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<\/a><\/p>\nFor a long time, I was afraid to speak the languages I was learning. I still have trouble getting the courage to speak in certain situations or with certain people. It isn’t something that I got over immediately, but I’ve slowly improved over several years.<\/p>\n
In my case, I was afraid of one thing: making mistakes.<\/p>\n
I felt that if I made a mistake something terrible would happen. I don’t know what, but something terrible. People would laugh. Or they would think I said something embarrassing or stupid. Maybe the world would explode!<\/p>\n
But being anxious or uncomfortable will simply make your language ability worse, increasing the likelihood that you’ll make a mistake. It’s a self-fulfilling prophecy.<\/p>\n
How did I get over it?\u00a0By making a ton of mistakes!\u00a0The more I made myself speak, the more mistakes I made. And you know what? Nothing bad happened! Everything was fine.<\/p>\n
My first year spent in USA helped increase my confidence more than anything else. I was forced to speak. At first, I was very nervous in government offices. But I had no choice.<\/p>\n
Now I’m a master of the tax office (Urz\u0105d skarbowy<\/strong>), immigration office (Urz\u0105d spraw cudzoziemskich<\/strong>), city hall (Urz\u0105d miasta<\/strong>) and social security (Zak\u0142ad Ubezpiecze\u0144 Spo\u0142ecznych<\/strong>).<\/p>\n Recording videos of myself speaking in English has helped a lot too. In every video I make several mistakes and I notice them while listening to them.<\/p>\n Not everyone can travel to the country where their target language is spoken. And being forced to speak can be a pretty bad experience in itself.<\/p>\n So here is what I recommend:<\/p>\n \u2740 Find one person you are comfortable speaking with in your target language (ex. your spouse, friend, a good teacher, etc).<\/p>\n \u2740 Create the most comfortable situation possible (ex. in your home with a cup of herbal tea).<\/p>\n \u2740 Talk with them as much as you can!<\/p>\n \u2740 You will make mistakes – and that’s ok! You’ll soon see that nothing bad happens and you’ll learn to be less afraid.<\/p>\n For me, I’m more comfortable talking to other non-native speakers, meaning people who are also learning the language. Of course, you’ll want to talk to native speakers eventually, but you have to start somewhere.<\/p>\n Good luck and please share your suggestions with us:)<\/p>\n \n Do nast<\/strong>\u0119pnego razu… <\/strong>(Till next time…)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" No matter how well you know a language, you can’t communicate with anyone if you’re afraid to use it. While it might not seem like this has anything to do with language learning, this is a problem that affects a lot of people. Even me! For a long time, I was afraid to speak the…<\/p>\n