Here is our next online Workshop on May 4. Free for all the students of the Confident Business writing group and open for everyone who wants to practice https://lu.ma/i8uzs1x8?tk=OUQLne

An email workshop begins today! How to send emails of apology, thank you emails, and how to keep your email tone in check. All the students who took the writing course can enjoy the free ticket to the workshop. We start in 2 hours. Register here http://nataliatokar.me/email-workshop

this Sunday. Join us at 12:00 in Moscow https://fb.me/e/28H2oE68h

Join us tomorrow at 12:00 in Moscow
*
1. You think your manager is overcomplicating things (instead of a 15-step process you're now expected to follow a 45-step protocol using outdated software). How do tell them that it will make everyone on the team feel resentful and stressed out?

2. How do you say NO to an introduction you don't want to make?

3. A Vendor You Don’t Want to Work With - how do you say NO gracefully?

4. You need to tell a client that you're increasing the fees.

5. You need to communicate to a client that whatever they ask for is impossible to deliver

6. You need to communicate to your management that you can't deliver expected results with the resources currently available.

We will be looking at these and more situations that people will bring to the session.

Join us on Sunday (May 16) and practice showing tough love and delivering tough messages in English🙂 We will be learning to use intonation, rhythm, and the right wording to arrive at mutual understanding, even in the most difficult circumstances.
https://fb.me/e/28H2oE68h

The free course "9 essential skills to achieve native-like fluency" starts tomorrow. If you already signed up, you will see the first lesson tomorrow. Remember to sign in and check your dashboard. If you would like to get on the waiting list for the next cohort in August, please leave your email address on the website. https://courses.nataliatokar.me/courses/9-essential-skills

New video. Keep your focus sharp. Tips for deliberate practice. https://youtu.be/r6X63_uGJPk

My story: from intermediate German to native-like fluency in English

What do you do when there are no more language courses, when you score as high as above the targeted level, and it doesn't mean a thing...? When you feel that you NEED and CAN do more than the system of language levels can offer.....

My idea of learning a language pivoted when I taught myself to learn the German language. Sometimes help comes from where you least expect it.
What's your story?

Part 2 is coming soon.https://youtu.be/CPvnEjigb2I

https://youtu.be/PAiSsW1tw5s

Three exercises to learn to THINK faster in English.

In this video, I also touch upon:
- Second language identity
- The art of being spontaneous in a foreign language
- Reading fiction: how to do it correctly to improve fluency

Which exercises have you tried?
Which exercises are you doing consistently?

https://youtu.be/13asPt8-5I8


I'm offering 60% off on both of my writing courses until October 5, 2021
Apply here to join a 4-month course "Learn to THINK in English" - https://cutt.ly/iEFQtUC
Apply here to join a 9-month program "Confident Business writing for non-native speakers" - https://cutt.ly/sEFQa2O

ALL courses offer individual feedback on all your work.

now, when major social networks, Google and Amazon services are down, this video is even more relevant https://youtu.be/dCb4jVX4Zo0

https://t.me/nataliatokar_russian
I started a new telegram channel in Russian. I used to post my thoughts on FB and Instagram, but now, when these services are down, I decided to post my thoughts in Russian here.

Please join if it's more convenient for you to read a blog here

How to see the beauty in the language? Learn to see the beauty of the thought. The beauty of intention. Read these excerpts from real letters that real people wrote to those who mattered to them.


The world is divided into people who do things and people who get the credit. Try, if you can, to belong to the first class. There’s far less competition.
Dwight Morrow to his son, Dwight Jr., 1925 | The Rotarian

***
If you will trust my scheme of making a mental habit of doing the hard thing first, when you are absolutely fresh, and I mean doing the hardest thing first at the exact moment that you feel yourself fit for doing anything in any particular period, morning, afternoon or evening, you will go a long way toward mastering the principle of concentration.
F. Scott Fitzgerald to his daughter, 18 Apr 1938 | Letters of F. Scott Fitzgerald

****
There is always more surface to a shattered object than a whole.
Djuna Barnes to Emily Coleman, 1960 | The Book of Repulsive Women and Other Poems

****
Inhabitants of different and largely incommensurable worlds can live happily together—but only on condition that each recognizes the fact that the other’s world is different and has just as much right to exist and be lived in as his own. Once the other’s right to live where he or she is temperamentally and, no doubt, physiologically predestined to live is recognized, there can be something very stimulating and liberating about the experience of being joined in a loving relationship with somebody whose universe is radically unlike one’s own. It becomes possible for each of the partners to enlarge his own private universe by taking his stand vicariously, through empathy and intelligence, within the other’s territory and trying to see what reality looks like from that other vantage point. I remember a very touching passage in one of my grandfather’s letters about his own obtuseness—the obtuseness of an immensely intelligent man of the highest integrity—in relation to his wife’s insights, immediate, non-rational and almost infallible, into human character. Jack Sprat could eat no fat, his wife could eat no lean—which is precisely why it is possible for them to constitute a symbiotic organism superior to each of its components. But, alas, what is possible goes all too often unrealized and, instead of federating their two worlds, the temperamental aliens settle down to a cold war.
Aldous Huxley to Humphry Osmond, 6 May 1959 | Psychedelic Prophets The Letters of Aldous Huxley and Humphry Osmond

*****
Listen: respect even the bad parts of yourself—respect above all the bad parts of yourself—for the love of God, don’t try to make yourself perfect—don’t copy an ideal, copy yourself—that is the only way to live.
Clarice Lispector to her sister, 6 Jan 1948 | Why This World

We meet in Moscow on October 10, 2021. Please join the practice. It'll be a pleasure to work with you in real time https://fb.me/e/SadVUt0D

if you don't see the FB post, you can register here http://careerboost.ru/

October 10, 2021. 12:00 - 14:00
Moscow, m. Aeroport.

Tomorrow at 12:00 in Moscow.

We meet every month to practice and improve our communication skills in English.



Register here
http://careerboost.ru

https://soundcloud.com/natasha-tokar/natalia-reads-women-who-run-with-the-wolves-chapter-3?si=dc933f577e794849a476d458c957f782

the text is in the description box.

https://youtu.be/l78ebc8aZyA

How to be creative and spontaneous with your English practice routine

I was working on my self-presentation today. Here is what I ended up with:



I'm Natalia, and I am not a native speaker. I don't create "unique programs", I don't advocate for "secret methods", I don't promote myself as an English teacher. There is no "secret" approach. On the opposite, all the tools are simple, transparent, and publicly available.

I fundamentally believe that non-native speakers can advance their English skills and reach native-like fluency in their home country, without having to take private lessons for the rest of their lives, and without having to buy expensive programs for "advanced" students.

I teach a self-study exploratory practice approach to learning a foreign language and I show HOW to actively learn from people (many native speakers, not one special person who is currently playing the role of your English teacher)

The challenge is to learn to learn. Instead, people wait to be taught.

Mastering a foreign language always means developing your cognitive and metacognitive skills. No textbook and no teacher in the world can develop these skills for you. No one can teach you to THINK differently about the language, to THINK IN a foreign language, and to self-correct your thinking and your speaking patterns. This is your job. You're the one who can do it best.

I don't believe that paying a teacher twice a week for a lifetime is a sustainable strategy to master a foreign language. I don't think that taking one course after another and not knowing what to do when no more courses are available (or once you can't afford new courses anymore) is sustainable either.

Many non-native speakers believe it's ok to depend on somebody's lesson plans, on somebody's unique teaching method. I disagree. I know that every person is unique. Any teaching method in itself is useless and not important. It only matters if people can apply this method to their own unique situations, their individual learning abilities, and if they can get the result (better English skills) WITHOUT having to depend on this method (or the one who promotes it) forever.

It's totally ok to use a combination of methods and learn from a lot of people. It's not true that one special person knows better than others....but since we live in the era of "personal brands", every teacher tries to convince their audience that they are the ONE.

My programs do not promise English "levels".
My courses are individual mentorship programs that help non-native speakers learn the skill to learn independently. Here people learn to THINK in English (instead of translating words in their head) and continuously advance their thinking and communication skills in English.

If I can do it, if people around me are doing it every day, I don't see a reason why other non-native speakers can't do the same.
You can move beyond "advanced", "proficient" or any other academic levels. Language is about understanding people, not about passing tests or scoring levels.

You don't pay for "unique" content. Content is free and should be free. Content doesn't matter as much as the strategies to work with content.

I teach the strategy to apply knowledge and develop cognitive skills in a foreign language. It's a system of simple exercises that every person can do on their own and in any life situation. My job is to help people master the exercises, and I always give individual feedback. Once a person has learned to do them, they can keep practicing on their own time and they can always reach out for feedback and support.

Your thinking process defines the quality of your speech. You're not only improving your language skills. You are inevitably learning to self-correct the way you speak (in any language).

On average, it takes an adult 9-12 months to acquire these skills.

I don't teach English. I help you learn English.... because you can do it yourself.
I don't charge by the hour (feedback is unlimited), and you never pay extra for my feedback and our communication "once the course is over". There is no such thing as "the end". The learning process is infinite. All my students continue practicing for at least 1,5 years (I keep creating educational videos for them at no extra cost) and they help other people with their results.

All you need is an internet connection and a desire to learn.
Check out my programs here - https://courses.nataliatokar.me/

Everybody who takes the Public Speaking course in English learns to craft their self-presentation in English. Every paticipant learns to tell at least 5 different stories to introduce themselves, their experience, and their service/product. Many people join the course to learn to sell themselves as professionals at a job interview. Check out the curriculum. We begin on Nov 19 https://courses.nataliatokar.me/courses/online-business-presentation-skills-in-english

Writing Fluency in English. Tips for advanced learners. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1MLHcMSWgU0