Learning languages as an adult, a true act of vulnerability
When I created this website to promote my coaching and career counselling services, I thought writing and publishing Blogs on a regular basis would be a good idea to interact with my network and the people interested in similar topics. Nothing revolutionary in doing that but important in the context of setting-up my own practice.
One of the first topic that came to mind was language learning as an adult. Why? Because it’s personal, I’m experiencing it right now and here is where I am:
For 2 years, I’ve been learning a new language from almost scratch;
I love doing it and hate it at the same time;
On top of learning this new language, I do my very best to discover and really understand the culture as I live in the country as well;
I’ve learnt on average 1 language every 10 years: French as my mother tongue, Spanish as a student, English as my working language and, today, German with my family;
The last time I learnt a language from almost scratch, I was a student, with no kids and no Corona virus, meaning that I could go out whenever I wanted to and socialize with whoever I wanted to, sounds like another age, right?
Finally, I just turned 40, meaning that I was 20 years younger last time I learned a language. This tiny difference in the age of humanity makes a huge difference in the age of learning a language 😉.
Whether you learn a new language, being abroad or not, for fun, for work, to understand what your family says (my case), or any other good reasons including no reason at all, I hope this article will help you better manage moments of too much exposure, demotivation and frustration, and simply make you feel prouder of what you’re currently undertaking.
I’m not going to teach you how to best learn a language because I’m simply incapable of that. I have my own struggle in that area and I’m still learning how to best learn and keep the motivation up. I would simply like to share some of my experience, bring you some practical tools, reminders and, hopefully, help you “positivize” this journey which can be quite a bumpy ride.
First, be proud of what you’re doing
Always remember, you’re “making the first step”, you’re learning the language of someone else you want to interact with in the future. Whatever language you’re learning, whatever your reason is, it is a good one because you’re putting your energy and efforts into something that connect and build bridges between people, which tends to be forgotten nowadays and not be recognized as it should be. You’re simply being curious and generous…
Welcome and embrace “someone else” within yourself
Let me explain and elaborate on this before you think I’m getting a bit weird here 😉. When you speak a foreign language, your “world” changes: your confidence may drop, your listening skills may increase as you speak less and observe/listen more, the perception of people about you will differ as well. Bottom line, you become someone else when you speak a foreign language. You have a weakness in the language you speak but you develop strengths along the way including resilience, curiosity, active listening, empathy, and many other soft skills. Accepting this “new person” within you is vital and always comparing this “new one” with the “original one” is useless. Indeed, you will never manage to speak and express yourself as good as in your mother language. It’s a fact so don’t even dream about it.
Imagine you as a new born instead of trying to clone who you already are. This image will help you create your own story with the words you’re progressively learning instead of trying to translate everything from your mother tongue, and failing or at least not properly learning. Forming new memories of yourself learning a new language will help you drastically improve your level. This video of Gabriel Wyner, someone I would have love to have as language teacher, explains why and how to form memories.
I personally have a lot of fun when non-French speaking people try to say my name properly. It usually gives Julian in English, Yulian in German, Rrroulian in Spanish. This reinforces in a way my statement of becoming someone else.
Finally, when you develop a strong friendship/relationship with someone in a foreign language, when you understand his/her culture and you reach a decent level of speaking, it’s like looking at the world with a different perspective, with a new pair of eyes, and you simply become more tolerant and open.
Don’t try to be perfect. Do you very best to understand, be understood… and deliver your key messages
Understand: Actively listen, in order to make sure you understand the sense of the discussion (let’s say 60% or more). You don’t need to understand every single word, you need to know what the person means by paying attention to the body language, tone of voice and of course, words.
In order to practice my listening while being alone, I turned on the radio every time I could to “immerse” myself in the language. Even if you don’t understand much at the beginning, you familiarize yourself with the intonations, the rhythm, the emotions, the voice, the words and it helped tremendously when I later listened to people and understand, not necessarily what was exactly said, but what was going on.
Be understood…: I still remember exactly the day where the teacher in my German class told us in preparation of an important oral exam where we had to give a short presentation of ourselves: “Don’t try to formulate complicated sentences the assessor will have difficulties to understand, keep it simple even if you don’t express everything you would like to” …Basic advice but so important.
…and deliver your key message: Keeping it simple doesn’t mean being simplistic, uninteresting or boring. It simply means being clear and concise enough that your audience understand what you’re saying and doesn’t get lost in too complicated descriptions or stories. Think of those great inspiring presentations available online with usually a couple of graphs, a few keywords and inspiring images filling the slides. On the other side, think of super wordy presentations you’ve at least once attended to (or gave 😉) at your workplace. There is one you will remember…the other not. I feel it’s the same impact on your audience when you speak a foreign language.
Be ready to fail…big time, over and over again!
Let me guess…the first time you tried to be intentionally funny in a foreign language, the discussion had already moved on and, therefore, either you kept your joke to yourself or you had the courage to say it out loud but you didn’t get the results you expected. It’s just an example of experiencing failure, frustration or in that case, a “moment of solitude” as we say in French. And there are many of those situations all along the road to mastering a foreign language – misunderstanding, feeling ridiculous, communication limitation, extra work generated, feeling useless, etc.
The more you will take those “painful” situations not too seriously, the better you will feel. Take it as a game, as something fun. In order to do that, try to identify situations where you felt good and try to replicate them, and avoid repeating situations where you didn’t feel comfortable.
And always remember, if you want to be perfect at speaking a foreign language, you will simply never speak.
Learn from your experiences and adjust
Finding you own learning method in order to have fun in the process, and therefore, to learn more efficiently is essential (watching films, talking to people, reading, looking at “foreign” recipes when you cook, etc). On that topic, there is an interesting talk on the secrets of learning a new language, which gives good, simple advices on how to learn a language and enjoy the process of it.
I’ll share a personal example: Dinner with friends where I’m the only foreigner. We all speak German during the entire evening. I feel excellent at the beginning, engaged, curious, not afraid of doing plenty of mistakes, happy to ask questions and even more happy when someone asks me one. The problem usually comes after 2-3 hours, we’re still sitting at the table, we’re having different conversations at the same time, my level of active listening is dropping minute by minute, I don’t dare asking questions anymore as I’m having difficulties to really follow any of the discussions and I shut myself off thinking I’m still not good enough, that I am a looser… Why? Because it’s too much, too long and at some point, I just “disconnect” and give up.
In that situation, I have the choice of keeping doing what I’m doing (status quo) until it gets better, until I significantly improve my level. Or change something, immediately... For example, telling my wife how I feel, changing the set-up when we invite for dinner such as playing games after eating, dancing or having dinner at 2 or 3 different places as our close friends live nearby, which changes the atmosphere every hour, add some fun and, therefore, keeps me “alive”.
And this can be replicated with the same principle at work with how you set your meetings for example. See what’s working, when you feel good, confident and willing to engage and try to remove as much as possible situations where you feel down and disconnected. You always have the choice to change something you don’t feel comfortable with, that makes you think you’re not good enough.
Focus on small wins rather than the final goal
The “step by step” approach is actually very important when you think of learning a language. Especially when you have ambitious objectives – for example: being able to make business presentations at work, complete an entire recruitment process in a foreign language, being fully socially integrated abroad, getting a diploma, etc. Celebrate your small wins in communicating in another language: ordering bread at the bakery – yes! Greeting a colleague in the corridor – yes! Having a basic talk with your mother-in-law - yes! Understanding your first joke – amazing! Delivering a presentation in front of you team – Boom!
Conclusion
Learning a language is tough, you feel exposed, you may feel useless, speechless, penalized at work or in real life to express what would be basic things in your mother tongue. But it is also a fantastic opportunity to learn and to continue learning during your entire life. Being vulnerable is having the courage to expose yourself knowing that you may fail, again and again…until one day where you make progress and truly achieve something. Learning a new language as well teaches you important “soft” skills such as listening, being curious, tolerant and compassionate.
Let me finish with a quote from Dr. Thomas Szasz (Hungarian American academic and psychiatrist) that says it all: “Every act of conscious learning requires the willingness to suffer an injury to one’s self-esteem. That is why young children, before they are aware of their own self-importance, learn so easily; and why older persons, especially if vain or important, cannot learn at all”.
Be vulnerable, be willing to learn.
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