How does your Dutch teacher hypnotize you?

A good teacher can make a decisive difference for everything that you learn, including Dutch. Most people understand this… But… there is one thing that most people never think about. It is subtle and not always visible. But… you can always hear it. It always has a direct impact on your results and… it has to do with hypnosis….

Hypnosis often happens during learning! Whether you realize it or not!

Did it ever come to your mind that while you are sitting in your Dutch class that you got hypnotized? Probably not… Maybe you did fall asleep and you had your eyes closed for a while. But… you did not walk around like a chicken, right?

Many people have outraged ideas about hypnosis. They associate it with theater shows in which people get in a trance and then do crazy things in front of an audience that is having such a great time, because you look so foolish… Often people associate hypnosis with mind control. It would be about turning people into zombies so that they will do anything that you like. No wonder that the word hypnosis often makes  people feel a bit nervous at least.

But…. as a matter of fact being in a trance, with or without hypnosis is quite normal. It happens when you daydream, watch television or drive your car.

Sometimes it simply means that you have focused attention on something. That is it! Nothing to really fear, right?

But… here comes the important thing… one specific thing are suggestions… Whenever you go to a hypnotherapist, all that you do is relax and then what you do is listen with heightened attention to some positive suggestions. For example, you’ll hear that you are confident and because of the relaxed state that you are in, chances are higher that you’ll accept this idea for yourself. You start believing that you can be confident and that you are confident. Then the positive result will be that you feel more confident!

But… whether you realize it or not, you already listen to suggestions all the time. Certainly from your teacher!

Simple words can put you in a receptive mood, or not!

A suggestion is an idea that you can accept or not and… they can both be positive and negative. So, here is the catch. What kind of messages does your teacher send out while teaching? If you pay enough attention, if you are conscious enough, then probably you’ll notice that unfortunately many suggestions tend to be negative.

Here are some examples of negative suggestions:
* This is difficult
* You need to study hard every day
* Only if you do your homework, you’ll learn
* Dutch has many exceptions
* These are things that cannot be explained

The problem is this: if this kind of suggestions gets repeated more often, chances are high that – whether you notice it or not – you’ll pick them up and that somehow – often without you really realizing – start to believe them. For example: what happens if you find out that you did not do your homework? If you truly believe that you can only learn if you study hard, then immediately it will have a negative impact on your results! You may feel that you are lagging behind, that now, you will never ever pick up, while maybe this is not the case!

On top of it, there is another subtle way of programming… If your teacher uses words like: study, homework, doing exercises, grammar, then what do you feel? Does it make you feel excited and eager to discover a lot more? For many people words associated with study and learning has often a contracting effect. Somehow it makes everything very serious and it is hard to really relax and open up!

Here is one more way how you can check it for yourself… if someone says: let’s party! What do you feel?

Therefore, for a teacher it is really important to know which ideas and suggestions you are sending out, while teaching. Unfortunately, many teachers are totally unaware of this. While they are sending out ideas and suggestions, many of them tend to be quite negative!

Luckily there is also good news. If your teacher understands the powerful impact of suggestions, then you can also use it for creating a highly positive impact. Here are some examples. Imagine that instead of a lesson, you talk about a Dutch language show. This already sounds more entertaining, right? What if your teacher says: hello my friends, welcome to this great learning adventure, you probably feel the difference, right? Even when it is on a subtle level…

Certain words can put you in a highly receptive learning state, if you know how to do it!

Here are some other examples. Instead of saying: that is wrong, you could say: almost there, take one more guess. Or: the more mistakes you make, the faster you’ll learn! You already do this in English, now just do the same thing in Dutch!

Somehow, words that we use create a certain energy. They help us to open up or to close down. They help us to decide whether we find learning joyful, adventurous, or horrible and tedious. The strange thing is: once you understand it, everything is so simple. Using positive suggestions is quite easy to do and somehow the effect of it is really so powerful!

Here is another important thing… the better you feel, the faster you learn! At the end, learning is not just an intellectual and rational activity. It is the energy that will move your forward, or not…

Here are some more examples of positive suggestions:
* Now that you understand this, things get easier and easier
* Doubt often means that you start to see new things. What is a next step that  you could do?
* You already understand how to pronounce this word, whether you feel confident about it or not….
* Every new word that you see will help you to connect more and more with everything around you…
* Feel free to make at least 65.000 mistakes and have fun with it!

You see? What you read are only words, and… they sound much better than things like: I must do it right now, or I must not make any mistakes, right?

Therefore, just be open to the idea (or suggestion) that words can have tremendous power! That is exactly why words are so fascinating. You can play with them and see how to can create an important impact. It is fascinating to discover and… once you know how to use it to your benefit it can make you a lot smarter too!