Don’t try to sound like a native speaker

We all want to sound like native speakers of our target language. This is a worthy goal.

But this desire can hurt your learning progress if approached the wrong way, especially as a beginner learner.

I experienced this when I traveled to Taiwan.

I tried too hard to sound like a perfect native speaker when I spoke.

I don’t mean that you shouldn’t have the goal of speaking like a native speaker in the future. But I don’t think you should expect to speak perfectly all the time on the way towards that goal.

This is counter-productive.

If you want to sound like a native speaker, the fastest way to get there is to not worry about sounding perfect, make tons of mistakes, and learn from them.

Unfortunately, I did the exact opposite of that.

I didn’t want to speak until my tone and pronunciation were good.

I didn’t want to make mistakes and have others judge me.

This was a big mistake.

In fact, sometimes, I would get compliments like, “Wow you’re Chinese is good”. This was a dopamine rush and motivating at first but ironically this actually made me more self-conscious because I didn’t want to break their expectations.

I felt like I had to maintain my image of what they thought of me.

I felt like an imposter.

Ok, so how do we fix this?

Make learning low-pressure.

Think back to when you were a child learning your first language. There was no pressure to be perfect; you simply spoke and gradually improved.

Approach Chinese learning with this childlike mindset. Allow yourself to make mistakes, and laugh at them. Really, laugh at yourself. This is very important.

Language learning is not serious business. It should be a fun adventure.

When I realized this, I started taking more risks and making more mistakes when I spoke and the results were truly liberating.

Not only did I get to practice more of what I learned, but I also got more feedback from others, and I quickly improved on my mistakes. I felt a weight off my shoulders.

Learning became low-pressure and fun and I could actually start to see improvement.

OK but…how do I do this practically?

I don't say “I speak Chinese".

Back when I was actively trying to improve my speaking, whenever I met someone new, I always made it a point to first say：

“My Chinese is not that good”

”不好意思，我的中文不太好“

Or if someone asked if I spoke Chinese, I would always respond：

“I speak a bit of Chinese“

”我会说一点中文.”

Some people might see this as underrating yourself which might decrease confidence, but it was the opposite for me. What I found was that saying “My Chinese is not that good” or “I speak a bit of Chinese” was very liberating because that set the stage for me to be a student.

I was not worried about how “fluent” I sounded, how perfect my tones were, and whether I would stumble over my words (I would).

Moreover, by being vulnerable and proudly claiming that I don’t speak Chinese, I gave the other person (usually a native speaker) permission to teach me and be more open to offering feedback.

This is the easiest “hack” I’ve found to break the ice with native speakers.

Most native speakers are reluctant to actively offer feedback on your mistakes. But you’d be surprised by how many people open up after I am vulnerable about my Chinese level and tell them about my Chinese learning goals.

Using this ice-breaker is how I met some of my best friends in the language even as a beginner.

What about pronunciation? Won’t you build bad habits?

When I say don’t try to sound like a native speaker, I don’t mean you should completely ignore pronunciation and throw it out the window.

Learning proper pronunciation and tones is still important and should be focused on (get my free pronunciation guide here)

But bad pronunciation should not be an excuse to not speak, especially at the beginning.

No one has perfect tones and pronunciation in the beginning. The fastest path to great tones and pronunciation is first having bad tones and pronunciation.

It takes lots of speaking practice, making mistakes, getting feedback, looking back, and improving.

You won’t build bad habits if you build good foundations and awareness about how good pronunciation sounds, which will come with time.

Have you heard of babies who start speaking with perfect pronunciation and command of the language from the start? There are many examples of learners who start out speaking with poor pronunciation and later improve it with practice.

Will Hart is a Chinese learner who started speaking after his first week of learning and has one of the best pronunciations I’ve heard from an adult learner.

My speaking improved.

By making this simple mental shift, I changed the way I approached speaking.

I became less concerned with trying to maintain a facade of speaking perfectly all the time and I became focused on how much I was improving.

I was taking more risks, trying new vocabulary and phrases, and making mistakes.

And I was improving a lot faster.

If you’re not where you want to be with your speaking, ask yourself if you are trying to sound too perfect. Are you afraid to make mistakes because of how you’ll look?

For me, the best thing I did was to strip away the expectation of sounding perfect that was weighing on me by embracing the fact that I’m a learner and being proud of that.

This doesn’t mean I don’t want to speak like native speakers, far from it, it just means that I’m not self-conscious about trying to be perfect when I’m practicing speaking. Practice is where I should be making mistakes and not need to sound perfect.

If you want to learn the system I used to practically implement this and build a speaking habit in a safe environment, check out the Copy Paste Speaking Course.

加油加油，

Danyo Pang

PS Here are some practical ways I can help you level up your Chinese:

Copy Paste Speak Course: This course will teach you a better & faster way to learn to speak Chinese by copying native speakers talking about real things, making real sentences, and speaking from day one.

Language Learner OS: This is a digital system to help organize your language studies, track vocabulary, build connections, stay productive, and learn faster! 

---