S5E4: Sometimes, let’s not go the extra mile
Full transcript:
Good morning, happy Thursday and welcome to the LCP, the daily dose of language courage for people who love languages, and those who really don’t, but have to learn one anyway!
So to celebrate the launch of the Be Your Own Best teacher sprint, all this week on the podcast, we’re going to be asking some questions to help us look back on our school experiences of language learning, bring what’s useful along with us into the present day, and leave all the rest behind.
And today, I want to talk about something that I heard so much at school, and just around and about schoolwork. And that is the phrase “go the extra mile”.
I always felt so much pressure to, not just do the thing, but do the bestest of best things. It needed to be done, okay. But it also needed to be neat, and pretty, and somehow quirky or original, and entertaining, and the list went on and on. It wasn’t enough to deliver the thing. It had to be impressive, on as many levels as I could conceive of, all the time.
And I’m pretty sure I’m not alone in this.
Because we don’t even know when we’ve gone the full distance with whatever we’re trying to do, but we just know we should go further than that. It’s like rocket fuel for any perfectionist, because it tells you that ticking the box of done, is only the first step. Then you have a whole journey of ‘extra’ to give, but extra what, who knows?
So today, language learners, if this is you, I just want to give you permission to say no to going the extra mile. It’s a card you can use whenever you want, as many times as you want. Because there will days when you feel amazing and energised or super generous, and there will be be tasks where you feel inspired to overdeliver, and you’ll know what you’ll want to do, and you’ll feel really good about it. But overdelivering doesn’t need to be the standard in every task you set yourself to reach your goal. Not for your teachers, not for you.
Sometimes, we don’t need to go the extra mile. Sometimes, we need to just get stuff done. So when you look at your to-do list today, let yourself define, clearly, what ‘good enough’ means on each of the things you’re going to be doing, so that you know when you can let yourself stop. You can call that task done, stop, and move on with your day.
And just some reminders from this week, there are a lot of things changing around here at the moment! This September sees the launch of The Language Project website, and its first ever group programme called Be Your Own Best Teacher, which will take place between September and December. And to celebrate, I would love to invite you to a two week Welcome-to-September celebration and free taster of my Be Your Own Best Teacher group programme to kick off the academic year (even if you're not in formal study any more!) to help you start the Autumn/Fall in a really compassionate way that suits your personality, your circumstances, and what you’re actually trying to do with your language.
We'll be mixing workshops, journaling, coworking and group accountability calls to help us detangle our present-day language learning from our schooldays, sift through our experiences, and make sure we’re bringing all the good stuff along, and leaving the less useful stuff behind. It starts next Monday, that is Monday 11th September, it’s going to be completely free, there’s no pressure at all to join the full programme afterwards, it’s just a way for you to see what it’s all about and for me to thank you for all your support over the past year. It’s only open to listeners of the podcast, members of the LCP community, and people that you decide to invite because you think they’ll love it too, so please spread the word to all the other creative, mission-driven linguists out there who want to make this process as meaningful and fulfilling as possible.
If you’d like more information, send me a DM on Instagram at @teawithemily or an email to emily@languageconfidenceproject.com.
I can’t wait to see you there! Have a wonderful day, and I will see you tomorrow.