487. How to stop LIMITING yourself and become your full self in English

When you don't like your voice in a certain language, you are less likely to communicate and express yourself. Hence you might feel limited. You also might not feel like yourself. That's not my voice. The voice is like the natural expression of who I am. And if it's not me, then it's a different version of me. Usually like a lesser version of me.

Hey, you're listening to the Influency podcast. I'm Hadar, your host, a pronunciation expert, fluency coach, and a proud non native speaker with over 16 years of experience teaching. I am here to share with you all my secrets on how to show up in English clearly with confidence and freedom. On this podcast, I'll provide step by step strategies, lessons, stories and practical tips to keep you inspired and motivated on.

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Do you feel like a limited or pale version of yourself in English? If that is the case, I want you to know that you are not alone. And today I'm going to talk about why that is, what that looks like, how is it expressed in in your day to day life and of course what you can do about it. How you can shift your thinking, reframe your thoughts so you can start moving away from that limited, fake, pale feeling that you have of who you are in English. Because at the end of the day, we want you expressing yourself fully, feeling joyful in English and being the best version of yourself no matter what language you speak. Now, if new to my channel, then hi, my name is Hadar. I'm a non native speaker of English. So I have been where you are now and here I am feeling fully expressive and joyful and free in English. And I want you to feel the same. So here on my platform, I share with you my best tips and strategies and patterns of thinking that can help you become your fluent, confident self. Okay, so let's talk about why you might feel like a limited version of yourself. The first reason is that you are limiting yourself yourself. You are not joining conversations. You keep quiet even though you have things to say. You feel like you are not saying yes to opportunities. So physically, technically, practically, you are limiting yourself. You are not doing all the things that you would do if it was your first language. And because of that, you feel limited. You feel restrained. You feel like you are not using your full existence to communicate in English. Okay? Now you could also feel limited because you have limited vocabulary and limited grammatical structures. And that is technical, right? Like you haven't learned it yet, you haven't turned it into a habit. So you might associate your knowledge of the language with your ability to communicate and to express yourself. Now, I get it. When you're first learning a language and you do have very limited vocabulary, you might actually be limited. You might not have the words to say the things that you want to say. But there comes a point, and I think a lot of the people watching my videos or listening to my podcast, they already have some experience and some knowledge in English. So that limited feeling doesn't necessarily come from actually not knowing the words, but feeling like you don't have enough words to express yourself or wanting to have nicer, fancier vocabulary to be able to express yourself, to suggest nuance, and to just feel like you have that freedom. But I just want to suggest that it's not like you can't say what you want. You just want to say it in different ways. And not being able to do that makes you feel limited. Now, there is no judgment here, and there is no right and wrong. If this is your experience, this is your experience. The only thing that we can do is change what we can, and also to have compassion for the times or the parts in us that are not yet where we want it to be. Now, the next reason for why you feel like a limited version of yourself is maybe your voice changes in English. And this goes really deep, and I want you to stay with me on that. Our voice is our immediate expression. That's the first thing people hear before your pronunciation, before your vocabulary. They hear your voice connect to other people's voice. You can form an opinion about someone else really quickly based on their voice, positive or negative. And sometimes when we shift into another language, something might happen to our voice. Now, I've already talked about it on my platform. I'm going to share links to all my videos about the voice, But I'm just going to say that when we feel insecure, our voice might change, and we might feel insecure when communicating in English, we might have ideas about how we should speak in English. And therefore, we change the voice because we think it should sound higher or lower or louder or softer, and it doesn't feel like us, but we do it because we think we need to do it. Maybe you have been imitating someone and that, you know, made you catch their voice quality, but maybe it's not your voice, and maybe you hold a lot of tension because of the sounds and the pronunciation, and that tension is being manifested in your voice as well, because tension brings tension. So maybe that changes your voice a little bit. So all of these reasons, and there are more, may result in you not having the voice that you know in English. And a lot of times we don't prefer that voice. It's not a voice that we say, oh, this is a much better voice than my natural voice in my first language. Usually it's a voice that you don't necessarily like. And not liking your voice can make you start having all these opinions and criticism around your voice. And when you don't like your voice in a certain language, you are less likely to communicate and express yourself. Hence, you might feel limited. You also might not feel like yourself. That's not my voice. The voice is like the natural expression of who I am. And if it's not me, then it's a different version of me, usually like a lesser version of me. So even though it's something very small, I find it to be so profound with my students. And when I help my students find their natural voice in English, there's always this sense of relief and joy and very emotional because something connects there. And when something connects, you do allow yourself to show up more like yourself, who you are, and to feel more authentic. And sometimes that is so much more important than knowing all these extra words and being more accurate with your grammar, right? Like that sense of self, sense of feeling authentic. I think it's so much more important, and you should spend time thinking about it and changing or shifting your thinking so that you can feel more expressive and feel more like yourself. Another reason why you feel like a limited version of yourself is because you may be very funny in your first language, but when you shift to English, all that humor disappears. Could be cultural because different cultures have different humor. And maybe what makes you laugh is not what's perceived funny in English, American culture, British culture, but also maybe it's just you don't. You're not feeling confident. Humor is a lot around language, right? Like wordplay and puns and all of that. And maybe you don't feel confident or you don't actually know how to be funny, using the language in a nuanced way. And I also think it's a lot about confidence because you cannot tell a joke or you cannot feel funny and express something in a humorous way if you don't feel super confident and comfortable, because judgment ruins humor and ruins, like, that sense of freedom. And unfortunately, a lot of what I see with a lot of my students is that that sense of judgment is really big, right? Like shame, judgment, fear of criticism is so dominant, then it doesn't allow them to be funny, even though they might be very funny in their first language. And that makes them feel like a limited version of themselves. And the last reason there are more. But I'm just going to settle with these because it's enough for us for, you know, like, for this session. You probably tend to overthink, rethink, censor yourself, edit yourself a lot more in English than in your first language. Overthink you know what to say and how to say it. Maybe you overthink what you just said, right? Like, you repeat everything that you've said in your head. You find mistakes, you feel bad, you beat yourself up. Maybe you are overthinking even saying a simple, hey, good morning, how are you? Right, like, should I go here, Should I go there? Should I say it like that? Should I say it like this? So that feeling of adding a lot of mental power and. And energy into every single interaction makes it feel uncomfortable and makes it feel heavy, as if you're running with weights. And it just makes you feel limited, okay? Because you don't have the mental freedom. You don't have that expression that you might want to have that you probably have in your first language. So all of these reasons, keeping quiet, actually limiting yourself, having limited vocabulary and grammar knowledge, changing your voice, not being able to use humor, overthinking and rethinking, like, all of these things are the reasons for why you might feel like a limited or artificial or partial version of who you are and of yourself. And here's how I want you to think about it. If you resonated with any of the things that I shared here, here's how I want you to think about yourself. First of all, the only person limiting you is you. It's not the English. It's not other people. Even if you have experienced discrimination or judgment, it's not about them. It's about you. And you are in full control over how you show up in the world and how you feel about yourself. So all of those things that I talked about, you can change those. Okay, it doesn't have to be this way. Think of people who might not have the best English, but you feel like they are so expressive and funny and free and they may not have all these limitations that you might feel. And then this is just proof that it's possible, okay? So remember that it's within your control and it's still you. Doesn't matter if it's you in your first language, be it Japanese, Spanish, German, Hindi, it doesn't matter. It's still you. In any language. So every time that feeling of, ooh, it's not me, I don't feel. I feel fake. I don't feel authentic. Just like, take a deep breath, center yourself, and say to yourself, it's still me. Okay? Same body, same soul, same presence. So it's all a question of how I want to feel and how I want to show up and not let those external thing things impact you. The second thing I want you to remember is that your voice is needed in the world. Your words matter. You deserve to take up time and space and to express yourself and to get stuck if needed. When you think of that, when you think of you deserve to claim that space in the world, then you might stretch out a little bit and use your voice to its fullest and say what you think, even though you don't have the perfect vocabulary and not judge yourself for every single mistake that you make. Okay, so just like, feel like you're allowed to expand, that you deserve to expand. Also remember that the more you limit yourself, right, the more you stay in that experience, the more stuck you'll stay in your English and your fluency, you in your confidence level. So I know that these things are important to you. I know that you want to be more confident. I know that you want to be more fluent. And these two things go together. And the way to get there is very different. Some people get there through a lot of practice. Some people get there through doing pronunciation work, which is something that I love helping my students with. Some people do it through learning all the theory and putting it into practice. Some people move to a different country or find a hundred conversation partners. It doesn't matter how you do it. There are many different ways to reach fluency and confidence, but none of these ways are going to be effective unless you also shift your thinking. And if you keep thinking of yourself as small, as limited, this is always going to be your experience. So the more you limit yourself, the more stuck you'll be, and the more stuck you'll be with your English progress. And the last thing is, what have you got to lose? Okay? What have you got to lose by being you? By taking up more space, by being louder, by being prouder, right? What have you got to lose? The worst thing that could happen is that people may have negative thoughts about you. Are you willing to risk feeling that? Knowing that some people might judge you for the possibility of you feeling more in your power, feeling more in control of who you are, feeling full and expressive and like yourself, and think of what communication could Be like if you were to feel funny and expressive and authentic and just you not like someone else, right? Not like you don't need to sound like a native speaker. You don't need to sound like a professional. You need to sound like you so you feel like you. And you need to use all the things that you've already learned and all the things that you know and just use it. Because you're also using probably half of the English that you know, right? Which also makes you feel limited. And the reason for that is probably lack of practice, lack of strategy, but also not feeling like you deserve to use all of that. We're not giving yourself the opportunities. So I want you to reflect on that. If you want, you can just go and journal for a few minutes thinking about this question. How do I limit myself in English? And I specifically want you to ask, how do I limit myself? And now how English is limiting me? Because English is not the problem. English doesn't do anything to you. It's you who are doing this to you. It's how you think about it. It's how you show up. Okay? And the good news is that you can change that because it's up to you. You can't change other people's thoughts, but you can change your own thoughts. And that's a great way to start, okay? So if you want to share your thoughts, please share them in the comments below. If you're listening to the podcast, feel free to just send me a DM on Instagram and share with me what you think. And if you'd like to be a part of my community and membership and learn more with me, I highly recommend that you check out beyond, which is my English practice community and membership. This is where we have these kinds of conversations with all the time. We have daily sprints, conversation groups with peers. We have daily lessons about all the different topics in English, grammar, vocabulary. And it's just such a great experience to be a part of this incredible community. So it's available for you to join. So go check it out@hadar shemesh.com beyond or click the link in the description below. Have a beautiful, beautiful rest of the day, be you. You are loved, you deserve to be heard. And go out there, do your thing. The world's waiting. Okay, take care and I'll see you next week in the next video.

Bye.