August 3, 2014 =========
☆ belief　信念
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Continuing on from yesterday’s thoughts – I think one reason is about “belief”. The beliefs we have can really affect our confidence. In Australia, we learn Japanese at school, and even though 95% of the students can only count to ten, and say nothing else in Japanese they don’t have any beliefs that say, “I can’t speak Japanese.” Or “Japanese is difficult.”
However, when I taught at the Eikaiwa school, I met a lot of people who had beliefs like, “Japanese people can’t speak English” or “English is difficult for Japanese people.” Naturally if you have this sort of belief, it’s going to be hard to improve at English! Even if you really want to be a good speaker, you’ll have this negative belief holding you back.
If you have this kind of belief, try to change it if you can. For example, “Japanese people can’t speak English” could become “I can’t speak English well, but I’m getting better.” In other words, make sure your belief is an “I” statement, and also that there is some positive part to it.
Bye,
Chris