Why you don't understand native English speakers

hey what's up Stefanie the English coach here from EnglishFullTime.com

in this video I want to talk to you guys about why you don't understand native

English speakers sometimes now a lot of you say you understand me

I speak very clearly I'm presenting I'm trying to make myself understood

but at the same time this is how I speak I speak very clearly even when I speak

quickly with that said I already made a video about why you don't understand

movies and TV shows a native English speakers but today I want to focus on a

few different things that I didn't mention in that video and if you're

interested in that video and you haven't seen it yet I'll go ahead and link it up

here okay but what I really want to say is we all know that when you're first

studying a language you're not going to understand everything that's obvious but

most of you here are at a pretty high level in your English language I mean

I'm speaking 100% in English I speak quickly so if you're here and you're

understanding your English is that a really great level ok and it's

frustrating right when you understand me but then you don't understand other

people and you're like what's wrong with me something must be wrong with me no

nothing is wrong with you I am here to tell you that it's probably not even

your fault okay and I'm gonna explain why it's not your fault

and that a lot of times native English speakers are to blame when you don't

understand them or no one's to blame but it's definitely not your fault okay so

reason number one why you might not understand a native English speaker

maybe they have really really bad speaking habits they mumble they speak

too quickly they don't enunciate that's not your fault for not

understanding them if I hear a person speak like that I might be like whoa

what are they saying and I'm a native English speaker now granted I might be

able to understand a little bit better than you because I have more experience

with this language but in general when people don't enunciate okay when when

they are mumbling when they're speaking too quietly I have to be like what

excuse me can you speak up please I don't understand you

so it's not your fault when people do this it's their fault okay for having

bad speaking it's now a quick story about this

because I could totally relate to you guys on this I was in Argentina for

those of you who don't know I lived there for six years my husband is from

Argentina we were over there we were at an asado which is a barbecue with his

friends and he had a friend there who was speaking so fast and I was like

listening intently trying to understand what he was saying and my brain was

hurting because I was like working so hard just to understand this guy and I

started feeling really bad I was like man you know I've been living in

Argentina for six years I speak Spanish apparently I don't speak it well or I

don't understand well something must be wrong with me because I don't understand

this guy and I just started beating myself up for not understanding him and

then the next day I told Ren about it and I was like you know what I've been

feeling really bad ever since the barbecue with your friend I was like I

just didn't understand like almost anything he said I had to work really

hard to understand him and he speaks so fast and you know what Ren said he was

like that's fine nobody understands him I was like what are you kidding me he's

like no nobody understands him we don't know what he said is half the time that

he's talking he speaks way too fast he has really bad speaking habits and I was

like you've got to be kidding me right now so I was beating myself up like

something was wrong with me and nothing was wrong with me

or my Spanish or anything it's that guy that has bad speaking habits so it's

it's really unfortunate because language is a way to communicate and if we're not

communicating well nobody's gonna understand us and that kind of defeats

the purpose of language which is for communication so anyways you need to be

able to recognize bad speaking habits in your native language and in other

languages so that you can realize when you don't understand somebody what it's

because of are you unfamiliar with their accent is it because they simply have

bad speaking habits what is it because of because if you can identify what it's

because of then you'll realize that you're not to blame

99.9% of the time and that's good because

if not you're gonna be way too hard on yourself and that's not necessary you

don't need that kind of pressure oh and quick story about the different

accents thing I was in a grocery store one time in Bariloche in Argentina and

I hear these people speaking this foreign language and I was like wow that

sounds so cool and I was like Ren what language do you think they're speaking

and he's like are you kidding me that's Chilean Spanish I was like what so it

was Spanish and I speak Spanish I am a fluent Spanish speaker and people from

Chile which is like across the border right it's just

Argentina's here and Chile is right next to it they're Spanish apparently is so

different I didn't even recognize it I didn't even know it was Spanish okay so

that's not my fault it's not my fault that I didn't

understand them they speak a dialect that I like never heard in my life and

I'm completely unfamiliar with and they were probably speaking very quickly you

know there were people my age so maybe they were using a lot of slang I don't

know so I think I made my point there let's move on okay

sometimes when native speakers are speaking you will understand all the

words that they say but you won't understand the meaning that's probably

not your fault for example my friend Pete from Aussie English we were on the

phone a few months ago and he was just like yeah mate I was taking the piss out

of myself lately and I was like you why it's taking the piss out of yourself I

didn't even know what that meant and you know what I don't remember what it means

so I'm gonna have to go look it up now but it means something apparently an

Australian English it's an idiom right and this is y idiomatic expressions are

so difficult because if you're not familiar with that idiomatic expression

you'll have no idea it's like the person is speaking another language they're

saying it all in English but you're like I have no idea what you just said okay

so again that phrase taking the piss out of myself lately or whatever I did not

know what that meant and I still don't know what it means I forgot he told me

but I forgot so I will look that up and if you want to know I guess you can look

it up too or I will you know what I'll put it in the

description that way we all have it so again sometimes your

understand all the words that you hear but you're not gonna understand the

meaning because it might be an idiomatic expression that you're unfamiliar with

ok the next reason why you might not understand native English speakers

sometimes is because you have zero interest in a conversation this happens

to me all the time in Spanish actually more frequently than I want to admit and

it's involuntary it's not my fault my brain does this and I wish it wouldn't

but for example if I'm at the dinner table and everyone's talking about

something that is really technical and I just don't feel like thinking about what

they're saying and you know making sense of it and I just I get lost or something

in the conversation all of a sudden my brain like shuts off I start thinking

about something entirely different and then in a few seconds or a minute

however long it takes me I come back and I'm like oh my gosh I was listening I

was hearing everything people were saying but it's like my brain wasn't

there and my family in Argentina or Ren's family they know that this

happens to me all the time so they just refer to it as Stefanieland they're

like oh Stefanie come back you're in Stefanie land again they can like see

it in my eyes my eyes just glaze over but this happens to me it's if I have

zero interest in a conversation or I mean that even seems or sounds kind of

rude to say but if my brain determines that the conversation is not important

to me then I just zone out and it's involuntary I try to control it but a

lot of times it happens to me if this happens to you you're not alone let me

know if it happens to you actually in the comments that way I know that I'm

not alone and this is one of the reasons why sometimes I don't understand things

in Spanish just because I'm like not even paying attention again its

involuntary okay I'm not being rude like oh I'm not gonna pay attention it like

happens to me okay next another reason why you might not understand native

English speakers is because the language they use is not clear its convoluted and

it's confusing this happens so often and it's unfortunate but for example

sometimes people struggle to communicate abstract ideas or if it's a vague

concept that they haven't fully developed in their own mind then

yeah they're gonna struggle to communicate that because they don't even

really know what they think so it's hard to communicate exactly what they think

cuz they don't know exactly what they think other times people speak in

riddles or they don't say what they mean they just sort of allude to something or

imply something and you're left like okay what like what are you trying to

say or what are you saying this even happens to me when I'm talking

with people if they're not being clear I have to bring that to their attention

and say okay I'm sorry this isn't clear can you please explain what you mean

okay again not your fault it's not your fault for not understanding when someone

else is being unclear and using convoluted language also recently one of

my friends who is Russian and she emigrated to the USA I think like 20

years ago or something she was really struggling with a document from work

that was written all in English it was these emails that people were writing

back and forth to each other they had a problem her job was to read through the

emails figure out the problem solved the problem get back to them etc and she

could not figure out like what they were talking about so she asked me for help I

read the emails and I was just like oh my gosh like the way these people are

writing yeah their native English speakers yeah it's English but it's so

confusing the way that they're writing I didn't even understand it and it's like

when people try to write in this formal way but it's like overdone to the point

where it no longer makes sense it's just like oh you could have said this so much

simpler or instead of saying what something is they say what something

isn't this is something I learned in my English class a long time ago in high

school right it's better to say what something is then what something isn't

for example if someone says it's not that I don't understand what happened

it's just that X Y Z instead of saying it's not that I don't understand what

happened which is super confusing you could just say I understand what

happened however do you see how that is so much more like oh it's so much easier

to understand yes because it's clear it's not convoluted it's not like a

double negative in a sentence right somebody

have very very bad communication habits unfortunately but again the point of

this video is to remind you that it's not always your fault okay and when you

can understand what the heck is going on around you it just makes it a lot easier

to be confident to feel in control and feel like it's not your fault and you're

okay it's not your problem okay speaking of it's not your fault and it's not your

problem one of the other reasons why you might not understand native English

speakers is because you were never taught how people speak in real life in

whatever course you did or class you did lessons you did whatever it is you were

probably not taught the way people speak in real life you were not introduced to

fast speech or connected speech or anything like that okay and that is a

huge problem because you become very confident in your English class maybe

you're the best student and you're like yeah I get the best grades I'm able to

answer the teachers questions this is awesome and then you go into the real

world and you're like oh my gosh and you have this rude awakening and you're like

oh okay nobody actually talks the way I was

taught in class I know because the same thing happened to me I studied Spanish

in high school in immersion programs I studied it in college you guys I know

that the same exact thing happened to me it's not our fault I wish that all

language institutions would kind of get with the program and really teach more

modern language but whatever if they're not gonna do it then we have to pick up

the slack and make it happen for ourselves right be independent

proactive learners okay and the last reason that I'll cover in this video of

why you might not understand native English speakers it could be related to

anxiety right if you have a lot of anxiety when it comes to speaking having

conversations interacting with native speakers then your brain can just go

into survival mode and you're like oh my gosh and you can't focus on anything

you're not relaxed and this anxiety makes it a lot more difficult for you to

communicate now with this anxiety think about it like this it's like people that

are good at math but they suck at math tests right they're good at math but

then here comes the test anxiety kicks in and it's like all the things that you

knew how to do suddenly get shut off and you can't do them anxiety will do this

to you so if you are struggling with any kind of anxiety when it comes to

communication this is definitely something to work on to focus on I talk

a lot about anxiety and confidence in my course connect and communicate if you're

interested in that I'll go ahead and leave a link in the description but just

a warning this is not a traditional English course this is about using

English as a tool to get better opportunities so I teach people how to

connect with native English speakers network with other professionals and how

to communicate with others professionally and confidently so I'll

leave a link to that below in the course we definitely talked a lot about anxiety

and confidence what produces anxiety why you might have a lack of confidence how

to overcome this etc once you really understand all of this stuff it's so

much easier to overcome okay so with that said thank you so much for watching

the video let me know what you think in the comments if you enjoyed this video

please give it a thumbs up and if you're not subscribed to this channel I

definitely invite you to subscribe and for those of you who haven't downloaded

the guide on practicing your English with native speakers I'm going to link

it in the description as well this guide is for anybody who wants to meet native

English speakers online to practice and improve their English that's it I hope

you enjoyed this video and I will see you in the next one bye