Beliefs

BELIEFS

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

Beliefs another important 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 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 ahead. So a limiting belief is a belief that stops you from improving, belief that stops you from getting better. And I’d say most students have limiting beliefs and many English students have very limiting beliefs. I call these beliefs English trauma and I got that from a few of my Japanese students. They would tell “AJ, I can’t speak English well because I have English trauma.”
What English trauma? What is that, what are they talking about? Well, means 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. other words, when they were in school in English classes, even as adults 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, they say “I not good at English.” Well, that’s a belief. It be true, it may not be true. But it’s opinion, it’s a belief that they have.
Another belief, very common belief, English is difficult. Or, English is complicated. Well, that’s a belief. For me English very easy, because I’m a native speaker, just like your 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, Japanese is easy.” These are just beliefs that come from our experiences. The problem these limiting beliefs limit us. They in fact do limit us. They stop us from
getting better. cause a lot of problems for us as students, learners. I have them, too. As I try to learn Japanese, example, I have 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 beliefs hurt my motivation. They lower my energy, and fact they’re wrong.
They’re not true. Japanese does have to be difficult, it does not have to compli- cated. A small child, even a small American child, learn Japanese very effortlessly, very easily. And the reason is, number one reason is, they don’t have the limiting beliefs. can sing songs and play games and enjoy the language, and they’ll it so quickly, so easily, they’ll say “Japanese is easy.” Well, it’s the same English with you. You learned in a very painful, difficult in the past. And so you developed, you created these beliefs in your head. English is difficult. English boring. English is painful. I’m not good at English. I’ll never speak excellent English. These are just beliefs.
how do you eliminate these beliefs? Okay, you have these beliefs. know they’re negative, you know they’re not helping you. we have to figure out, how can we get rid the 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 is just experience 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 stronger or weaker. So, for example, you have this “English is painful and boring.” And when you think of belief, where does it come from?

Well, you think of all these past experiences. You think of time in middle school where your teacher corrected your mistake and you felt terrible. And you of maybe the bad grades you got on the test all the red marks on your English papers. And you start adding more and more and more memories, of these negative experiences, these negative references. And if you enough, you will develop a very, strong, deep, powerful “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 question experiences. Take the power away from the experiences. And an easy way do that is just to ask questions about them. For example, me ask this question. Your past English schools, were they excellent? Were they fantastic English schools with fantastic, amazing, fun, positive English teachers? Did you a great time every day? Well, I know for most of you answer is no. So that’s interesting, so if your were not excellent, maybe the school was the problem. Maybe it’s not you. Maybe your is not great because you did not go to schools. And did those schools that you went to, or the books you used, did they use methods? Did they use research-based methods? Did they know lot about the research about English learning, English teaching? Did they only use the best methods? Or they just use the textbook that everybody else uses?
Well, I know my experience as 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 not choosing the very, very methods. They’re not choosing the very, very best books. And maybe the reason you believe English is difficult is you used difficult methods in the past, or your teachers did. Maybe you think English is boring in the past you used boring methods. You went to schools. You had boring teachers. Maybe English isn’t the problem. Maybe it was these past experiences. it was the way you did it or where you it. Ask yourself these questions. Think about them in detail. Weaken your beliefs. Challenge your limiting beliefs. Another question, in school you learn deeply? For example, did you take one chapter in your book learn it for a long time so that you mastered it, so that you knew it completely, 100% never forgot it? Probably not, most schools I have and 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, after one 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 I forgot it all. Because never learned deeply. They just tried to make us learn 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. about you? Did you learn deeply in your schools? not, maybe that was one of the problems. Maybe feels difficult because you never learned deeply. Maybe English is not problem.
Finally, did you learn with a grammar translation method? Did you study a of grammar rules? Did you take a lot of tests? 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 them a lot, especially this as you listen to Lesson Number 4. I want you to think about these questions again and and again. And really be honest about it. And start 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 in the future. So let’s do that.

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

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

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

You can do this in your and its fine. You can do it outside and make everyone look at and think you’re crazy. Why not? It’s better than feeling powerless, right? It’s better than being bored. promise you will learn so much faster if you this. So do these incantations every day just before do a lesson. Get your body strong, peak emotional state, and then 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 story “Beliefs.”