Beliefs

BELIEFS

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

Beliefs are another important part of your psychology, of strengthening your psychology so that you will English, or anything in fact, much faster. And there are two kinds of beliefs to categories of beliefs. Limiting and empowering.
Let’s talk about limiting beliefs first. Now means, limit is something that stops you. It’s like a boundary. It you from going ahead. So a limiting belief is belief that stops you from improving, a belief that stops from getting better. And I’d say most English students limiting beliefs and many English students have very strong beliefs. I call these beliefs English trauma and I got that name from a few of Japanese students. They would tell me “AJ, I can’t speak 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 hurt. So what they mean is that they had some negative, painful experiences with English in the past. In words, when they were in school in English classes, even adults going to other English schools, they had very experiences. And all these negative experiences have created some negative beliefs, some very limiting beliefs. For example, they say “I am 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.
Another belief, a common belief, English is difficult. Or, English is complicated. Well, that’s just a belief. For me very easy, because I’m a native speaker, just like 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 problem is these beliefs limit us. They in fact do limit us. stop us from
getting better. They cause a lot of problems us as students, as learners. I have them, too. 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, 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 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 reason is, number one reason is, they don’t have the limiting beliefs. They sing songs and play games and enjoy the language, 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 you developed, you created these beliefs your head. English is difficult. English is boring. English is painful. I’m not good at English. I’ll never excellent English. These are just beliefs.
So how do eliminate these beliefs? Okay, you have these beliefs. You they’re negative, you know they’re not helping you. But we to figure out, how can we get rid of limiting beliefs? That’s the first step, you have to them. You have to make them weaker and weaker weaker. You have to cut them down. Well beliefs get stronger from references. And is just an 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 belief stronger weaker. So, for example, you have this idea “English is painful and boring.” And when you of this belief, where does it come from?

Well, you think all these past experiences. You think of the time in middle school your teacher corrected your mistake and you felt terrible. And you think of maybe bad grades you got on the test or all the red on your English papers. And you start adding more and and more memories, more of these negative experiences, these references. And if you get enough, you will develop a very, strong, deep, powerful belief “English difficult. English is painful. I’m not good at English.” to weaken these, you just 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 me this question. Your past English schools, were they excellent? they just fantastic English schools with fantastic, amazing, fun, positive English teachers? Did you have a great time day? Well, I know for most of you the answer no. So that’s interesting, so if your schools were not excellent, maybe school was the problem. Maybe it’s not you. Maybe your English is not great because you did not to great schools. And did those schools that you went to, or the books you used, they use proven methods? Did they use research-based methods? Did they know a lot the research about English 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 the same textbooks. They don’t know why. Maybe the tells them “We must use this book.” But they’re not the very, very best methods. They’re not choosing the very, very best books. And so the reason you believe English is difficult is because you used methods in the past, or your teachers did. Maybe you think English is boring because the past you used boring methods. You went to schools. You had boring teachers. Maybe English isn’t the problem. it was these past experiences. Maybe it was the way you did it or where 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? example, did you take one chapter in your book 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 I have seen and the ones I have taught in, it’s quite the opposite. teachers go very, very, very quickly. You learn one chapter in your book, boom, after one week to the next one, and the next one. Each chapter so many new words, so much new grammar.
For example, my with Spanish in high school and university, I took Spanish, I’ve had a total of two years of Spanish, but I forgot it all. Because we never learned deeply. They tried to make us learn as many words as possible, a lot of words, a of words, a lot of grammar, very, very fast. then, of course, I forgot everything. How about you? Did you deeply in your schools? If not, maybe that was one of problems. Maybe English feels difficult because you never learned deeply. Maybe English not the problem.
Finally, did you learn with grammar translation method? Did you study a lot of grammar rules? Did you take a lot of tests? you feel good about that? Again, maybe the method was the problem. Maybe school is the problem, not English. So think about these questions and think about every day. Think about them a lot, especially this week as you listen Lesson Number 4. I want you to think about questions again and again and again. And really be honest it. And start to destroy these limiting beliefs. Get of them. They’re wrong. English is not difficult. English is painful. English is not boring. It’s only a belief. It’s only a past experience. You change that now and in the future. So let’s that.

Let’s talk now about empowering beliefs, the positive side. So to empower, verb, to empower means to make stronger. It means to power to another person. Or in this case, it means the give you power. An empowering belief is a belief that makes you feel powerful, that gives power. That’s the kind of beliefs you want and need to choose them. You must decide which beliefs will you stronger. For example, here’s an empowering belief. You can your old limiting belief, add this one instead. You say “My brain is a natural language learning machine.” Because that’s what all the scientific research shows, our brain naturally learns languages. It designed to learn language. It should be easy. It should be effortless. It should good. You learned your native language that way. It wasn’t was it? English was easy for me to learn, because I it in a totally natural way. And the more naturally I tried to 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 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 empowering belief and it’s also true. You can think of a lot examples for 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 not serious. English be fun and effortless. That’s an empowering belief you want to and you want to remember it every day.

And make these beliefs stronger, you need experiences. Remember, you need references, you need examples that prove belief. So I’m going to give you some examples you can find more. Go find people who speak very well. Or maybe even that have learned another language very well. I’ll give you one of favorite examples, Steve Kaufman of The Linguist speaks, I believe, twelve now. I want you to find these people and look their beliefs. I’ll tell you some of his beliefs he’s a friend, I’ve talked to him a number of times, Steve believes, for example, that language learning is easy effortless. That’s his belief. He’s a native English speaker, he speaks Cantonese, he Mandarin, he speaks Japanese, he speaks Russian. These are all, supposedly, difficult languages. For they’re not difficult. They’re easy and effortless. That’s a strong belief he has.

Another belief he has is that must learn language naturally and you must focus on meaning. So other words, he doesn’t focus on the grammar. He’s not focusing on boring textbooks. He’s interesting things that 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 best students have. They all have these same ideas. The best students, ones who learn the fastest, the ones who have best test scores, the ones with the best speaking, they believe these things. They all believe that English is fun, interesting and effortless. They all believe that language is natural. They all believe that they should focus on 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 to have the same beliefs as them.
So here’s what want you to do. Here’s your homework. This is the last thing, the last part this lesson. What I want you to do is down two, three, four empowering beliefs, beliefs that give power about English. Maybe “My brain is a natural language learning machine.” Maybe “English be fun and effortless.” Maybe “I love English.” I don’t know, write down, two, three, four empowering beliefs about English. 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 sentence you say again and again. It has almost a magic idea, it from magic. An incantation is a magical sentence. It’s sentence, you say the sentence something will happen. That’s where it comes from. But us an incantation is just a belief you are to repeat again and again and again every day.So here’s what you’re going to do. For example “English can fun and effortless.” You’re going to say that out loud every day while you’re walking and 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 getting ready for lesson, you’re going to repeat this out loud. You’re going to say “English can fun and effortless.” You’re going to say it with emotion. Say it with feeling so you’re smiling, you’re deep, you’re moving your body, you have good posture and now you’re also these strong beliefs. English can be fun and effortless. repeat it again. English can be fun and effortless. And then say it again. English can be fun and effortless.

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