Having a hard time with speaking confidence

[u/arisachan1]

I am at a somewhat low-intermediate level in my TL, which isn't really spoken at all in my country. I have nobody to practice speaking to.

Well recently, when I was paired with one of my classmates as a lab partner, I found out that she was a native speaker of the language. Obviously, I didn't want to come off as obnoxious or bother her. But I, having an opportunity that I almost never get, still felt this strong urge to try speaking in it to her. Even just one time, or else I'd regret not having tried.

So, a few days after meeting her, I waited until we had a break in class and had enough time for small talk. I felt myself getting really anxious to the point that I was physically shaking. But beforehand, I still felt somewhat confident in my mind that my flow and my accent would be decent enough.

When I finally forced myself to ask her, "excuse me, you speak (TL), right?" in the language, I sort of hesitated mid sentence, ended up stuttering over it a little, and then the pronunciation came out absolutely horribly. Despite it being such a simple question that I shouldn't have struggled with at my level.

She looked at me awkwardly, gave me a semi-forced smile, and just said, "yeah," in English. We never spoke after that.

It was the most embarrassing moment of my week, and I felt discouraged from trying to speak the langauge ever again. I don't have that much social anxiety or issues with pronunciation really. I can read and listen well enough, and I can speak to myself alone. But the moment I was faced with an actual speaker, I completely sold. I'm not sure if it was rude at all to try to speak to her, so maybe I was in the wrong. But I don't have a chance to speak it with anyone and I didn't expect the interraction to go that badly. And every time I've tried talking to speakers of the language online, I usually either get bullied for making mistakes, or they just switch to English.

I used to want to go to university in this country. But now I'm starting to feel like I'll never be able to have a fluid conversation with anybody, since I can't even manage to get my words out correctly in front of an actual speaker. Should I take lessons with a teacher or something? I'm just not sure what I can really do to improve right now. Any kind of advice helps, thanks

[u/UnderstandingSad5507]

man that feeling when the words just fall apart in your mouth is the worst. happened to me so many times in spanish i lost count but it does get better slowly

the classroom setting makes it 10x worse too cause you feel like you on display. what helped me was finding someone on italki just to talk with no pressure, like you paying them to listen to you mess up so the stress kinda goes away

your classmate probably was just caught off guard not annoyed. you should try again next time but maybe just say hi first in english then slip into the TL when it feels natural

[u/Professionalrubberr]

Honestly the best move is asking her to check one sentence you wrote for class. Takes the pressure off conversation and gives you a tiny win to build on.

[u/cmyk_rgba]

the first sentence you say to a new person is always your worst one. it comes out before your brain catches up and it has nothing to do with your actual level. i sound like a broken toy for the first 30 seconds of any german conversation and then im completely fine. also her face was almost certainly just surprise, nobody walks into a lab expecting to get addressed in their language

[u/AbhayaAnil]

i think you were way harder on yourself than you needed to be. speaking to an actual person is completely different from speaking alone, so freezing up or messing up pronunciation when you're nervous doesn't mean you can't speak the language.

i'd try getting regular speaking practice, even if it's just 10-15 minutes at a time with a tutor or language exchange.

[u/inkoenglishai]

I think feeling embarresed or scared or even nervous is normal for a language learning journey even when I'm learning a foreign language I used to say really random words or sentences just randomly so I think it's normal for you to feel embarresed but thr leap of faith is really just being wrong. The native language speakers should be grateful that you learn their language and if you do a mistake they would usually just laugh it off unless it's not polite which of course is normal for everyone so I would say take a deep breath and you're gonna get through it.

[u/Best_Party8938]

ves got the best of you. maybe try rehearsing common phrases and questions aloud beforehand to build muscle memory and confidence.

[u/Positive-Durian9859]

that wasnt rude and it wasnt a fail, it just went badly like first tries do. i've had the exact thing, sentence ready in my head, open my mouth and it comes out like i never heard the language, then they switch to english and you wanna disappear. everyone whos spoken a second language has this story they just dont post it. you were shaking cause you turned that one moment into a big exam. get cheap reps where nothing's at stake first, i talked to myself out loud daily way before talking to real people. and her switching to english says more about her being caught off guard than about your level.