3 Lessons I Learned from 3 Mistakes in front of 230 people.

In this episode of the Speak English Fearlessly podcast, we'll dive into mistake making and how mistakes can be powerful learning opportunities if you see them in the right way.

We'll also talk together about how to develop a healthier mindset toward mistake-making: embracing errors, rather than avoiding them, can help you make faster progress with your English skills!

We'll discuss the significance of continuous practice, realistic expectations, and the growth that stems from imperfections.

00:00 Introduction: Admitting My Mistakes

01:10 The Importance of Mistakes in Learning

01:30 Welcome to the Speak English Fearlessly Podcast

02:11 Common Mistakes and Their Impact

03:32 Revealing My Podcast Mistakes

04:45 Reflecting on My Mistakes

06:46 Learning from Mistakes

09:34 Embracing Imperfection

15:03 Final Thoughts and Encouragement

17:15 Subscribe for More Tips

Links mentioned today:

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The quote by Jeffrey S. Nevid, Ph.D., ABPP

The road of life is strewn with disappointing, frustrating experiences and outright failures (my pitiful attempts at tennis come to mind). But losing does not make one a loser, and even a pitiful performance on a tennis court does not render one pitiful. A failure is just that, a failure; it does not make a person a failure unless the person labels themself a failure. Life experiences, whether positive or negative, are not statements about personhood—not unless we apply these words to ourselves and permit them to pierce the veil of our personhood.

Three episodes ago, I made three mistakes in my podcast. I usually make mistakes every time I record one of these, but I usually find a way to edit them out. My mistakes tend to be mispronouncing something, getting lost with what I was trying to say next, or having something or someone interrupt me. Like I said, I will often edit those mistakes out so that you don't get to hear them.

But three episodes ago, I thought I had caught all of my mistakes and had edited them out and had edited them out. Did you hear that? I just made a mistake and I'm going to leave it in there, I thought I had caught all of my mistakes and had edited them all out. But I was wrong, and I'm going to play those mistakes for you, shine the spotlight right on them for all to see, because you might have missed them. But I want to point out what I did wrong and share what I've learned from my own mistake making that will hopefully help you when you make a mistake with your English.

Why? Well, simple. What you do after making a mistake can help you grow, Or it can totally tear you down. So today let's talk all about mistake making.

  📍

Well, hello there and welcome to the speak English fearlessly podcast. This is the podcast for motivated English learners who want to speak English fearlessly and learn practical tips and strategies to conquer the CELPIP exam.

I also love to feature encouraging interviews with regular people. People just like you, who are working towards becoming fluent in English, so we can learn from their experiences together. Who am I? My name is Aaron Nelson, and I've been an English teacher for over 16 years, and I now help students prepare for the CELPIP exam through online classes.

Ah, yes. Mistakes. They come in all sizes and shapes, don't they? And when you're learning how to use a new language, those mistakes can come pretty hard and fast. And they can impact you in so many different ways, most of them negatively, depending on what you tell yourself, about yourself, about the mistake you just made.

A commonly held idea is that mistakes should be avoided. and at all costs. This is especially true when you're learning a new language like English. I have friends, for example, who are so afraid of making mistakes with their English that they avoid using it as much as possible. And you know something?

Their strategy works really well for them because they don't make any mistakes. But it also works against them, because their English never gets better. The truth is this. Mistake making is part of the process of developing your English skills. If you look at your mistakes properly and be careful what you tell yourself, about yourself when you make a mistake, you will find that you do your best learning from your mistakes.

So here are my mess ups, my mistakes from a few episodes ago that I mentioned in the introduction.

  They easily began talking about where they were living before. Their adventures in getting packed and ready to move to their new spot and unpacking all over again.

 Sometimes taking that step of stepping out of your comfort zone and going where the action is, is a big step.

Point number two, you need to engage. If you're anything like me, sometimes taking that step of actually stepping outside of your comfort zone and going where the action is, is a big step for you to take.

 And in case you missed it, the three mistakes were a mic bump. A text message arriving on my cell phone and repeating myself after trying to edit out something.

At the time of this recording, that episode has been heard by 230 people in 34 countries. Oh my goodness, that's a lot of people and a lot of countries. When I first heard those mistakes, I was on my way to work. On the day it went live. I always listen to my episodes on their launch day to make sure they sound right.

When I first heard them, when I first heard those mistakes, I remember blurting shoot loudly as I waited for the stoplight to turn green. The mic bump, that mic bump was so loud. And as I started moving again, I thought, well, Editing out that mistake would have been impossible for my underdevelopment editing skills. So, I shrugged and told myself, Eh, that's alright. It was just one mistake. But several minutes later, I heard more background noise.

Ugh! That's not good! But then, then, the moment came. A text message arriving midway through my recording. The bzzzt bzzzt. I had made the mistake of leaving my phone on the desk next to my microphone. Which, as you heard, picked it up quite easily. I had totally and completely missed that when I was editing.

I remember thinking, how on earth did I miss that? And then I was interrupted by yet another mistake just a few seconds later. I had attempted to edit something out but ended up starting the audio again in the wrong spot so I ended up repeating myself in the audio like you just heard. Oh man. That's likely one of the worst published episodes for mistakes that I've recorded so far.

And I've been at this for over a year and three months and 72 episodes. You'd think by now I'd be pretty much error free, right? Nope. I'm still making mistakes.

As I arrived at work that day, I'm thankful to report that what I was telling myself had changed when compared to the first few episodes where I struggled to record single sentences, let alone full episodes. And where my self talk went something like, Jeez, you suck at this. Podcasting is what other people do, but not you.

Are you really sure this is something you should be doing with your time? Maybe, maybe you should just quit. This is not your thing. No, but this time. I was surprised to find myself smiling and thinking, I'm going to leave this stuff in there. I can make a whole episode around it and talk about how to deal with making mistakes.

Yep, instead of seeing those errors as something to be avoided, I realized how they could help me help you. Here's how. Number one, realize that mistake making happens all the time and to everyone. In my case with my mic bumps and phone buzzes, I told myself that it was okay. It wasn't the end of the world. I decided to look at the mistakes as an opportunity to help you. With language learning, mistakes can for sure feel embarrassing. Hey, did you notice that the mistakes I'm talking about with my podcast have been heard at the time of this recording by over 230 people?

And did I mention that they were from 34 different countries around the world? Yeah, I know a little bit about doing embarrassing things. There's not much you can do to avoid that kind of thing from happening in your day to day. When you're trying to use your English, you just can't. It's just part of the process, but you can and should change the way you look at your mistake.

For me, My mishaps quickly became an opportunity to help. For you, your mistakes in English, be it a pronunciation mistake, an incorrect verb tense, or simply not knowing what to say next, can help you out a great deal. How? Because mistakes give you something. They give you laser focus on what you need to practice.

Have you ever felt unsure of what you need to do to improve your English? Well, what was your last mistake? What was the correct way for you to say what you were trying to say? Figure it out and practice saying it, so you'll be ready for the next time. Mistakes can help you focus your practice.

The second thing I learned, I'm not a terrible podcaster. Number two, I'm not a terrible podcaster.

Like I mentioned before, if this would have happened a year ago, I would have likely died inside, after hearing those mistakes. And would have likely tried to take the episode down in a frantic panic, feeling deeply embarrassed about what I had done. This time, I saw it way differently. as an opportunity to help as an opportunity to help you hopefully realize that mistake making is normal and even an important part of getting better at something.

An even bigger realization, a mistake is just a mistake. It's not a person. It doesn't become who you are unless you give it permission to. Dr. Jeffrey Nevid writes, The road of life is strewn with disappointing, frustrating experiences and outright failures. My pitiful attempts at tennis come to mind. But losing does not make one a loser.

And even a pitiful performance on a tennis court does not render one pitiful. A failure is just that a failure. It does not make a person a failure unless the person labels themself, a failure. Life experiences, whether positive or negative, are not statements about personhood. Not unless we apply these words to ourselves and permit them to pierce the veil of our personhood.

Woo! Now that's a big quote. Did you catch all of that? Failing at English does not mean you are a failure as an English speaker. Just like my many podcast mistakes don't make me a failure as a podcaster. I don't know if you heard that, but my phone just beeped and I committed the same mistake as I did before.

I forgot to take my phone, put it on silence, which is what I'm going to do right now. I'm putting it on silence and I'm going to move it away from my microphone and then I'm going to get back to talking with you. So. Where was I? Did you catch all of that? Failing at English does not mean you are a failure as an English speaker.

Just like my many podcast mistakes don't make me a failure as a podcaster. But my failures can become who I think of myself as being if I choose to allow myself to think of myself in that way.

You know what I'm saying? If you label yourself as a failure just because you've made a mistake with your English, then chances are you're going to take that label on and believe that it's true. You shouldn't be doing that. Making a mistake in English does not make you a failure. It just makes you human.

It just makes you a normal living, breathing human being. I'm going to play some of the mistakes I made in this very episode, all about making mistakes. I've got quite a few so far. I think I'm what, how many minutes in I am 14 minutes and 32 seconds in, and I'd be willing to bet I've got a full two or three minutes of mistakes that I can share with you at the end of this podcast, but anyway, mistake making.

is normal. It's part of life. It doesn't make you a mistake. It doesn't make you a failure.

So if you tend to beat yourself up when you make a mistake with your English, try changing what you tell yourself about yourself. Because here's the real truth. The only time, the only single time I never made a mistake with my podcast was when I wasn't making 📍 podcasts! . I'm going to say that again. The only single time that I never made a mistake with my podcast episodes was when I wasn't making 📍 podcasts .

According to his website, his shows have been downloaded over 3. 1 million times. Million. Million times. That's a lot of people. And that number, by the way, is over two years out of date. It's probably a lot bigger today. You'd think someone who's been doing this for almost 23 years would be perfect at it, right?

Well, no, he's not. Almost every show has a bit on the end where he plays his bloopers. All of his outtakes. All of his mistakes. They're often hilarious. And what I love about listening to them is that they let me know this one truth. It reminds me of this one truth. Everyone makes mistakes. You don't have to be perfect.

You just have to keep on keeping on.

And that leads me to my last point. It's most important to get yourself out there. Perfection comes over time. The most important thing is getting each episode out. For me, With this podcast, that's the most important thing, getting each episode out. Now, they need to be the best I can get them to be, but I don't have to be perfect.

And, mostly, they aren't. I do put in a lot of hard work to create each of these episodes that you're listening to. Often, each one takes me four or five hours to put together. From writing the script, recording it, Editing it, and finally uploading it. I work on these a lot, and I love doing it. But if I was only allowing myself to post new episodes when I knew they were absolutely perfect, I would likely not be 73 episodes in right now.

I think the only way for you to make progress with your English is to be using it day in and day out. And learning. From your mistakes as best you can. Waiting to have your English all together and perfect before you try and use it Will mean you'll never get to use it. By the way, even native English speakers Hello, like me, if you've been listening, you've heard me make quite a few mistakes over the course of this episode.

Even native speakers make mistakes when they're using English. It happens to everybody. So don't focus on completely removing every possible mistake. Focus instead on getting yourself out there and using the English that you have, imperfections and all. You'll develop your skills over time as you go.

Just like I'm building my podcasting skills every time I put one of these episodes together. I seriously learn something new about myself and about the art of podcasting each and every time. Was this episode helpful? Then you should subscribe to my free weekly newsletter. Every week I take a look at what I talked about in each podcast episode as a way to help you review what we've been talking about together.

And I also share extra tips and extra strategies to help you develop your English skills and get ready for the CELPIP exam. There's a new edition each and every Tuesday, and best of all, it's totally free. To sign up, just go to celpipsuccess.com/subscribe That's celpipsuccess.com/subscribe.

Thanks so much for listening to today's episode. I will see you again next Tuesday. Bye bye.