When my clients ask my advice on how to improve their English, one of my top tips is always: Forget shame. If you feel ashamed and embarrassed every time you slip up, you will never improve. To become better at anything, we have to try, we have to take risks and when it all goes wrong, we have to get up, smile, carry on and most importantly, try again. I hate to use the word “ass” two weeks in a row in my post (sorry mother!) but this time it really is unavoidable. When you speak a foreign language, there will always be times when you make mistakes and fall on your ass (there it is again). Some mistakes are more dramatic than others, but they are going to happen, whether you like it or not. So what to do? Take a tip from some Olympians.

Did anyone catch any of the ice-skating during the recent Winter Olympics in PyeongChang? I’m not into winter sports but I always like to watch a bit of figure skating. That combination of sparkly, sequinned outfits and amazing athletic talent and skill. However, there’s always that moment in every performance where you kind of hold your breath. When the skater is getting ready to do a jump and everyone is wondering if they will land it. Sometimes they do but sometimes they don’t. Even the top skaters in the world are not perfect every single day. But in order to gain points and get a medal they have to take risks. And what’s really striking about these skaters, is that when they fall and it all goes wrong, they pick themselves up and carry on. Hold the tears in, put on a brave face and try to make up for the fall with the rest of their performance. Imagine being the best in the world but still going out there knowing that you might fall in front of millions of people? Wow. They really don’t let shame get in their way.  As the American Mirai Nagasu recently said (just before becoming the third woman ever to land the elusive triple axel at the Olympics) “I’m definitely going for it. No guts, no glory. If I fall, I’ll take the fall and just keep going.”

Now, don’t get me wrong, I’m not trying to compare having a conversation in Italian with the talent and commitment of being an Olympic figure skater. But there is a lot we can learn from them. Don’t let those falls and mistakes put you off. Learn from them, smile  and just keep going. And it least be grateful you don’t have to display your grammatic ability in front of millions of people in a sequinned outfit!

What are your top tips for learning and speaking a foreign language? Feel free to comment below. As always you can follow my blog by adding your email address to the box on the right.