If you’re struggling to feel confident in a new language, you’re not alone.
Despite what some apps or products may tell you, learning a language is about building your confidence just as much as it is acquiring new vocabulary, understanding grammar points, and developing your reading, writing, speaking, and listening skills.
After starting my language learning journey terrified of speaking in front of anyone, I discovered tips that can help learners become confident in a new language.
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The fastest way to build confidence in your target language is to use it as much as you possibly can.
Practice, of course, helps you improve your level in the language. But it also makes the act of using it less scary.
At the start of 2021, I was really struggling with low confidence when I spoke German. Despite being at a conversational level, I constantly doubted myself and my abilities.
However, after speaking German daily as part of a Lingoda Language Sprint, speaking the language stopped feeling like a Big Scary Thing and just became something I did every day.
As scary as it may feel right now, making your target language a part of your daily life can have a major impact on your comfortability and comfort in it.
The more confident you are in yourself– and the more okay you are with being vulnerable– the more confident you’ll be when trying new things or making mistakes in a new language.
Stepping outside of your comfort zone helps you see that you’re capable of more than you may think and that making mistakes doesn’t have to feel like the end of the world.
This could mean specifically stepping outside of your language learning comfort zone by speaking before you feel ready, focussing specifically on the topics you feel weakest in, or just allowing yourself to make mistakes while learning.
However, it could also mean stepping out of your comfort zone outside of language learning.
Everything you do to build confidence, both within and outside the context of language learning, will help you gain confidence as a language learner.
Confidence is defined as “a feeling of self-assurance arising from one’s appreciation of one’s own abilities or qualities,” not “knowing everything and feeling happy that you do.”
Therefore, one of the best things you can do to be confident at any language level is to take pride in what you know right now and to embrace making mistakes as part of the learning process.
A great way to work on embracing the process is to regularly check on your progress and to focus on your accomplishments and wins, both big and small.
Even if you’re just getting started with learning a new language, there are so many small successes you can focus on to see that you are capable of learning and using your target language. If you need some ideas of things to look for in your speaking, check out this post.
As you work to embrace the process of learning a language and build confidence in your own abilities, it’s crucial that you avoid comparing yourself to others.
With social media at our fingertips, it can be difficult to avoid seeing other people’s progress without comparing it to our own.
But the reality is that we all have different backgrounds, different study habits, and different skill sets. The comparisons you make between your language progress and someone else’s are likely unfair, and only serve to make you more self-conscious about yourself.
Avoiding comparison and embracing your own journey also makes it much easier to deal with others’ comments and judgements, because if you’re not comparing your journey to anyone else’s, why should they?
Learning a language can be a long, difficult process.
By challenging yourself to embrace every part of that process, good and bad, you’ll find yourself growing more and more confident about yourself and your abilities as a language learner.
As an added benefit, you’ll likely find that learning a new language builds your confidence in the rest of your life!
So get out there, celebrate your abilities, talk to new people, embrace mistakes along the way, and remember that practice makes progress.