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