Beliefs

BELIEFS

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

Beliefs are another important part of managing your psychology, of your psychology so that you will 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. Now limiting means, limit something that stops you. It’s like a boundary. It stops you from going ahead. a limiting belief is a belief that stops you from improving, a belief stops you from getting better. And I’d say most English students have limiting beliefs many English students have very strong limiting beliefs. I call beliefs English trauma and I got that name from a of my 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 about? Well, trauma means some kind of injury, some kind 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, had very negative experiences. And all these negative experiences have created some very beliefs, some very limiting beliefs. For example, they say “I not good at English.” Well, that’s a belief. It may be true, it may not be true. it’s an opinion, it’s a belief that they have.
belief, a very common belief, English is difficult. Or, English complicated. Well, that’s just a belief. For me English easy, because I’m a native speaker, just like your native for you is very easy. Tomoe can speak Japanese fluently because she’s Japanese, so I say “Japanese is difficult,” and she would say “No, Japanese is easy.” These are just beliefs that come from our experiences. The problem is these limiting beliefs us. They in fact do limit us. They stop from
getting better. They cause a lot of problems for as students, as learners. I have them, too. As I try to learn Japanese, for example, I a lot of these limiting beliefs I realize. I think “Oh, Japanese so difficult.” Japanese is complicated, just look at 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 to be difficult, it does not have to be compli- cated. A small child, even small American child, could learn Japanese very effortlessly, very easily. And reason is, the number one reason 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 same with English with you. You learned in a 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.
So how do you eliminate 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 get rid of the beliefs? That’s the first step, you have to weaken them. You to make them weaker and weaker and weaker. You have to cut them down. Well get stronger from references. And reference is just an experience a memory. Sometimes it’s just something you imagine, actually. But it’s a experience or a specific imagination, a specific moment, that makes the belief stronger weaker. So, for example, you have this idea “English is painful and boring.” And when think of this belief, where does it come from?

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

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

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

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

And to these beliefs stronger, you need experiences. Remember, you need references, you examples that prove the belief. So I’m going to give you examples and you can find more. Go find people 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 find these people and look at their beliefs. I’ll you some of his beliefs because he’s a friend, I’ve talked to him number of times, and Steve believes, for example, that language is easy and effortless. That’s his belief. He’s a native speaker, he speaks Cantonese, he speaks Mandarin, he speaks Japanese, he 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 language naturally and you must focus 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. all have these same ideas. The best students, the ones learn the fastest, the ones who have the best test scores, ones with the best speaking, they all believe these things. They all believe English is fun, interesting and effortless. They all believe that learning is natural. They 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 to think like them. You need to have the same beliefs as them.
So here’s what I you to do. Here’s your homework. This is the last thing, the part of this lesson. What I want you to do write down two, three, four empowering beliefs, beliefs that you power about English. Maybe “My brain is a natural language machine.” Maybe “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 a word, that’s a new word, incantation.
An incantation is a phrase or that you say again and again. It has almost a magic idea, it comes from magic. An incantation a magical sentence. It’s a sentence, you say the sentence something will happen. That’s where it comes from. for us an incantation is just a belief you are going to again and again and again every day.So here’s what you’re going to do. For “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 more thing. As you walk, as you’re getting ready for 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 with some emotion. Say it with feeling you’re smiling, you’re breathing deep, you’re moving your body, you have posture and now you’re also saying these strong beliefs. can be fun and effortless. You repeat it again. English can fun and effortless. And then you say it again. English can fun and effortless.

You can do this in your room and its fine. You can do 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. promise 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. English can be fun and effortless. English be fun and effortless. Now your body, your mind, beliefs, they’re all together, very strong. Then you’re ready learn.

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