Conversation Skills - Speak with confidence

Hi there. My name's Rurani. I'm here to teach you how to speak to people in English with

confidence. It's something that's very difficult, but you can fake it. Not everyone has confidence,

especially if you are speaking in a different language. I know that when I lived in Japan

and I was learning how to speak Japanese, I was shy. I don't mean shy. I know I was

shy a little bit. Okay. I was a little bit shy. So I'm going to teach you the techniques

that I used when I lived in a different country and had to communicate in a different language.

This is called "The Art of Conversation Part 2 - Confidence." Fake it.

So the very first most important thing that 99% of people ask me, they say, "Teacher,

I'm afraid to speak. I'm afraid to make a mistake." Not a mistake. Oh, geez. Do you

know what? I make a mistake all the time. Probably about 42% of my life, I have made

mistakes. It is natural. It is normal. I've made mistakes on this website, and I've had

to come back and correct them. And I'm an English teacher. So if an English teacher

makes a mistake, it's all right if you make a mistake, too.

So the very first part is mistakes. Make them. This means "them." Make mistakes. Making mistakes

are, one, normal, and two, you learn from them, or "em." So make them, learn from them.

The very, very first mistake I made in Japan -- I was about two weeks into my Japanese

adventure, and I was sitting in the teacher's room eating my lunch. And I said what I thought

in Japanese, "I am hungry." In Japanese, "hungry," you can say, "peko peko." Oh, cute. But what

I did say was, "I am pako pako." Now, in Japanese, "pako pako" is the sound you make when you

are having sex. The sound the bed makes goes, "er, er, er." But in Japanese, they say, "pako

pako." So I said to my boss, new teacher, "I am the sex noise that you make when you

are having sex." I thought I was very intelligent and told him something, information that was

really, really good. He almost died. His face dropped. His mouth dropped. "You are what?

I am pako pako?" And then, he burst into laughter. I will never forget the words, "I am hungry,"

and the noise made to have sex in Japanese. So if you make a mistake in English, who cares?

Don't worry about it. Learn from your mistakes. Always remember, mistakes are good. They're

natural. They help you. Number two, if you're worried about maybe what to say to people.

Maybe you'd like to talk to the beautiful girl in your class or the sexy boy over there

at the bar, and you don't know what to say in English. No one knows what to say. There's

no rule. You can say anything you want. "Hi, my name's Ronnie." "What's your name?" "Oh,

my name's Bob." "Oh, hello, Bob. How are you tonight?" You can say anything. If the person

wants to talk to you, they will talk to you. They will have to respond to what you say

to them. So if I went to someone and I said, "Hi, my name's Ronnie," and the person did

this, I think they don't want to talk to me, and that's fine. If I went up to someone and

said, "Hi, my name's Ronnie," and they said, "Oh, hi. My name's Jessica. Oh, hi," it's

Jessica's turn to ask me a question. If you start the conversation, they have to answer

it. Cool? It's easy. It works.

Number three. This is very important in English when you speak to someone. You have to make

eye contact. Make it. Look at the person in their eyes. If you do not do this, people

think two things. One, they don't care about you. Sorry, you don't care about them. If

I was making a video and I was like this, "So, guys, how are you tonight?" "Yeah, today

we're going to talk about conversation." Okay? You always need to look at the person. This

is very, very basic, polite manners in North America, in Europe. If you do not look at

the person, it is rude. People get offended. Also, they might think you're looking at something

else. Maybe your fly is down. Uh-oh. Maybe they think that you've got something on your

mouth, and you keep on staring at their lip. People get nervous. So, look in their eyes.

It will help you make eye contact. Say anything you want. Look them in the eye. And don't

be afraid to make mistakes. This is how you fake confidence, and you can start speaking

English to anyone. All right. Go out and conquer the English world. Goodbye.