Humility and learning
To speak a language you have to have a shift in your consciousness from your native language to your target language. This takes a lot of humility. If you are a prideful person you will not be able to do it. Why? Because you are so smart in your native language and to speak in your target language you will be very limited in your expression and make a lot of mistakes and even might sound stupid. This is a main problem with adults. They are shackled by the bonds of excess pride. You need to be humble and say I am no better than anyone else and I will sound very silly for a long while in this language. You need to let go of your native language consciousness and make a full shift. Not a half, sometimes shifts.
Even if you think and speak and think wrong it does not matter. I teach English and do not think in perfect “Cambridge-King’s English” So what. It is really about being strong enough to be humble and try to replace your native language stream of consciousness with your target language stream of consciousness.
Tags: How to learn a language
3 responses to Humility and language learning
Pride and pronunciation do not make up the problem, the vocabulary is the real problem
Your right! Vocabulary is a given. You need to know this. You need to learn more than 2000 words to get off the ground. But even if you know 5000 words and their meaning you will have to shift your thinking to your target language and that takes work. When I teach students I see a lot of resistance to this, alot of complaining and many people just revert back to their native language as its easier. Living in Poland for several years most English and Americans speak little Polish after several years, they can not humble themselves to speak at a basic level for a while and always switch back to English.
And second problem (if you already know more than 2000 words) is – I’m not sure as to qualify this – the feeling of meanings.
Leave a reply to Humility and language learning