that.

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

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

And to make these beliefs stronger, you need experiences. Remember, you need references, you need examples that prove belief. So I’m going to give you some examples and you can find more. Go find who speak English very well. Or maybe even that have another language very well. I’ll give you one of my favorite examples, Steve Kaufman of Linguist speaks, I believe, twelve languages now. I want you find these people and look at their beliefs. I’ll tell some of his beliefs because he’s a friend, I’ve talked to him a number times, and Steve believes, for example, that language learning easy and effortless. That’s his belief. He’s a native English speaker, he speaks Cantonese, he speaks Mandarin, speaks Japanese, he speaks Russian. These are all, supposedly, difficult languages. For him they’re difficult. They’re easy and effortless. That’s a very strong he has.

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

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

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