Beliefs

BELIEFS

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

Beliefs are another important part of managing your psychology, strengthening your psychology so that you will learn English, or anything fact, much faster. And there are two kinds of beliefs to 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 going ahead. So a limiting belief a belief that stops you from improving, a belief that stops you getting better. And I’d say most English students have limiting beliefs and many students have very strong limiting beliefs. I call these English trauma and I got that name from a of my Japanese students. They would tell me “AJ, can’t speak English well because I have English trauma.”
What is English trauma? What is that, are they talking about? Well, trauma means some kind of injury, kind of hurt. Emotional hurt, deep emotional hurt. So what they mean is that had some very negative, painful experiences with English in the past. other words, when they were in school in English classes, even as adults going other English schools, they had very negative experiences. And these negative experiences have created some very negative beliefs, very limiting beliefs. For example, they say “I am not at English.” Well, that’s a belief. It may be true, it not be true. But it’s an opinion, it’s a belief that have.
Another 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 limit us. They in fact do limit us. They stop us from
better. They cause a lot of problems for us as students, as learners. I them, too. As I 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 at the writing system. It’s so different from English. And these beliefs hurt motivation. They lower my energy, and in fact 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 a small American child, could Japanese very effortlessly, very easily. And the reason is, the number one reason is, they don’t the limiting beliefs. They can sing songs and play games enjoy the language, and they’ll learn it so quickly, so easily, they’ll say “Japanese easy.” Well, it’s the same with English with you. You learned a very painful, difficult way in the past. And so developed, you created these beliefs in your head. English is difficult. is boring. English is painful. I’m not good at English. I’ll speak excellent English. These are just beliefs.
So how you eliminate these beliefs? Okay, you have these beliefs. You know they’re negative, know they’re not helping you. But we have to out, how can we get rid of the limiting beliefs? That’s the first step, you have to weaken them. have to make them weaker and weaker and weaker. have to cut them down. Well beliefs get stronger from references. And is just an experience or a memory. Sometimes it’s just something imagine, actually. But it’s a specific experience or a specific imagination, a specific moment, that makes the belief 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, you of all these past experiences. You think of the in middle school where your teacher corrected your mistake and you felt terrible. And you of maybe the bad grades you got on the or all the red marks on your English papers. And you start adding and more and more memories, more of these negative experiences, these negative references. And if get enough, you will develop a very, strong, deep, belief “English is difficult. English is painful. I’m not good at English.” So to weaken these, you have to question the references.

You have to question 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 you the answer is no. So that’s interesting, so if your schools not excellent, maybe the school was the problem. Maybe it’s not you. Maybe your is not great because you did not go to great schools. And did those that you went to, or the books you used, they use proven methods? Did they use research-based methods? Did they a lot about the research about English learning, English teaching? Did only use the best methods? Or did they just the textbook that everybody else uses?
Well, I know from my experience as a teacher, 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 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 schools. You had boring teachers. Maybe English isn’t the problem. Maybe it was these past experiences. Maybe was the way you did it or where you did it. Ask these questions. Think about them in detail. Weaken your limiting beliefs. Challenge limiting beliefs. Another question, in school did you learn deeply? For example, did you take chapter in your book and learn it for a long time so that you totally it, so that you knew it completely, 100% and never forgot it? Probably not, most schools have seen 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 week on the next one, and the next one. Each chapter has so many new words, much new grammar.
For example, my experience with Spanish in high school and university, took Spanish, I’ve had a total of maybe two years of Spanish, but forgot it all. Because we never learned deeply. They just tried make us learn as many words as possible, a of words, a lot of words, a lot of grammar, very, fast. And then, of course, I forgot everything. How about you? Did you learn deeply in schools? If not, maybe that was one of the problems. Maybe feels difficult because you never learned deeply. Maybe English is not the problem.
Finally, you learn with a grammar translation method? Did you study a lot of grammar rules? Did you take lot of tests? Did you feel good about that? Again, maybe method was the problem. Maybe the school is the problem, not English. So about these questions and think about them every day. Think about a lot, especially this week as you listen to Lesson 4. I want you to think about these questions again again 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 that now and the future. So let’s do that.

Let’s talk now about empowering beliefs, the positive side. to empower, the verb, to empower means to make stronger. It means to give to another person. Or in this case, it means beliefs give you power. An 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 make you stronger. example, here’s an empowering belief. You can replace your limiting belief, add this one instead. You can say “My brain is a language learning machine.” Because that’s what all of the scientific research shows, brain naturally learns languages. It is designed to learn language. It be easy. It should be effortless. It should feel good. You learned your native language that way. 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 to learn Japanese, for example, or Spanish, the easier feels. So this is a new belief and you should write it down, think about it. Write this idea, this belief “My brain is a natural language learning machine.” about it every day. Decide to choose that belief. Here’s belief you might decide to choose “English can be fun and effortless.”

English can be fun effortless. That’s an empowering belief and it’s also true. can think of a lot of examples for this. of these mini-stories you’re listening 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 choose and you want to remember it every day.

And to make beliefs stronger, you need experiences. Remember, you need references, you examples that prove the belief. So I’m going to you some examples and you can find more. Go people who speak English very well. Or maybe even that have learned another language very well. I’ll you 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, he speaks Russian. are all, supposedly, difficult languages. For him they’re not difficult. They’re easy and effortless. That’s a very strong he has.

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

You can do this your room 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 being bored. I promise you will learn so much faster if do this. So do these incantations every day just before do a lesson. Get your body strong, peak emotional state, and then say these incantations. English can be fun effortless. English can 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.”