163. Want More Confidence in English? Do This

Welcome to the Influency Podcast. I'm Hadar, and today we are going to talk about confidence in English, and in particular, about the fact that confidence is a skill.

Hey, everyone.

Welcome back. Thank you so much for tuning in. Now, confidence is is a big topic when it comes to speaking English as a second language or speaking any other language or living and doing things in life. All of that requires confidence. Showing up, speaking to people with authority, talking to your spouses or kids or parents. Sometimes it takes confidence to say things that are important to you and not as important to others. Or there are many other situations where we feel like we could use more confidence. Right? And what I'm trying to say here is that a lot of people think that confidence is something that you're just born with, or it really depends on your surroundings, which is, of course, true. And how we grow up and the environment we live in, the gender we're born into, the color of our skin. All of that definitely affects how we show up in life and how we feel about ourselves and sometimes even our confidence. But at the same time, confidence is something that you can develop and build. And this is what this episode is all about. Now, before we go into the episode, I want to tell you something really important, and that is our annual event. Our live annual event is coming up really soon. This year's live annual event is called the English Fluency Festival, and it's seven days filled with core training, implementation sessions with coaches, conversation groups, coaching sessions with me, challenges, sprints, and so much more. And it is designed to help you boost your confidence. If we're talking about confidence, your fluency, improve your pronunciation, understand the best learning strategy that is right for you and designed for your needs, and of course, overcome barriers and limitations. So we're going to do all, all of that in those seven days. And that event is 100% free and is open for everyone. And I really hope you can join us. If you enjoy some of the content that I share about pronunciation and mindset and confidence and fluency, you are going to love this event. And even more so, you are going to love the fact that you don't have to do it on your own, because like I said, you're going to have my coaches there and you're going to have fellow English speakers from around the world who are there to reach a breakthrough in English. So I really hope you're going to join us. And I'm going to put the link to join in the show notes and sign up now so you can put all the events in your calendar. And by the way, it's going to be across all time zones. So no matter where you live, you will be able to join live or watch the recordings. And no, you don't have to have Facebook to join the live event. Okay, so now let's go back to talking about confidence and how confidence is a skill. Let's listen to today's episode.

Hey everyone, it's Hadar. Thank you so much for joining me.

Today.

We are going to talk about confidence. Now, when I ask my students and followers what is the one thing or the few things that they would like to improve about their English, they usually mention something related to either pronunciation or flow or grammar. But then right after that, they also say, I really want to be more confident when speaking English. So confidence seems to be the one thing that people crave the most, yet they're not sure how to achieve it. Now here's the thing. While confidence definitely improves, the more you practice your English and the more you put your English into use and you use it speaking to other people. And of course, the more you increase your knowledge and improve your knowledge and you become more aware of what it is that you're doing and how to use the language, of course that is going to boost your confidence and help you feel more confident and in control and in charge when you're communicating in English. However, what if we also looked at confidence as a skill in and of itself? So just like English or basketball or cooking or knitting or ice skating, where all of those things are skills that need to be practiced and improved, what if it's the confidence that we were to practice and improve and not just English? So yes, confidence is a byproduct of improving your English. But we can also address working on your confidence and your mindset and that alone will help you become more confident. And when you're confident, you're also more fluent because lack of confidence definitely affects your flow and fluency and the availability of the language in your head. So it's a win, win situation. So on one hand, to improve your confidence, you need to improve your English, but to improve your English, you should be working on improving your confidence as well. So in this video, I'm going to share with you a few exercises and mindset tips and that are going to help you work on your confidence and not just on your English. Now, I have tried these exercises with my students in my programs because in my programs I really tackle this idea of confidence and mindset because I think it's an intrinsic part of learning a language. And I have to tell you that they love those exercises and now I'm sharing them with you. Now, if you're new to my channel, then let me introduce myself. My name is Hadar and I'm a non native speaker of English. And I am here to help you feel confident, clear and free when communicating in English. And if you want to find out more about how I can help you reach your goals in English, come on over to my website@hadarchemish.com or follow me on Instagram Hadar Accentsway because over there I share with you a lot of exercises and resources for for you to get to where you want to be. Now let's talk about confidence as a skill. The first exercise is the appreciation practice. Every day I want you to take a moment and think about the things that you were able to do thanks to your English. So instead of complaining about your English or feeling frustrated because of your English, you in this exercise I want you to think about all the great things you currently have or the experiences you've had during that day thanks to your ability to communicate in English. Whether it's you living in an English speaking country and something good happened to you and that wouldn't have been possible without the knowledge of the language or maybe you had a good conversation, or maybe you just had a really good practice or, or maybe you just stayed consistent and did the work and that was something that you're proud of and you're appreciative of, right? So the idea is to start showing more appreciation towards your English because then it would not feel like an enemy you need to battle or something you need to overcome. But English will become your friend and English will become a part of you and who you are and what you do. So at the end of each day, I want you to write down one or two things that you are now able to do thanks to your English. Or you can just write a couple of things that you're proud of that you did related to English. The next exercise is called choosing your words. And I learned this exercise from the brain coach, Jim Kwik. Now, Jim Kwik suggests that every time you find yourself using need to, you want to change it to get to. It also has to do with this appreciation work that you are not doing something just because you have to, but you are appreciative of the fact that you get to do them. Because listen, so many people in this world don't even have access to the Internet and they are unable to watch this video to learn and to improve, you have the ability and the privilege of learning English through the Internet. Otherwise you wouldn't be here watching this video, which is incredible. So even if it feels like the odds are against you sometimes because you don't have places to practice, you feel frustrated, you have no one to give you feedback. Remember that you still have access to all this knowledge, and this is something that you don't want to take for granted. So even if you feel like, oh, I need to work on my grammar or I need to practice English, what if you changed it to, I get to practice my English, I get to improve my grammar? And then that alone can create a mindset shift where you focus on the positive rather than on the negative. And there is nothing more motivating and inspiring than feeling positive about your experience learning English. Because when you have all those negative feelings, it just pulls you down and you don't really want to do the work, and you feel frustrated and you feel. And you start being hard on yourself. And all of that does not lead to a productive place. Something else that I'm inviting you to do is to do something that scares you, which means to go live on Instagram or to post on Facebook or LinkedIn a story that you wrote. Or you can start uploading videos on a regular basis in the influency our community for global speakers from around the world. Or you can start going to job interviews to jobs that you don't even want, but you want the practice or the experience of interviewing in English because it freaking scares you. The idea is to think about something that really scares you. But inside you feel like this is something that you could potentially do or that would be interesting. Or maybe you look at the people who are able to do these things and you're like, they're so confident. They're so lucky. So the idea is to start doing it before you feel the confidence. So do something that scares you, whatever that is. And if you can think of something that scares you, write it in the comments below and say, I am going to go live on Instagram, start a YouTube channel, go to a job interview in English, or whatever that scary thing is for you. All right, so I'm going to be reading your comments. Make sure to comment it below. Another thing that I want to talk to you about is managing your negative thoughts. Managing your negative thoughts is a skill that you want to develop and that is going to help you boost your confidence. Because the negative thoughts that you're experiencing while speaking in English or learning English or practicing English is Something that is affecting your confidence. So managing those thoughts is something that can help you improve your confidence. Again, working on developing the skill of confidence. So one of the ways to do that is to use pattern interrupt. Pattern interrupt is when you get into the pattern of those negative thoughts. Oh, it's not possible for you. Oh, you won't be able to do it. Oh, why even bother? Because you are not talented in learning languages, right? Like when that pattern of negative thoughts, you know what it is for you? When that starts happening in your brain, I want you to break the pattern. One of the ways to do that is to change the action, right? Like go wash your face. Go do 10 jumping jacks. Get on the phone with a good friend and tell them what's going on with you. Yell into your pillow. This is I am not going to listen to those thoughts. Or you can simply say to yourself, stop it. And then move away to something positive. The idea is to not get into that pattern, right? Like, and not dwell in it and think about it too much, but instead to just shift from that situation and move into something else that is more productive. Manage those negative thoughts. This is something that is definitely going to improve your confidence. Okay, so these were a few exercises that you can do to boost your confidence, but there are many, many more. So if you have any other suggestions or tips or exercises that you'd like to share, please share them in the comments with the rest of the community. Now, if you like this video, consider liking it and subscribing to my channel because I share with you a valuable lesson every single week and also you can share it with friends who also need this confidence boost. Thank you so, so much for watching. And remember that making mistakes is the only way to learn. So stop being afraid of mistakes, stop being afraid of not being perfect, and just get into the work of using English so it starts serving you. All right? And I'm here to help. I got you. Have a beautiful week and I'll see you next week in the next video.

Bye.