Fluent You Explained Clearly

If you feel like you've been learning a foreign language for many, many years, but you're still not fluent, you're going to want to watch this video because I used to be there. I used to chase fluency like it was a finish line. I wanted to have perfect grammar, perfect pronunciation. if I made a mistake or forgot how to say a specific word that made me feel really upset. But the truth is something that I actually got to learn over the years. A very big lesson that has helped me a lot is that the moment you stop obsessing over fluency, you actually start feeling fluent. Hi

guys, welcome to my channel. I'm Veronica and here we talk about language learning that actually fits into your life and that actually makes you feel good. I think that when you're learning a foreign language, it should feel personal, fun, and actually rooted in your everyday habits. I don't think your studying should lead you to burnout or perfectionism. If you're looking for a way to stay organized in all of your language learning, I highly recommend checking out my notion template for language learners. It works in an amazing way if you want to stay organized and track your

progress in one place. Also, check out my language mastery program. It is a short self-paced course where I share the science behind language learning and how you can learn any language by yourself. You can find all the links to everything I mentioned in the description below. Okay, now let's talk about the first habit that has helped me a lot and that is attach the language to your existing identity. This habit is going to be amazing especially to those of you guys who always say that I don't have enough time. I don't know how to make time or make room for

language learning and I don't know what to do. I really used to think that if I wanted to learn a foreign language, I had to build a whole new life for myself in this foreign language. Like I had to practice for hours and hours with books and drills and I had to make it into like a very big and complicated thing. But what I'm realizing for myself more and more is that I actually make real progress when I do something that I love in the language that I'm learning. I talk about this a lot at the very beginning of my English journey. I was watching a lot of YouTubers like their vlogs.

Everything was in English because I just really liked vlogs. Not because I was making myself watch those videos. Not because I was pushing myself to become fluent. No, I was just interested in those videos. I was watching them for fun. I was pausing. I was making sure that I could understand some of the words. I was shadowing because it was fun. Like there was no pressure. I wasn't pressuring myself to be fluent, to sound fluent. And because my driver was this feeling of fun, fluency was a byproduct of me having a good time. After that, I remember I became really passionate

about nutrition. And so I was reading like thick books about nutrition, one after the other, but I wasn't really focused on the fact that all of these books were in English and there were a lot of words I didn't know. and oh my god my English is not perfect yet. No, like those things were not important because the message of the books was so much more important than the language of the books. Like right now, for example, in my Spanish learning journey, what is really helping me create this spark and uh keep the spark alive is the fact that I really like yoga. So every time

I go and practice yoga, first of all, I can go to a local studio and just practice yoga there and listen to the teachers who all speak Spanish. That is absolutely amazing for me. But what I can also do is, you know, read a book about yoga in Spanish or maybe follow some creators who talk about yoga in Spanish or just watch a YouTube video like do a yoga practice in Spanish. In these moments, honestly, I always think about the time when I was in high school, in college, and I had to memorize body parts in like English or Spanish or any other language. And how impossibly hard that was for

me? Because in school, they just give you like a table, right? A table with all of the words you have to memorize. And when I look at a table with no pictures, no context, why? Like, what's the point of all of that? But memorizing body parts while practicing yoga is actually very effortless for me. Often times you don't need more time. Like I have a very busy schedule too. And I don't have 4 hours to dedicate to language learning every single day. I mean sometimes I don't even have an hour to dedicate to language learning. like when I sit down, when I open a grammar book and

I go through all of the exercises, I only have that time on the weekend or I like to have that time on the weekend, but during the week I just love watching YouTube videos, like saving all of the new vocabulary, adding it to an later and this is the majority of my language learning because I prefer to swap habits for their Spanish versions or their English versions. It's like instead of watching a video about yoga in my native language, I'm going to do it in English. I'm going to do it in Spanish and have a good time and also practice my languages at the same time. And I also think

that when you approach language learning this way from the place of how can I integrate it into my life, this starts to become more lasting like your language learning will actually be sustainable. You guys know that I prefer to learn all of my languages, English, Spanish, by actually living in them, by incorporating them in my daily life. And that is why I'm so excited to be partnered with Migaku. Because Migaku makes immersion feel effortless. It's a language learning platform that turns your favorite content from Netflix, YouTube, Disney Plus, Reddit, and

more into a fully interactive learning experience. You can use it through the Maku Chrome extension or their mobile app. And here is what makes it special. You get dual language subtitles, so you can follow along in both your target language and your native language. You can click on any word to get an instant definition and even deeper AI powered explanations. You can check what this word means and then how to pronounce it correctly and then shadow after the speaker. See that? And best of all, Migaku automatically creates flashcards from what you're watching or reading,

so you can actually remember all of the new vocabulary. If you download the Migaku app and click on your profile icon and then choose YouTube, you will be able to watch the videos inside the Migaku app and then automatically create flashcards without needing your laptop. You can even use it with physical books or screenshots thanks to their built-in text recognition and realtime translator, which is perfect if you're like me and love reading physical books. Any Mako subscription will give you access to all of their available languages you can see on the

screen. And I have an exclusive offer for you guys because you're my subscribers. Starting with only $10 per month, you can get 50% off their lifetime subscription. And as I mentioned before, all of the Migaku subscriptions give you access to all of their available languages. The link to check out Migaku is going to be in the description. Okay, now let's talk about my habit number two that has been helping me a lot when it comes to my language learning journey right now. Stop chasing fluency, chase connection. The reason why I benefited from this habit so much is because I used to

be that person who would Google how long do I need to wait to become fluent in English, to become fluent in Spanish. Like I was really looking for this magical solution to become fluent in whatever language I was learning as fast as possible. You know, for me it was a timeline. It was like a race to a finish line. And once I crossed that finish line, once I became fluent, I could just like breathe out, relax. And to be honest, yes, that mindset kind of helped me. That's why I had it. It helped me achieve my goals when it came to my language learning. But also,

it made me incredibly self-critical. Like, I would avoid speaking. I would check every single word in the dictionary like talk to Google Translate before I could start a conversation just because I was so scared to make a mistake. And because of that I was not really focusing on connecting with people on talking to people. The only thing I was focusing on is being perfect is making sure that I sounded as fluent as possible that I made as few mistakes as possible. And here what really helped me is realizing more and more how vague fluency is. Like a lot of different people have their

own definitions of fluency. And some people have a very perfectionist like approach to fluency. Like you're fluent if you know everything, if you never ever make mistakes, if you know all the grammar rules. But I personally don't think it's realistic. And because that is my personal belief that really helped me start shifting from that perfectionist mindset because I knew it wasn't for me. Like I didn't want to become that person who would judge myself so freaking much that I would be scared to speak all the time. But the thing is I'm not a native English speaker. I'm not a native

Spanish speaker. My native language is Russian. And so sometimes I make mistakes when I speak Russian. Sometimes I pause. I need to think. I stumble over my words. But for some reason, I don't give myself this grace when I speak a foreign language because my standards are so impossibly high. And because I think that to belong, I need to be fluent even though no one cares. Like to actually belong, you just need to be yourself and that's it. You don't need to be anyone else. You don't need to chase this vague definition of fluency. And so what I did was I

shifted my goal from becoming fluent to actually talking to people to communicating my thoughts in an effective way to actually expressing what it was that I wanted to express. And also right now, for example, when it comes to my Spanish learning journey, my goal is to just communicate with my husband's family in Spanish to feel like I have enough vocabulary to talk about the things that I want to talk about and also to just not feel this pressure, not feel this pressure to know everything all at once from the very beginning because it just doesn't happen this way. But this

perfectionist fluency first focused mindset always tells us that we have to be perfect from the very beginning and always you know even if you become advanced there's no room for error you absolutely always have to be perfect which is again not realistic makes us feel bad and never actually helps us get closer to our true goals and so when I really switch my focus to connection to what it is that I actually need this language for. I stopped fixating so much on fluency because fluency doesn't mean you speak like a native. It means that you can do what you personally

need to do in this language. If your goal is to watch Spongebob every single day in English or in Spanish and you feel pretty good, you know, when you watch Spongebob in this foreign language, then you have achieved your goal and that is amazing. I know that one of the situations where we feel a lot of pressure is when we're preparing for an exam or a test like a language learning test and that is why we really have to like box ourselves in and only focus on this test on grammar drills and vocabulary tables and stuff like that. I get that you know it's just one part of it.

But the thing is a lot of us put this pressure on ourselves even when we don't need to take any tests. We create those tests for ourselves. Let's say I'm talking to a native speaker and in my head I'm judging myself as if it were a test. I'm noticing all of the mistakes I'm making, all of the words I'm forgetting. And instead of focusing on connection, I focus so much on sounding fluent, on sounding perfect. And honestly, I've noticed for myself that when I focus on connection, fluency becomes a byproduct. When I learn my language consistently still, you know,

I watch YouTube, I focus on connection, I focus on feeling good, like doing something that makes me feel excited. I do improve my language skills. Like those things start to happen in a natural way. I just don't pressure myself so much if you know what I mean. Okay, now let's move on to habit number three, which is try to focus on your identity instead of your motivation. instead of looking for this feeling of oh my god I'm so motivated to learn English to learn Spanish because motivation is very fleetating like one day you have it the next day you don't and often times

we don't have motivation and if you're constantly searching for this feeling of motivation before beginning a certain task you will be searching for a very long time because for me I often find that my identity the way I see myself really drives my behior behavior. If I see myself as a person who is trying to learn Spanish, who hates Spanish, who thinks Spanish is so complicated, I honestly don't think I'm going to be practicing Spanish very often because I see myself as a person who doesn't really like this language. And so because I believe that your

identity really drives your behavior, if you view yourself as a person who hates this foreign language, who hates everything connected to studying and learning, it will be very hard for you to show up and actually be dedicated to your practice. And so I think for me right now, when it comes to language learning, when it comes to all of the different habits that I have, it's not really about like a specific habit. It's about how I see myself. If I see myself as a Spanish speaker, I will show up like one. I will look for those opportunities to practice Spanish,

to speak with people, to make sure that I listen to podcasts, watch YouTube videos, that this language is a part of my life because I am a Spanish speaker. Even if I make mistakes, even if I don't know every single rule and I don't conjugate my verbs perfectly every single time, I still belong in this language because my core belief is I'm a person who communicates in Spanish. My core belief is not I'm perfect in Spanish, I'm perfect in English. Absolutely not. because I tried going down that path of perfect fluency, never ever making a mistake,

knowing every single rule, never showing people that look, I forgot, you know, look, I don't remember how to say this word. And I didn't like that. Like, I didn't like following that path. I choose a path of connection and authenticity right now and being real and human. And I think this is what being human and being real looks like. making mistakes, being messy, but still showing up and still practicing your languages just because this is who you are and these languages are a part of your life. So guys, I think it's going to be it for today's video. If

you liked it, please don't forget to give it a thumbs up and subscribe to my YouTube channel. Make sure to check out my notion templates, my language mastery program, and also Maku. All of the links to everything I mentioned in today's video are going to be down in the description. As always, when it comes to my language learning practice, one thing that I do the most is listening. Listening to podcasts, watching YouTube videos, maybe listening to audiobooks. This is the only practice that I do consistently. And I do a lot because I think that listening might

be the only skill you actually need to improve your language skills and to become fluent. So, if you want to check out this video and see why I'm so passionate about listening, just click right here and keep on watching and I'll see you there and I'll explain everything to you.