How to stop translating in your head: 5-steps to get stuck LESS and speak FASTER in English

150,321 views ・ 2019-03-05

Accent's Way English with Hadar


Please double-click on the English subtitles below to play the video.

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Hey, what's up, it's Hadar and this is the Accent's Way. And today we're going to talk about how to stop
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translating in your head when you're speaking English. So, you know this thing when you start a conversation and then a thought comes up,
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but it comes up in your native tongue. So you need to start translating it in your head before you start speaking
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So you think about the words in your native tongue, And then you start
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translating it looking for the words.
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I mean you have all these things that you need to do thinking about how you structure the sentence. I mean, this is so time-consuming.
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This is really time-consuming:
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translating and then retrieving. Anyway,
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even without translating it takes time to retrieve the words and think about how to structure the sentence and to add to that the
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translation. I mean, no wonder you get stuck.
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So, as you start speaking and as you start practicing your pronunciation and your speaking
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you also need to train yourself to start thinking in English. So, you're basically
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limiting the mind's capacity to experience complex and
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and
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varied thoughts, which is okay, but what you're doing is you're
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starting to get into the habit of just thinking in English because when that happens you do not have to
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translate your words in your head when speaking.
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So, I'm going to share with you 5 things that you can start doing as of today to help you stop translating
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the words in your head. The first thing is to train yourself to think in English
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what I want you to do is to set a timer every single day for five minutes for five minutes
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let's start with five minutes, like any meditation practice. And
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what I want you to do is to sit down and to think in English. I know it seems funny and
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probably very boring
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but
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every time you go back to your native tongue every, every time a thought comes in, you need to go back and think it in
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English. So, you can start by observing whatever is around you, you know,
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like thinking about that you can start by thinking about what you need to do a little later on, what happened to you today
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but everything that is going on in your head is in English.
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If you're missing a word then try to think about it differently try to think about something else try to retrieve the word.
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Take your time.
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So, enjoy the fact that you have five minutes and if all you need to do is to
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retrieve words and to think about the right words then do it, but do it every single day. Be intentional about it.
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Make sure you don't skip a day and you don't have any distractions, right?
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And you're only thinking in English.
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I mean, yeah, speaking is the most important thing
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but right now we're focusing on one very specific thing
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which is the act of translating the words in your head or translating the ideas and the thoughts,
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okay.
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So, start by training yourself to think in English.
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You can expand on that and then do it on the bus or when when you're waiting for someone or even when you're on
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Instagram and you're seeing something so try to think about it in English, like what would you say?
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What is your reaction to this person's picture, right?
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So, so, think about it, think about how you would talk about it in English,
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but you've got to train yourself to think in English. The next thing you can do is simulate conversations in your head.
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So, come up with a certain situation.
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It could be a real situation that just happened to you or that you're anticipating or you can make up a situation,
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okay, and
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create a conflict of some sort in your head and have that conversation in your head in English between two people,
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between you and your mom, or you and your friend, or you and your teacher,
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or your teacher and another student or
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whatever you want, like enjoy it, have fun, but create those conversations in your head.
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It's okay that you're not yet speaking,
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you're just training yourself to think and think and think about different things in English.
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And because it's only in your head, then you're probably less judgmental and have more freedom to
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express
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yourself because when we speak it's a little different then we become more self conscious about how we sound or
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about the fact that we get stuck and in our head we get stuck a little less.
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So, enjoy it, right, enjoy it and feel like hey, I'm two fluent in my head.
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Now, the next thing you can do that is very very helpful is to speak up your stream of thoughts,
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okay. So it's not no longer just thinking it but thinking and speaking at the same time.
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So, for example, you're driving your car and you're like "oh
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there is a red light right now." You're actually speaking it not just thinking
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"there is a red light right now I should pull over
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look at this traffic. I'm never gonna get home in time. I'm so hungry,
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I only ate an apple in a tomato today.
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Look at this person
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singing to himself.
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What is up with him?" This is me driving, right?
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Okay, so you get the point. So, you're driving and you're thinking and speaking at the same time. slowly.
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It can be like random thoughts. You don't need to make any sense
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but right now you're starting to connect your thoughts,
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right.
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You're starting to connect thinking and speaking at the same time without the pressure of doing it in conversation,
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without the pressure of speaking about something very specific or, or
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building an argument or
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saying something more complex,
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okay Just your train of thought that is delivered through your mouth out
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to the car or the room or but but make sure that you're alone.
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Okay, the next thing is less of a practice but more of the mindset change. If you know anything about me
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you know that I always like to talk about how you need to change the way you think about English and how you
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see yourself as a non-native speaker in order to improve your
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confidence and your
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fluency and how free you feel when you communicate in English.
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So, the one thing you need to understand when you switch from
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translating in your head and in general when you speak English is
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that you need to accept the gap. You need to accept the gap between how you express yourself in your native tongue
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and how you express yourself in English, especially when you think in English and then speak right away, right.
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It's going to be limited. It's not going to be as rich and
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expressive as it in your native tongue and THAT IS OKAY. That's the only way to learn.
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That's the only way to start expending your abilities. That's the only way to
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to make more words available,
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okay, for you and
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and it's just how it is. So, when you resist it when you feel like oh, no, that's not good
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I'm supposed to be better by now or I'm supposed to be as fluent as this person or that person
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I mean that doesn't help you and it definitely doesn't advance you, right? It's only holding you back.
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So, once you let go of that and you accept that it's not going to be the same then you are
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ready to really learn and to apply all the things that you want to apply. Now,
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the fifth thing is a challenge but a fun challenge because once you start doing it
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I mean it's not going to be simple at first, but once you start doing it
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you will see the amazing impact it has on the immediacy of the words and your
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communication in English without translating and that is
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improvisation,
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when you improvise in English. What does that mean?
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So, when I was in school when I was in acting school, we had improv classes. Now
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I dreaded those classes because you have to come up with an idea and do it right away
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Anyway, even in my native tongue, it would feel strange and awkward for me. I'm not I'm not spontaneous
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I need to plan things out. I need to be ready
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I need to be perfect and then I can do it and then I'm super proud and happy and but if I'm not prepared or
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I'm I'm caught off guard or I'm doing something that is not my strength
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I feel terrible, like I don't feel safe
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but I took these classes as an opportunity to step out of my comfort zone and
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improve the skill.
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But I noticed that it was a lot harder for me to improvise in English than it was for me to improvise in
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my native tongue, in Hebrew. And I really struggled with that and I tried to explain it to my friends who were
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native speakers and it was kind of hard for me to tell them that the words are not or not in my gut,
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they're not in my head all the time. So, it was hard for me to think that but
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I did get better at it. It did become easier and this is where I realized. Hey, I'm not only
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better at improvising in English, but everything becomes quicker,
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okay, everything is a lot easier. So, it helped me not only in my improv classes, but also in speaking.
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So what can you do?
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First of all,
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if you have English improv classes around you then go ahead and get out of your comfort zone and
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enroll in one of those courses and just just or go to one class and see how it feels, okay.
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It's going to feel scary,
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I'm telling you, but it but once you're done, you'll also feel very very accomplished and you'll be like, hey
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I did it, and it's something to tell your friends. So, a few things you can do on your own. You can
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look at a dialogue or a book and
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start reading the beginning of the sentence and instead of finishing it you can just finish it on your own, right. So,
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continue it in any direction that you want. It can be completely
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non-realistic, it can be something concrete. It can be whatever you want,
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right, but you finish it and you have to think fast and you can't take any pauses,
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okay. So, this is a really cool exercise and I've done it with a few of my students.
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So, you start a sentence and then you just finish it the way you want to finish it and and again do it alone.
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So, even if it's stupid, no one sees it, okay. Another thing you can do is play the ABC-game.
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So, you look at the alphabet and then you look at the letter A and you need to say a sentence with the letter A,
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and then the next sentence should start with the letter B, and then the letter C,
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so on and so forth. And you need to, you can think about it in advance and it needs to be related,
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okay. The second sentence that starts with the letter B needs to be a continuation of the first sentence of sentence A.
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Okay, that's it. These are the five things that you can start doing as of today that will help you stop
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translating in your head
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every time you speak in English. Okay, that's it. Thank you so much for watching.
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Let us know in the comments below what are the things that you are doing that help you stop translating?
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in your head every time you speak in English. If you liked this video consider subscribing and share it with your friends. Thank you
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so much for watching and I'll see you next week in the next video.
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