Beliefs

BELIEFS

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

Beliefs are another important part of your psychology, of strengthening your psychology so that you learn 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 first. Now limiting means, limit is something that stops you. It’s a boundary. It stops you from going ahead. So a limiting is 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 English students very strong limiting beliefs. I call these beliefs English trauma and I got that from a few of my Japanese students. They would tell me “AJ, I can’t speak English because I have English trauma.”
What is 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. what they mean is that they had some very negative, painful experiences with English in past. In other words, when they were in school English classes, even as adults going to other English schools, they had very negative experiences. And all these experiences have created some very negative beliefs, some very limiting beliefs. For example, they “I am not good at English.” Well, that’s a belief. It may be true, it not be true. But it’s an opinion, it’s a belief they have.
Another belief, a 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 native language 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 super easy.” These are just beliefs that from our experiences. The problem is these limiting beliefs limit us. in fact do limit us. They stop us from
getting better. cause a lot of problems for us as students, as learners. I have them, too. As I to learn Japanese, for example, I have a lot of these beliefs I realize. I think “Oh, Japanese is so difficult.” is complicated, just look at the writing system. It’s different from English. And these beliefs hurt my motivation. lower my energy, and in fact they’re wrong.
They’re not true. does not have to be difficult, it does not have to compli- cated. A small child, even a small American child, could learn Japanese effortlessly, very easily. And the reason is, the number one reason is, don’t have the limiting beliefs. They can sing songs and play and enjoy the language, and they’ll learn it so quickly, easily, they’ll say “Japanese is easy.” Well, it’s the same English with you. You learned in a very painful, way in the past. And so you developed, you created these beliefs in your head. English difficult. English is boring. English is painful. I’m not good at English. I’ll never speak 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 have to figure out, how can we get rid the limiting beliefs? That’s the first step, you have to weaken them. You have make them weaker and weaker and weaker. You have cut them down. Well beliefs get stronger from references. And reference just an experience or a memory. Sometimes it’s just you imagine, actually. But it’s a specific experience or a imagination, a specific moment, that makes the belief stronger weaker. So, for example, you have this idea “English is painful and boring.” when you think of this belief, where does it come from?

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

You have to question the experiences. Take the power away the experiences. And an easy way to do that just to ask questions about them. For example, let me ask this question. Your past schools, were they excellent? Were they just fantastic English schools fantastic, amazing, fun, positive English teachers? Did you have a time every day? Well, I know for most of you the is no. So that’s interesting, so if your schools not excellent, maybe the school was the problem. Maybe it’s not you. Maybe English is not great because you did not go 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? they know a lot about the research about English learning, 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 the same textbooks. don’t know why. Maybe the boss 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 maybe the reason you believe English is difficult is because you used difficult in the past, or your teachers did. Maybe you think English boring because in the past you used boring methods. You went boring 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 you did it. yourself these questions. Think about them in detail. Weaken your beliefs. Challenge your limiting beliefs. Another question, in school did you deeply? For example, did you take one chapter in your and learn it for a long time so that you mastered it, so that you knew it completely, 100% and never forgot it? Probably not, most schools I seen and the ones I have taught in, it’s quite opposite. The teachers go very, very, very quickly. You learn one in your book, boom, after one week on to the next one, and the next one. Each chapter so many new words, so much new grammar.
For example, my experience with Spanish in high school university, I took Spanish, I’ve had a total of maybe two years of Spanish, but I forgot all. Because we never learned deeply. They just tried to make us learn as many words possible, a lot of words, a lot of words, lot of grammar, very, very fast. And then, of course, forgot everything. How about you? Did you learn deeply in your schools? If not, maybe that was of the problems. Maybe English feels difficult because you never deeply. Maybe English is not the problem.
Finally, did 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. 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 about these again and again and again. And really be honest about it. And start destroy these limiting beliefs. Get rid of them. They’re wrong. English not difficult. English is not painful. English is not boring. It’s only belief. It’s only a past experience. You can change that and in 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 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 of you want and you need to choose them. You must which beliefs will make you stronger. For example, here’s an empowering belief. You can replace your old belief, add this one instead. You can say “My is a natural language learning machine.” Because that’s what all the scientific research shows, our brain naturally learns languages. It is designed to learn language. should be easy. It should be effortless. It should feel good. You learned your native that way. It wasn’t difficult was it? English was easy for me to learn, I did it in a totally natural way. And the 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 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 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 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 these beliefs stronger, you need experiences. Remember, you need references, you need that prove the belief. So I’m going to give you some examples you can find more. Go find people who speak English very well. maybe even that have learned another language very well. I’ll give you one of my favorite examples, Steve Kaufman The Linguist speaks, I believe, twelve languages now. I want you to find these and look at their beliefs. I’ll tell you some of his beliefs because he’s a friend, I’ve talked him a number of times, and Steve believes, for example, that language is easy and effortless. That’s his belief. He’s a English speaker, he speaks Cantonese, he speaks Mandarin, he Japanese, he speaks 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 has is that you must language naturally and you must focus on meaning. So in other words, 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 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 have these same ideas. The best students, ones who learn the fastest, the ones who have the test scores, the ones with the best speaking, they believe these things. They all believe that English is fun, and 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 to have the same beliefs as them.
here’s what I want you to do. Here’s your homework. This is the last thing, last 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.” I don’t know, down, two, three, four empowering beliefs about English. And day you’re going to do an incantation. That’s a word, that’s a new word, incantation.
An incantation a phrase or sentence that you say again and again. has almost a magic idea, it comes from magic. An incantation is magical sentence. It’s a sentence, you say the sentence something happen. That’s where it comes from. But for us an incantation just a belief you are going to repeat again and again and again every day.So here’s what you’re to do. For example “English can be fun and effortless.” You’re 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 going to add one 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 fun and effortless.” You’re to say it with some emotion. Say it with feeling you’re smiling, you’re breathing deep, you’re moving your body, you have good posture now you’re also saying these strong beliefs. English can be fun effortless. You repeat it again. English can be fun effortless. And then you say it again. English can be and effortless.

You can do this in your room and its fine. can 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 promise you will learn so faster if you do this. So do these incantations day just before you do a lesson. Get your body strong, peak emotional state, and say these incantations. English can be fun and effortless. can be fun and effortless. Now your body, your mind, your beliefs, they’re all together, strong. Then you’re ready to learn.

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