If you entered here, apart from wanting to help a fellow language learner, you may be wondering if I actually have an answer to that question. Oh dear, I wish. And I am here to bring more questions than answers, so read at your will.
I've always been top of the class. My school wasn't famous, nor that difficult. It was enough to get me into the university I wanted, but it wasn't an actual challenge. And I knew that. I knew that once I went to college things would change. But I guess I was not prepared.
Today I had the chance to listen to an amazing Brazilian entrepreneur make the following metaphor about resilience: when we were in high school, we had a 3/10 challenge, but our capacity was a 2. That's why we found it hard. In college, we have a 5 challenge, but we just reached 3. That's why we struggle. And challenge after challenge, we build ourselves up and enhance this confort zone.
But what happens when we are scared? When we have such great expectations of ourselves that we limit our growth with fear? We do exactly that, we limit ourselves. We become insecure. When we don't see progress overnight and think we're stupid, or incapable.
Another thing the man said was regarding gender. That men are way more easily out of their confort zone than women. That they just go for it, while we, women, know we will receive a ton more of backlash if we fail. And that made me question a lot who am I as a woman. I say "risk yourself" to other girls while I maintain myself still. While I had to wonder for 40 minutes if the question I wanted to make to this guy was going to be seen as stupid or not. I have countless questions I wanted to make to countless amazing people that I didn't do because of insecurity.
I remember another time, two months ago, that this guy was saying "come on, don't be shy, entrepreneurs aren't like that". And I know he was saying that to me. I was the only person with the camera on who hadn't made a question. And guess what? From that day forward I started to question myself. Question if I actually am the "entrepreneur persona". If that even is for me. Because if I can't have the guts of making a question to someone miles away from me through a Zoom call, how the fuck will I be a leader?
And the answer to this questions is: I don't know. But if I don't try, that won't change.
So this is a promise, from me to you, that, from this day on, I will ignore that stupid little voice in the back of my mind that says that "people will think you're stupid". Let them. Let them think and let me live my life the way I want. A little more confident each day, without fear of making mistakes.
Hi Annie! I leave the correction part to native speakers. The issue that you raised is quite common. We all want to be fluent and make no mistakes, but it is impossible, especially in the early stages of the language journey. Let's imagine that tomorrow I start talking to you in Portuguese. Definitely, my attempts will be feable. But will you think that I am stupid? Most probably, you will try to help me as much as possible. Other people are alike. We create this fear. Enjoy the opportunity of talking to other people in English and celebrate your milestones of improvement!
Hi Annie! What a great topic! I think it's interesting that gender did get brought up, because I've also had conversations with my friends about that aspect of working through your fear, asking "stupid" questions, etc, especially when it comes to women entering male-dominated fields, hobbies, or interests. For example, when I was playing music more, I used to joke about purposely being bad so I can help encourage girls to be bad at it too. Because I really do think that boys/men in general are given the leeway to be bad at things more than girls are, while girls are not allowed to experiment like that. Anyway, if you couldn't guess I'm a raging feminist, you can probably guess now. Haha. Great post! There were a few awkward phrasings but overall your post was very clear, and I thought you laid out your thoughts very well. Hopefully we can all live with a little less fear in our lives! That's why I'm so excited about learning other languages too.
@Natalia Thank you so much for the encouragement :)
@June Thank you so so much!! We women must always support each other <3 And thanks for the correcting!
Hi Annie,
I wanted to comment as someone who majored in Entrepreneurship in university in Canada (I'm a native English speaker). I'm also a woman, and I remember having some of the very same thoughts that you had. I felt like maybe I didn't have the "entrepreneurship personality" as well. What I realized though is that there are many different "entrepreneurship personalities." Often in the microcosm of business school we see certain personality types (often very outspoken) being overrepresented and held up as the example of what entrepreneurs look and act like. Many of my classmates who were very outgoing and confident did not start businesses later on, for whatever reason.
I realized that the definition of an entrepreneur is not "someone who asks questions in class" but rather "someone who makes the difficult decision to start a business and make it work no matter what obstacles they face." It is true that entrepreneurship requires courage and stepping out of one's comfort zone, but that doesn't look the same for everyone. Also, you don't need to take literally every opportunity to push yourself - just the ones that matter. I didn't always ask questions or take advantage of every opportunity in business schools to "make a strong impression." But four years after graduation I had finished my Masters, worked two years in corporate marketing, and then left to move to Japan and start the business that I still run now, 9 years later. I think anyone who is willing to take the initiative required to start a business has the entrepreneurship personality. Likely your business won't require you to ask questions in front of your classmates any way. ;) I'm sure you'll find ways to practice and improve on the skills you need.
Cheers, Darby
P.S. The guy who said that "entrepreneurs aren't like that" sounds like he was be an obnoxious little punk. ;) People who are truly confident don't need to make passive aggressive comments like that to bolster their own self-esteem.
@Darby your comment was amazing. Seriously, thank you so much for telling me your story! Congratulations on your company, I hope it skyrockets! I really agree with you. Just like in any type of job, there isn't only one personality type that fits the description for entrepreneurs. If there were only people who thought alike, there would never be innovation in anything, huh? And, looking back on that day now, I agree that guy was somewhat obnoxious hahaha Thank you <3