[April 29, 2020 UPDATE: I wrote this exactly one year ago today. Now this post seems otherworldly. I had considered deleting it, as it doesn’t fit with the current mood. However, we will soon find our “normal” again, so I am leaving this post up as a sign of the hope on the horizon.]
With spring finally here, this first blog post feels quite in line with the new hopes and adventures that come with beautiful weather in such a beautiful city. A quick Google search of “springtime in Paris” gets nearly 17 million hits, and there is an infinity of songs by that name for a reason!
I’ve started a new habit this year–and I’m a bit ashamed to admit it. In all my years living in France, I have finally gone and made purchases at the local marché, and now I go once or twice a week. This is huge!
You must know; I have been to this marché dozens of times before. I’ve explored and window-shopped. That’s all it was ever going to be for me because it’s just so involved. After mulling over “why” for a while, I think I’ve figured it out… Having to interact with a third party that wasn’t a plastic shopping bin and a curt exchange with a cashier in order to pick out and buy a carrot seemed like, 1) too much work, and 2) too many opportunities to gaffe.
The first is the stereotypical American in me; things need to be done fast and convenient for my schedule. The Carrefour next door being open seven days a week (and until 9pm–what luxury!) speaks to this American and makes a very tempting argument.
As for that second hurdle, mind you, I speak French and am a fluent navigator of French culture and customs. So then why was the market on my radar as a non-option? Partly because starting a new routine is hard. But it’s also due to another reason, and one that this language nerd finds more interesting; it’s the result of an irrational manifestation of anxiety, doubt, and sometimes even fear. Second language researchers rather clinically refer to this manifestation as the affective filter.
Stay with me here and think back to your time in foreign language class.
More often than not, you chose to save face and not speak up instead of stringing together a sentence in French or Spanish at the drop of a hat. You know you could do it, but what if…? And maybe for you it wasn’t in a foreign language class, maybe it was math or science, or that time you had a great idea for a project but didn’t share it at the meeting. In life, too often, we choose to protect ourselves–our affective, or inner, selves–and once the filter is saturated by stress, that’s it. You’re done for the day.
Say you do speak in French, or in that meeting, and you make an error or it’s poorly received. Now you’ve got to sit there for the rest of class, the rest of that meeting. This is thaat feeling, this is your affective filter. Now it’s full and now you’re done. So what to do about it? A classroom with a positive learning environment is the place to be!
My program addresses the affective filter thanks to how I built the curriculum and how I structure our lessons. I check in with you several times over the course of the session. And class is a space where mistakes are welcome, even celebrated (because mistakes zap your working vocabulary and memory into gear). Please check out my program page to see more information about the program and class structure.
Okay, so that’s in the classroom, but what about my day-to-day life in France?
Living in a new country often leads one to create a comfort zone that we don’t budge from. Come on, we’ve already moved to another country, and now you’re saying we’ve got to branch out even more and on the reg? Well, yep, if you want to get to where you want to be in the language. And yep, I’m guilty of it, too.
If I fell into this mindset with regards to my local market, someone who knows about and addresses the affective filter every day in class, I know the 15,000 American expats and 50,000 British expats in Paris do, too, yet they are not aware of it.
My program addresses this in two ways.
First, you cannot address a problem that does not have a name. (Hello, affective filter. I see ya there!) Together, we look at this feeling and analyze it away.
Second, we improve fluency, and with improved fluency comes confidence 🙂
I can help you overcome this affective filter, that self-doubt, the hesitation to interact.
Expats are this city’s cowboys and we’re on this new frontier because we love it, we are energized by it, it excites us and makes us tick. It’s what we brag about to our friends and family back home. You’ve got this. You just need the right tools in order to speak French, and speak French confidently.
Doing my food shopping at the market is now my new most favorite thing to do. My meal planning has had such an inspirational boost, and my cooking has never been better. PLUS, I feel more connected to my neighborhood. The market works better than a hot cup of coffee to get me up early on Sunday mornings.
A small change to my way of thinking has me feeling better than ever about my life in France. I want to share this feeling with you.
Let me teach you my second language lifestyle to learning French.
Feel free to send me an email or leave a comment to ask me where your (cowboy) journey can begin.