S4E27: ‘Not now’ isn’t ‘never’

Full transcript:

Good morning, happy Tuesday and welcome to the Language Confidence Project, the daily dose of language courage for people who love languages, and those who really don’t, but have to learn one anyway.

And today I just wanted to pop in with a really quick reminder that just because something is hard now, just because you struggle with something now, or you can’t do something now, it doesn’t mean you’ll never be able to do it.

For so many of us, our brains are very all-or-nothing when it comes to its evaluations of what we’re capable of. And I know that for a lot of us here, our brain heads straight for the nothing side of all or nothing. it’s amazing how quickly we go from “I can’t do this thing yet” to “I’ll never be able to do this thing. This thing just isn’t for people like me.”

But it’s not true, language learners. Learning a language is a process and I know it’s frustrating. I know it’s hard to visualise being able to do something that right now feels completely out of your reach. But every time you look at a baby, who can’t walk, can’t talk, barely crawls, it’s hard to imagine that they’re soon going to be grown up humans that are able to read and write and study and get a job and open a pension fund, but guess what, they do grow up. And it’s exactly the same when it comes to building new skills.

So no matter, what your brain is telling you, don’t mix up not yet and never. Even if you can’t see it, this is possible for you. Even if you don’t know how to get there yet, don’t lose faith that you can get there. You don’t have to have it all planned out today. You don’t need to have all the answers right now. So take all the pressure off that’s telling you that you need to catapult yourself from beginner to expert because you really don’t. You just need to gradually build the skills and routines and experience to light up the one tiny next step on your path.

One day, you’ll look back and you’ll be able to do all the things that Beginner You was sure was impossible. Just keep going, keep chipping away at it, and remember what you’re doing it all for. 

Remember, every tiny thing you achieve today counts, and every word matters.

Have a wonderful day, and I’ll see you tomorrow.