Beliefs

BELIEFS

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

Beliefs are important part of managing your psychology, of strengthening your so that you will learn English, or anything in fact, much faster. And are two kinds of beliefs to general categories of beliefs. and empowering.
Let’s talk about limiting beliefs first. 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 you from improving, a belief that stops you from better. And I’d say most English students have limiting beliefs and many English students have strong limiting beliefs. I call these beliefs English trauma and I got that name from a 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 means kind of injury, some kind of hurt. Emotional hurt, emotional hurt. So what they mean is that they had very negative, painful experiences with English in the past. other words, when they were in school in English classes, even as adults going to English schools, they had very negative experiences. And all these experiences have 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 be true, may not be true. But it’s an opinion, it’s a belief they have.
Another belief, a very common belief, English is difficult. Or, is complicated. Well, that’s just a belief. For me very easy, because 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 might “Japanese is difficult,” and she would say “No, Japanese is super easy.” are just beliefs that come from our experiences. The problem these limiting beliefs limit us. They in fact do us. They stop us from
getting better. They a lot of problems for us as students, as learners. I have them, too. As try to learn Japanese, for example, I have a of these limiting beliefs I realize. I think “Oh, Japanese is so difficult.” Japanese is complicated, look at the writing system. It’s so different from English. these beliefs hurt my motivation. They lower my energy, and in fact they’re wrong.
They’re true. Japanese does not have to be difficult, it does not have to compli- cated. A small child, even a 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. 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 way in the past. so you developed, you created these beliefs in your head. is difficult. English is boring. English is painful. I’m not at English. I’ll never speak excellent English. These are just beliefs.
So do you eliminate these beliefs? Okay, you have these beliefs. know they’re negative, you know they’re not helping you. But we have to out, how can we get rid of the limiting beliefs? That’s the step, you have to weaken them. You have to make weaker and weaker and weaker. You have to cut them down. Well beliefs stronger from references. And reference is just an experience a memory. Sometimes it’s just something you imagine, actually. But it’s a specific or a specific imagination, a specific moment, that makes the stronger or weaker. So, for example, you have this idea “English painful and boring.” And when you think of this belief, where does it come from?

Well, think of all these past experiences. You think of the time middle school where your teacher corrected your mistake and you felt terrible. And you of maybe the bad grades you got on the test or all the red marks on English papers. And you start adding more and more and more memories, more these negative experiences, these 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 question the experiences. Take the power away the experiences. And an easy way to do that is just to questions about them. For example, let me ask this question. past English schools, were they excellent? Were they just fantastic English schools with fantastic, amazing, fun, positive teachers? Did you have a great time every day? Well, I know for most of the answer is no. So that’s interesting, so if schools were not excellent, maybe the school was the problem. Maybe it’s not you. your English is not great because you did not go to schools. And did those schools that you went to, the books you used, did they use proven methods? 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 use the textbook that everybody else uses?
Well, I from my experience as a teacher, most schools just use same textbooks. They don’t know why. Maybe the boss tells them “We must use this book.” they’re not choosing the very, very best methods. They’re not choosing the very, very books. And so maybe the reason you believe English is difficult is you used difficult methods in the past, or your teachers did. Maybe you think is boring because in the past you used boring methods. You went to boring schools. You had boring teachers. English isn’t the problem. Maybe it was these past experiences. Maybe it was the way you did or where you did it. Ask yourself these questions. Think them in detail. Weaken your limiting beliefs. Challenge your limiting beliefs. question, in school did you learn deeply? For example, did you take one in your book and learn it for a long so that you totally mastered it, so that you it completely, 100% and never forgot it? Probably not, most schools I seen and the ones I have taught in, it’s the opposite. The teachers go very, very, very quickly. You learn chapter in your book, boom, after one week on to the next one, and the next one. chapter has so many new words, so much new grammar.
For example, my experience Spanish in high school and university, I took Spanish, I’ve had a total of maybe years of Spanish, but I forgot it all. Because we never deeply. They just tried to make us learn as many words as possible, a lot of words, lot of words, a lot of grammar, very, very fast. then, of course, I forgot everything. How about you? you learn deeply in your schools? If not, maybe that one of the problems. Maybe English feels difficult because you never learned deeply. Maybe English is the problem.
Finally, did you learn with a grammar translation method? Did you study a lot grammar rules? Did you take 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. about them a lot, especially this week as you to Lesson Number 4. I want you to think these questions again and again and again. And really be honest about it. And start to these limiting beliefs. Get rid of them. They’re wrong. is not difficult. English is not painful. English is boring. It’s only a belief. It’s only a past experience. 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, empower means to make stronger. It means to give power to another person. in this case, it means the beliefs give you power. An empowering belief is a that makes you feel powerful, that gives you power. That’s the of beliefs you want and you need to choose them. You must decide beliefs will make you stronger. For example, here’s an belief. You can replace your old limiting belief, add this instead. You can say “My brain is a natural learning machine.” Because that’s what all of the scientific research shows, our brain learns languages. It is designed to learn language. It should be easy. It should be effortless. It feel good. You learned your native language that way. It wasn’t was it? English was easy for me to learn, because I did it in a natural way. And the more naturally I tried to Japanese, for example, or Spanish, the easier it feels. So this is a belief and you should write it down, think about it. down this idea, this belief “My brain is a natural language learning machine.” Think about it day. Decide to choose that belief. Here’s another belief you might decide choose “English can be fun and effortless.”

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

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

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

You can do this in room and its fine. You can do it outside make everyone look 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 these every day just before you do a lesson. Get your body strong, peak emotional state, and then 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. you’re ready to learn.

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