Beliefs

BELIEFS

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

Beliefs are another important part managing your psychology, of strengthening your psychology so that you learn English, or anything in fact, much faster. And there two kinds of beliefs to general categories of beliefs. Limiting and empowering.
Let’s talk about beliefs first. Now limiting means, limit is something that you. It’s like a boundary. It stops you from 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 very strong limiting beliefs. I call these beliefs English trauma and I that 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 with English the past. In other words, when they were in school in English classes, as adults going to other English schools, they had very negative experiences. And all these negative experiences created some very negative beliefs, some very limiting beliefs. For example, say “I am not good at English.” Well, that’s a belief. It may true, it may not be true. But it’s an opinion, it’s belief that they have.
Another belief, a very belief, English is difficult. Or, English is complicated. Well, that’s just belief. For me English very easy, because I’m a native speaker, like your native language for you is very easy. Tomoe can speak Japanese fluently because she’s Japanese, so might say “Japanese is difficult,” and she would say “No, is super easy.” These are just beliefs that come from our experiences. The 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 have them, too. As try to learn Japanese, for example, I have a lot of these limiting beliefs realize. I think “Oh, Japanese is so difficult.” Japanese is complicated, just look the writing system. It’s so different from English. And these hurt my motivation. They lower my energy, and in they’re wrong.
They’re not true. Japanese does not have be difficult, it does not have to be compli- cated. small child, even a small American child, could learn Japanese very effortlessly, very easily. And the is, the number one reason is, they don’t have the limiting beliefs. can sing songs and play games and enjoy the language, and they’ll learn it quickly, so easily, they’ll say “Japanese is easy.” Well, it’s the same with with you. You learned in a very painful, difficult in the past. And so you developed, you created these beliefs in head. English is difficult. English is boring. English is painful. I’m not good English. I’ll never speak excellent English. These are just beliefs.
So do you eliminate these beliefs? Okay, you have these beliefs. You know they’re negative, you know they’re not you. But we have to figure out, how can we rid of the limiting beliefs? That’s the first step, have to weaken them. You have to make them and weaker and weaker. You have to cut them down. Well get stronger from references. And reference is just an or a memory. Sometimes it’s just something you imagine, actually. But it’s a specific experience or specific imagination, a specific moment, that makes the belief stronger or weaker. So, for example, have this idea “English is painful and boring.” And when you think of this belief, does it come from?

Well, you think of all these past experiences. You think the time in middle school where your teacher corrected your and you felt terrible. And you think of maybe the grades you got on the test or all the red marks on your English papers. And you 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 weaken these, you just to question the references.

You have to question the experiences. Take the power away from the experiences. And an way to do that is just to ask questions about them. For example, let ask 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 answer is 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 great because you did not go to great schools. And did those schools that went to, or the books you used, did they 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. Maybe boss tells them “We must use this book.” But they’re choosing the very, very best methods. They’re not choosing the very, best books. And so maybe the reason you believe English is is because you used difficult methods in the past, your teachers did. Maybe you think English is boring because in the past you used boring methods. went to boring schools. You had boring teachers. Maybe English isn’t problem. Maybe it was these past experiences. Maybe it was way you did it or where you did it. Ask yourself questions. Think about them in detail. Weaken your limiting beliefs. Challenge your limiting beliefs. Another question, school did you learn deeply? For example, did you take one chapter your book and learn it for a long time so that totally mastered it, so that you knew it completely, 100% and never forgot it? not, most schools I have seen and the ones I taught in, it’s quite the opposite. The teachers go very, very, quickly. You learn one chapter in your book, boom, after one week on to next one, and the next one. Each chapter has so new words, so much new grammar.
For example, my experience with Spanish high school and university, I took Spanish, I’ve had a of maybe two years of Spanish, but I forgot it all. Because we never learned deeply. They just to make us learn as many words as possible, a lot of words, a lot words, a lot of grammar, very, very fast. And then, of course, forgot everything. How about you? Did you learn deeply in your schools? If not, maybe that one of the problems. Maybe English feels difficult because you never learned deeply. English is not the problem.
Finally, did you learn with 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 the method the problem. Maybe the school is the problem, not English. So think about these questions and think about them day. Think about them a lot, especially this week as listen to Lesson Number 4. I want you to about these questions again and again and again. And really be honest about it. start to destroy these limiting beliefs. Get rid of them. They’re wrong. English is difficult. English is not painful. English is not boring. It’s a 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 to make stronger. It means to give power to another person. Or in case, it means the beliefs give you power. An empowering belief is a belief that makes feel powerful, that gives you power. That’s the kind of beliefs you want and you need to them. You 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. can say “My brain is a natural language learning machine.” Because that’s what all of the scientific shows, our brain naturally learns languages. It is designed to learn language. It should be easy. It should effortless. It should feel good. You learned your native that way. It wasn’t difficult was it? English was easy for me to learn, 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 it down, about it. Write down this idea, this belief “My brain is natural language learning machine.” Think about it every day. Decide choose that belief. Here’s another belief you might decide to choose “English be fun and effortless.”

English can be fun and effortless. That’s an belief and it’s also true. You can think of a of examples for this. Some of these mini-stories you’re to, right? They’re fun. They’re stupid, sometimes. They’re crazy, sometimes. But they’re not serious. English can fun and effortless. That’s an empowering belief you want to choose and you to remember it 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 and you can find more. Go find people who speak English very well. Or even that have learned another language very well. I’ll give you one of my favorite examples, Kaufman of The Linguist speaks, I believe, twelve languages now. I want you to find these people look at their beliefs. I’ll tell you some of beliefs because he’s a friend, I’ve talked to him a number times, and Steve believes, for example, that language learning is and effortless. That’s his belief. He’s a native English speaker, speaks Cantonese, he speaks Mandarin, he speaks Japanese, he speaks Russian. are all, supposedly, difficult languages. For 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 other words, he doesn’t focus on grammar. He’s not focusing on boring textbooks. He’s reading interesting things he enjoys. He’s listening to interesting things that he enjoys. So, him, language learning is interesting. What’s really interesting for is that these are the same beliefs that all of my best students have. They have these same ideas. The best students, the ones who the fastest, the ones who have the best test scores, the with the best speaking, they all believe these things. all believe that English is fun, interesting and effortless. They believe that language learning is natural. They all believe that they should focus on meaning, not on the grammar and the little pieces of language. So if you want to be like these successful people, you need think like them. You need to have the same as them.
So 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 to do is write two, three, four empowering beliefs, beliefs that give you power about English. Maybe “My brain is a natural learning machine.” Maybe “English can be fun and effortless.” Maybe “I English.” I don’t know, write down, two, three, four empowering beliefs about English. And day you’re going to do an incantation. That’s a 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, say the sentence something will happen. That’s where it comes from. for us an incantation is just a belief you are going to repeat again and again and again day.So here’s what you’re going to do. For example “English can be fun effortless.” You’re going to say 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 to add one more thing. As you walk, as you’re ready for the lesson, you’re going to repeat this out loud. You’re going say “English can be fun and effortless.” You’re going say it with some emotion. Say it with feeling you’re smiling, you’re breathing deep, you’re moving your body, you have good posture and now you’re saying these strong beliefs. English can be fun and effortless. You repeat it again. can be fun and effortless. And then you say it again. English can fun and effortless.

You can do this in your and its 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 than bored. I promise you will learn so much faster you do this. So do these incantations every day just before you a lesson. Get your body strong, peak emotional state, and then these incantations. English can be fun and effortless. English can be fun and effortless. Now your body, mind, your beliefs, they’re all together, very strong. Then you’re ready to learn.

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