I moved to United States 13 years ago following a growth opportunity during the early years of my career. Despite my fears, I took the leap of faith, decided to change my life & moved across continents.
In all honesty, until I made the move, I have never doubted my English. It was my business language during the working hours, whether it was with my manager or with my international colleagues. Little did I know, living in US and working ninety nine percent with native language speakers was a complete different ball game. From connecting colleagues with a spectrum of accented English speakers to being a minority speaker aka ESL(english second language)was a very unexpected challenge, on top of the challenge of change in life. With that added pressure, I found myself transitioning from having a full confidence on my ability to speak another language to feeling like an idiot, all day everyday! Yeah, you heard me right.
It was a truly exhausting experience.
Simply because you spend so much energy by translating everything in your mind since you simply think in your native language 1st and then translate. This translation take a bit of time and naturally slows you down. Hence why you are not as fluent as you want to be. Even worse, you feel like you can not keep up with the pace of the discussions, especially in meeting settings. As a bonus you are constantly challenged by the new words that are completely outside your limited vocabulary.
Then comes expectations; from yourself and others as simple as contributing to the discussions. Due to the pace of natural conversations and your process of thinking, translating & then overthinking makes you feel like falling short at all times.
Of course your ego comes in to play; somehow you are too proud to admit if there are things that you don’t understand. Whether it is about new words or cultural references. As a result that self doubt gets under your skin. It doesn’t matter how good you are at your job, how confident you are as a person or how smart you are, you just question your abilities. It simply drains you, without even needing to say a word.
Based on my experience, here are some suggestions on what to do when you find yourself in this spot?
Corporate America is really fast and your colleagues might not realize that they are loosing you in the middle of a discussion unless you raise your hand. It becomes a bit of your job (unfortunately) to remind people that you are not a native speaker & it is on you to make them pay more attention where they might need to explain further or give deeper context. It is also subtle education for the room, what it means to work with international people. If you won’t say anything, they will never understand their role & know when to check in with ESL colleagues.
Stop Self Doubt. Just remember, you simply can speak more than one language and it takes practice for your brain to switch from one to another. It gets faster and natural with time.
Just Own it. The jokes about “your cute accent” is your advantage to be remembered especially when you are new to the team. So why not use it to your advantage.
Don’t take yourself too seriously. Learn to laugh at your own pronunciation errors, it takes the pressure off for everyone.
If I look back now, I know these are all easier said than done but I wish someone talked to me about the journey so that I could give myself more grace. I hope reading this will help someone out there who might feel similar to how I felt years ago. Just know that it will take time, it will take practice and some getting used to. Just trust the process. Growth doesn’t happen over night. Be easy on yourself. Promise its all going to feel better.
JUST SAYIN'... 