Beliefs

BELIEFS

Hello, welcome the fourth 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 of beliefs to general categories of beliefs. Limiting and empowering.
Let’s talk about limiting beliefs first. limiting means, limit is something that stops you. It’s like a boundary. It you from going ahead. So a limiting belief is belief that stops you from improving, a belief that you from getting better. And I’d say most English students have limiting beliefs and many English have very strong limiting beliefs. I call these beliefs trauma and I got that name from a few my Japanese students. They would tell me “AJ, I can’t speak well because I have English trauma.”
What is English trauma? is that, what are they talking about? Well, trauma means some kind of injury, kind of hurt. Emotional hurt, deep emotional hurt. So what they mean that they had some very negative, painful experiences with in the past. In other words, when they were in in English classes, even as adults going to other English schools, had very negative experiences. And all these negative experiences have created some negative beliefs, some very limiting beliefs. For example, they say “I am not good English.” Well, that’s a belief. It may be true, it not be true. But it’s an opinion, it’s a that they have.
Another belief, a very common belief, English is difficult. Or, English complicated. Well, that’s just a belief. For me English very easy, because I’m native speaker, just like your native language for you very 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 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 us as students, as learners. I have them, too. As I try to Japanese, for example, I have a lot of these limiting beliefs realize. I think “Oh, Japanese is so difficult.” Japanese complicated, just look at the writing system. It’s so from English. And these beliefs hurt my motivation. They lower my energy, and fact they’re wrong.
They’re not true. Japanese does not have to be difficult, it does have to be compli- cated. A small child, even a small American child, could learn very effortlessly, very easily. And the reason is, the number one reason is, they don’t have limiting beliefs. They can sing songs and play games enjoy the language, and they’ll learn it so quickly, easily, they’ll say “Japanese is easy.” Well, it’s the same English with you. You learned in a very painful, difficult way the past. And so you developed, you created these beliefs in your head. is difficult. English is boring. English is painful. I’m not good at English. I’ll never excellent English. These are just beliefs.
So how do you eliminate these beliefs? Okay, you these beliefs. You know they’re negative, you know they’re not you. But we have to figure out, how can we get rid of limiting beliefs? That’s the first step, you have to weaken them. You to make them weaker and weaker and weaker. You have cut them down. Well beliefs get stronger from references. And reference just an experience or a memory. Sometimes it’s just something you imagine, actually. But it’s a specific or a specific imagination, a specific moment, that makes belief stronger or weaker. So, for example, you have this idea “English is painful and boring.” when you think of this belief, where does it come from?

Well, think of all these past experiences. You think of the time in middle school your teacher corrected your mistake and you felt terrible. And you think of maybe the bad grades got on the test or all the red marks on your papers. And you start adding more and more and memories, more of these negative experiences, these negative references. And you get enough, you will develop a very, strong, deep, belief “English is difficult. English is painful. I’m not good English.” So to weaken 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 that is just ask questions about them. For example, let me ask question. Your past English schools, were they excellent? Were they just fantastic English with fantastic, amazing, fun, positive English teachers? Did you have a great time every day? Well, 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 not you. 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, they use proven methods? Did they use research-based methods? Did they know a lot about the research about learning, English teaching? Did they only use the best methods? Or did they just use textbook that everybody else uses?
Well, I know from my experience as teacher, most schools just use the same textbooks. They don’t know why. Maybe the boss tells them “We use this book.” But they’re not choosing the very, best methods. They’re not choosing the very, very best books. so maybe the reason you believe English is difficult because you used difficult methods in the past, or your teachers did. you think English is boring because in the past you used boring methods. went to boring schools. You had boring teachers. Maybe isn’t the problem. Maybe it was these past experiences. Maybe it was the 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 you learn deeply? For example, did you take one chapter in your book and it for a long time so that you totally mastered it, that you knew it completely, 100% and never forgot it? Probably not, schools I have seen and the ones I have taught in, it’s quite opposite. The teachers go very, very, very quickly. You one chapter in your book, boom, after one week on to the next one, and the one. Each chapter has so many new words, so much new grammar.
For example, my experience with in high school and university, I took Spanish, I’ve had total of maybe two years of Spanish, but I forgot all. Because we never learned deeply. They just tried to make us as many words as possible, a lot of words, lot of words, a lot of grammar, very, very fast. And then, of course, I forgot everything. How you? Did you learn deeply in your schools? If not, maybe was one of the problems. Maybe English feels difficult you never learned deeply. Maybe English is not the problem.
Finally, did you with a grammar translation method? Did you study a lot of grammar rules? Did you a lot of tests? Did you feel good about that? Again, maybe method was the problem. Maybe the school is the problem, English. So think about these questions and think about them every day. Think about them a lot, this week as you listen to Lesson Number 4. I want you to think about 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. English is not difficult. is not painful. English is not boring. It’s only a belief. It’s only past experience. You can change that now and in the future. So let’s do that.

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

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

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

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

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