Last week I posted on my Posterous (my unedited, whenever I feel like posting, random thoughts “diary”) about the 5 Levels of Fluency. As you already know if you pay attention to Benny (Happy Birthday Benny!), a lot of learning a new language is confidence and making mistakes in conversations with native speakers.
My lack of confidence in speaking Polish has always been due to the fact that I should know how to speak well (I was born here!) and I was embarrassed that, while I could easily get around in Poland, I stammered, stumbled, and misspoke. (I still stammer, stumble, and misspeak.) I wasn’t giving myself any slack for having no real practice with the language for a good 10 years. I mean, I speak with my Parents regularly, but that is not nearly enough.
And yes, I may have been born here, but my family left to Austria when I was 6 months old, and then the US when I was 1. Not much language practice there. ;)
I know quite a lot of people who have Parents who speak other languages but they don’t speak a word themselves. I should have given myself credit for at least being semi-fluent. The first 6-7 weeks were somewhat of a struggle none-the-less because I was too far into my head. That is all neither here nor there now. I’m really happy I decided to come back here and I am falling in love with this city. If it wasn’t for the fact that it has a Fall/Winter/Spring that are not up to my temperature requirements I would definitely stay longer.
More on confidence:
If you didn’t read Thursday’s article How To Be More Confident I highly suggest you read it as well as all the comments. Lots of good stuff in there. If you’re into that article, a tweet or a facebook share would rock my Saturday.
Links 2, 3, 4 … (I probably shouldn’t throw an old Rammstein reference into my article without making it known, so … made known!)
8 Ways To Be More Confident: Live The Life of Your Dreams by Lori Deschene
In keeping with the confidence theme here is some more great advice about confidence. Lori and I planned this. Kidding. I don’t know Lori. Hi Lori! I love TinyBuddha. Blog high five.
How To Stop Living For Others’ Approval by Tammy Strobel
Ja to kocham. ;)
The 20 Essential Habits of Highly Passionate People by Henri Juntilla
A great list here from Henri. I have nothing of consequence to add. :)
Start Before You’re Ready by Steven Pressfield
“By the time we’re ready, it’s too late.”
I’ve stated it before, but as far as Wednesday blog articles go, there is none better than Steven Pressfield’s. If I was only allowed to read one blog on Wednesdays it would be this one.
The Best Way To Deal With Loss by David Cain
David writes the blog Raptitude and I love it. He’s at a few thousand readers right now. In one year I suspect he’ll have exponentially more. :)
This is the story of his ruined laptop and how, in the grand scheme of things, life is amazing.
Vegan and Vegetarian: Questions and Answers by Niall Doherty
Although these are specifically Niall’s answers and mine would be different, I get enough questions on this topic to warrant sending you here to get Niall’s perspective.
On Monday I’m posting an article about Stress Free Vegan Travel. It’s an epic at ~2,500 words. It might piss you off if you’re vegan, and you probably won’t read it if you’re not. Sweet! ;)
That’s all for this week.
Questions/comments/this? You know what to do…