4 Simple Steps To Enjoying Your English Learning Practice By Finding Flow

Let me ask you, when do you feel you're happiest? You might be thinking,

Annemarie, that's easy. It's when I'm doing nothing, when I'm totally relaxing,

and that might be true.

Or are you most happy when you are fully

absorbed in an activity when your brain is so focused on

something that you lose track of time? For example,

it might be working out a new song on the piano, solving a problem,

completing a crossword puzzle, creating website graphics,

planning your travel budget, painting.

That feeling of getting lost in an activity.

This is what we call entering a flow state or

finding flow. In English,

we also refer to it as getting into the zone.

According to positive psychology,

you're in flow when you're absorbed in an activity,

when you have a feeling of energized, focused,

complete involvement and enjoyment of the process.

We can thank psychologist Mihály Csíkszentmihályi for Flow

State Theory. Based on his research,

he said "The best moments in our lives are not the passive,

receptive, relaxing times.

The best moments usually occur if a person's body or

mind is stretched to its limits,

involuntary effort to accomplish something difficult and

worthwhile." So how does all of this relate to your English?

Why are we talking about it in a Confident English lesson?

Let me ask you this.

Have you set goals for your English learning practice and over

time you've lost the motivation to meet those goals?

You know you should be practicing and you have that thought a lot.

I really should sit down and practice,

but and then you don't because your practice has become

stagnant. You've lost motivation, you're tired, you're bored,

and you just don't know if it's worth it.

You don't know if you're making progress.

You still have that thing you want.

You still have that desire to be a confident English speaker or to speak

with fluency and accuracy,

but you're having a difficult time sitting down

and doing the tasks that will help you get there.

If that sounds familiar to you, it's okay.

That's a completely normal experience and finding

flow in your English learning practice can reinvigorate

your efforts. It can give you renewed energy,

new motivation and excitement.

You can even enjoy the process of learning English.

That's my goal in talking about flow state with you today.

I want to help you.

You know how to enter a flow state in your English learning practice so that you

have fun,

so that you enjoy it and you see the progress you're making.

I want you to think for a moment about your job and all the responsibilities

of your job.

There are some responsibilities you have that you actually really

enjoy and you get lost in them.

Time disappears when you do those tasks,

and then of course there are other tasks,

other responsibilities that you have to do. They're part of your job,

but you have to really push yourself to do them. You don't enjoy them.

All of that is true about any particular skill we're working to

improve in our life, whether we're working to become a better athlete,

a better singer, a better artist,

or a better language speaker in every skill,

there are tasks that help us improve and that we also enjoy

tasks that allow us to enter a flow state and find

that renewed energy and there are tasks that we need to do

to make improvements,

but that might be more of a struggle if your English language practice

is stagnant right now,

if you don't have the energy or motivation to sit down and

practice so that you make the improvements you want,

I want to give you four simple steps to follow so that you can find

opportunities to enter a flow state.

Enjoy the process and note your progress.

Not only will finding flow in your English learning practice help you

find enjoyment, it will also increase your creativity,

improve your productivity and performance,

lead to more satisfaction and fulfillment.

Create a desire for continued learning and mastery.

Increase your confidence in your skills and in your belief that what

you want is achievable. And lastly,

finding flow leads to increased levels of happiness.

Before I get to the first of four steps,

let me quickly introduce myself just in case this is your first time here.

I'm Annemarie with Speak Confident English.

Everything I do is designed to help you get the confidence you want for your

life and work in English.

One way I help you do that is with my weekly Confident English lessons where I

share my top fluency and confidence-building strategies,

advanced-level vocabulary and lessons just like this one where I help you enjoy

the process of learning English. So while you're here,

make sure you subscribe to my Speak Confident English channel on YouTube so you

never miss one of my Confident English lessons. Now,

if you're ready to identify tasks that are going to help you find flow

in your English learning practice and bring back that motivation you need,

here are four simple steps to follow. Step number one,

find your golden hour.

A golden hour is also known as that magical period of time during the day

when the light is soft and it's perfect for capturing a photo.

For example, when the sun is rising at dawn or when it's setting at dusk,

you also have a golden hour,

a time period during the day at which you are your most productive

and your most creative.

It's a time of day when it's easiest for you to focus.

When you want to enter flow,

it's important that you prioritize tasks during your golden

hour. To find your particular golden hour,

I want you to assess your weekly routine and identify periods of time during the

week when you are your most productive and when it's easiest

for you to focus without any distraction.

Once you know what that particular time of day is,

I want you to set aside a portion of that golden hour for your

English learning practice a few days a week. For example,

if you're an early bird,

someone who is most productive in the early morning hours,

set aside a portion of that time for your English learning or if

you're a night owl, the opposite. Someone who's most productive,

most creative in the evening or lay hours,

set aside a portion of your time for your English language learning.

The second step I want you to follow to find flow in your practice

is to set the tone and get in the mood. There are two things you can do here.

The first eliminate distractions.

Distractions get in the way of flow, whether it's noise,

hunger, social media alerts or email pings.

All of that can get in the way of finding flow.

In an effort to remove those distractions,

it's important to find a peaceful quiet place for you to study.

And I also recommend removing clutter.

Clutter is a word that refers to those heaps and piles of things

that are disorganized,

whether it's on the desk or the floor or anywhere around us.

So to remove clutter,

you can spend a little bit of time tidying up before you sit

down to practice. If you have a lot of loose papers floating around,

you can organize them into a pile and set it aside.

If you have pens and pencils and paperclips all over your desk,

put some of them away in a drawer. Try to create a clean,

organized, peaceful space.

This contributes to a distraction-free environment.

The second thing you can do to set the tone and get in the mood is

have a pre flow ritual.

This is a series of actions that helps to reduce mental clutter,

remove any negative thoughts and distractions in your mind,

and it can help get your brain ready to focus.

So in addition to taking a little bit of time to tidy up your desk or

your study area, you can add a few more activities that become a ritual,

something that you consistently do that tells your brain,

I'm preparing to enter a flow state and practice my English skills.

For example, maybe you brew a cup of tea or coffee,

open the windows to let in fresh air and natural light or spend a few minutes

meditating to quiet your mind or perhaps journaling.

Journaling is a fantastic way to not only quiet your mind,

but get rid of any frustrations or negative thoughts before you begin your

practice.

Other pre-ritual ideas include eating something so that you're not hungry,

telling others that you'll be unavailable for a period of time.

Turning on the do not disturb setting for your smartphone and your

computer closing or minimizing internet tab windows that you don't really need

for your English learning practice and reducing any unnecessary

noise.

Following these different steps helps to get you into that flow

mindset. Now I mentioned reducing any unnecessary noise,

and if you are the kind of person who doesn't really like complete silence,

I totally get it. I'm the same way.

When I'm creating writing or problem solving,

I like to have a little bit of background music,

but when you choose some music to listen to while you're in your flow state,

it's important that that music contributes to your flow state that

it's not distracting.

Instrumental or ambient music is a perfect choice for helping you focus.

If you want some of my recommendations,

some playlists that I enjoy when I want to enter a flow state,

I have four recommendations for you and I've shared links to those

playlists in this lesson at my Speak Confident Englishwebsite.

When it's your golden hour and you've completed your pre flow ritual,

you've eliminated all distractions.

The third step in finding flow for your practice is

to focus on one specific task.

That is challenging but not too challenging.

Flow happens when we're focused on one task,

a task, not in multiple tasks.

Multi-tasking is an obstacle to flow.

This means you need to have a clear plan,

a goal of what you want to improve and the specific tasks or

activities that will help you make that improvement.

Then when you sit down to practice,

you need to choose one of those specific tasks for your

practice time,

and you want to make sure that task is appropriately challenging.

If it doesn't challenge you, you're going to get bored and you'll stop doing it.

You'll lose motivation. If it's too challenging,

you'll get frustrated and give up, so it's important to find that balance.

Let me give you an example.

Let's say that part of your practice is to improve your listening

and your speaking skills,

so you listen to a podcast and then you practice summarizing it with

a speaking journal practice.

If you've been listening to the same BBC podcast for years

and every time you listen to it, it's super easy,

everything is familiar,

then it's probably time for an increased challenge.

It's time for a new podcast.

You want to have a podcast that challenges you,

that forces you to listen carefully and be fully focused on the

podcast.

You should not be able to listen to the podcast and do your

emails at the same time while you're listening, you're listening.

That's your one task.

Then when it's time to practice summarizing and work on your speaking,

you might start by doing a quick mind map or writing down some of the keywords

from the podcast and then focus on your speaking portion.

Focus on doing the speaking task with no other distractions.

If doing a speaking journal is something that you're quite comfortable with,

something that you've been doing for a while,

then it's important to add some new level of challenge,

whether it's speaking for a longer period of time or trying to speak

spontaneously without any preparation in advance. If you're thinking,

all this sounds amazing,

but I really wish someone would just give me the right materials and help me

identify the tasks that'll help me improve my skills,

I don't know where to start.

I'd love to tell you about the Confident Women Community.

It's a private members-only online space for women to get

speaking practice and improve their English confidence inside the Confident

Women Community.

We focus on real-life practice with accountability and support.

That includes real speaking practice with discussion partners,

weekly activities that challenge your grammar,

vocabulary and pronunciation,

as well as live workshops where you get to practice what you're learning,

get additional speaking practice and immediate input or feedback during

the workshop. Plus,

every month we provide a step by step downloadable study guide

so you know exactly what to focus on.

The Confident Women Community is open to all women around the world with an

intermediate level or higher in English,

and if this sounds like something you've been looking for,

we'd love to have you join us.

You can learn more about the Confident Women Community just down below.

The fourth and final step to enter a flow state in your English learning

practice is to do what you enjoy and don't force it.

We highlighted earlier that there are tasks or responsibilities in your job that

you love to do, that you get absorbed or lost in,

and there are responsibilities that you have to do even if you don't really

enjoy them. The same might be true in your English learning practice.

There are things that you enjoy, things that are fun for you,

and then there are study tasks that you know you need to do,

but they really take effort.

When you want to enter a flow state,

choose the activities you enjoy.

The other ones you can save for another day for flow.

It's important to choose tasks or activities that you feel good

doing, and of course everyone will find flow in a different way.

The tasks that you enjoy might be completely different from what someone

else enjoys when they're working on their English language skills. Now,

I mentioned in this fourth step it's important that you do what you enjoy and

don't force it. If you follow all these steps,

you have identified your golden hour, you've set aside time,

you've sat down, you've organized everything, removed, clutter,

and you've identified one specific task that you enjoy,

but you find that you're just not able to enter a flow state,

you're distracted or frustrated, other things are on your mind, it's okay.

Don't force it. It's not a failure.

Some days are simply harder than others.

If you're struggling to get into a flow state,

even after you follow all these steps, set it aside.

You can do it another day, but before you totally give up,

I recommend that you spend a few minutes journaling, writing things down,

get out that negative frustration, the negative energy,

any negative thoughts you might be having,

any distracting thoughts that you're having.

Getting it on paper helps to release it and remove it.

You might even find that after you spend a few minutes doing that,

you're totally ready to enter a flow state or perhaps you decide,

I'll do it again tomorrow. Now,

if you find that it's consistently difficult for you to enter a flow state,

you're following all these steps, you're doing everything right,

but you just can't get there.

One thing I recommend is setting an intention

and making sure you have your intention in front of you to remind you of

why you're doing this.

An intention is a plan or a determination to positively

act in a certain way.

You can also think of it as the purpose for doing what

you're doing to help you identify your intention.

I have a few questions you can answer. Number one,

why do I want to improve and then name the specific skill?

Why do I want to improve my English listening skills?

Why do I want to improve my pace while speaking?

The second question is,

how will strengthening that particular skill improve

my life?

How will strengthening your listening skills improve your life or how will it

benefit you? How will strengthening your speaking skills improve your life?

How will it benefit you? The third question,

why is that important?

Why is that particular benefit important to you?

For example,

if strengthening your speaking skills will help you have easier conversations

with coworkers and develop stronger relationships at work,

why is that important to you? Why does it matter? And the last question is,

what tasks or activities do I enjoy in English

that will help me improve that skill? To determine your intention,

your purpose for spending time improving your English

language skills,

I recommend spending a few minutes answering those questions and writing down

your answers. They don't have to be lengthy responses.

Perhaps you just write down a few key words to each question.

Once you've done that,

I want you to take the highlights and put them on a post-it note

somewhere where you can easily see that.

Post-it note and be reminded of your intention,

your purpose for doing this.

Setting an intention can help you get that initial

motivation,

that initial spark you need to follow these four steps,

enter a flow state, and enjoy your English learning practice. To finish,

I have two questions for you. Number one,

what activities or tasks do you enjoy in your English learning practice?

What activities do you get absorbed or lost in?

Tell me what they are, and you can share with me in the comments below.

The second question is, after watching today's lesson,

what are you going to do first or what will you do next?

How will you refresh your English learning practice based on what you've

learned? As always,

you can share your comments and your questions with me in the comments section

below. If you found today's lesson helpful to you,

I would love to know and you can tell me in one very simple way,

give this lesson a thumbs up here on YouTube. Thank you so much for joining me,

and I look forward to seeing you next.