Beliefs

BELIEFS

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

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

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

You have to question the experiences. Take the away from the experiences. And an easy way to do that is just ask 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, English teachers? Did you have 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 you. Maybe your English is not great because you did go to great schools. And did those schools that you went to, or books you used, did they use proven methods? Did they research-based methods? Did they know a lot about the about English learning, English teaching? Did they only use best methods? Or did they just use the textbook that everybody uses?
Well, I know from my experience as teacher, most schools just use the same textbooks. They don’t know why. Maybe the tells them “We must use this book.” But they’re not choosing the very, very best methods. They’re choosing the very, very best books. And so maybe the reason you English is difficult is because you used difficult methods the past, or your teachers did. Maybe you think English is boring because in the you used boring methods. You went to boring schools. You had 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 take one chapter in your book and learn it a long time so that you totally mastered it, so that knew it completely, 100% and never forgot it? Probably not, most schools I 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 on the next one, and the next one. Each chapter has 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 two years of Spanish, I forgot it all. Because we never learned deeply. They just tried to us learn as many words as 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 your schools? If not, maybe that was one of the problems. Maybe English feels difficult because never learned deeply. Maybe English is not the problem.
Finally, did you learn a grammar translation method? Did you study a lot of grammar rules? you take a lot of tests? Did you feel good about that? Again, maybe the method the problem. Maybe the school is the problem, not English. So think about these questions and think about them day. Think about them a lot, especially this week as you listen Lesson Number 4. I want you to think about these again and again and again. And really be honest it. And start to 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 a belief. It’s only a past experience. You change that now and in the future. So let’s do that.

Let’s talk about empowering beliefs, the positive side. So to empower, the verb, to empower means to stronger. It means to give power to another person. Or in this case, means the beliefs give you power. An empowering belief is belief 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 which beliefs will you stronger. For example, here’s an empowering belief. You replace your old limiting belief, add this one instead. can say “My brain is a natural language learning machine.” Because that’s what all of the research shows, our brain naturally learns languages. It is to learn language. It should be easy. It should be effortless. It should feel good. You learned native language that way. It wasn’t difficult was it? English was 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. Write down this idea, this belief “My brain is natural language learning machine.” Think about it every day. Decide to choose that belief. Here’s another you might decide to choose “English can be fun 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 of mini-stories you’re listening 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 empowering belief want to choose and you want to remember it day.

And to make these beliefs stronger, you need experiences. Remember, you need references, need examples that prove the belief. So I’m going to give some examples and you can find more. Go find people who English very well. Or maybe even that have learned another language well. I’ll give you one of my favorite examples, Kaufman of The Linguist speaks, I believe, twelve languages now. want you to find these people and look at their beliefs. I’ll tell some of his beliefs because he’s a friend, I’ve talked to him a of times, and Steve believes, for example, that language learning easy and effortless. That’s his belief. He’s a native English speaker, he Cantonese, he speaks Mandarin, he speaks Japanese, he speaks Russian. These are all, supposedly, difficult languages. For him they’re difficult. They’re easy and effortless. That’s a very strong he has.

Another belief he has is that you must learn naturally and you must focus on meaning. So in other words, he doesn’t on the grammar. He’s not focusing on boring textbooks. He’s reading interesting things he enjoys. He’s listening to interesting things that he enjoys. So, for him, language is interesting. What’s really interesting for me is that these are same beliefs that all of my best students have. They all have same ideas. The best students, the ones who learn fastest, the ones who have the best test scores, the with the best speaking, they all believe these things. They all that English is fun, interesting and effortless. They all believe that language learning is natural. They all that they should focus on the meaning, not on the grammar and little pieces of the language. So if you want to be these successful people, you need to think like them. need to have the same beliefs as them.
here’s what I want you to do. Here’s your homework. is the last thing, the last part of this lesson. What 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.” Maybe “I love English.” don’t know, write down, two, three, four empowering beliefs about English. And day you’re going to do an incantation. That’s a good word, that’s new word, incantation.
An incantation is a phrase or sentence that say again and again. It has almost a magic idea, comes from magic. An incantation is a magical sentence. It’s a sentence, you say the something will happen. That’s where it comes from. But for us an is just a belief you are going to repeat again and and again every day.So here’s what you’re going to do. For example “English can be fun effortless.” You’re going to say that out loud every day while you’re walking along and you’re your posture. And you’re breathing and you’re smiling. Well, you’re going to add one more thing. As walk, as you’re getting ready for the lesson, you’re going repeat this out loud. You’re going to say “English can be fun effortless.” You’re going to say it with some emotion. it with feeling so you’re smiling, you’re breathing deep, you’re your body, you have good posture and now you’re also saying these beliefs. English can be fun 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 room and fine. You can do it outside and make everyone look at and think you’re crazy. Why not? It’s better than powerless, right? It’s better than being bored. I promise you learn so much faster if you do this. So do these every day just before you do a lesson. Get your strong, peak emotional state, and then say these incantations. 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 learn.

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