705 - Learning A Second Language

With Share My Trip from Uber, you can send your live trip location to the ones who matter most, like Dan and Hannah who always wait up to make sure their daughter gets back to her college dorm room. Or Tiffany, who's running late as usual, and her friends are tracking her trip to make sure she's actually on her way. Or Sam, who never goes anywhere without her roommate knowing exactly where she is. Some journeys are meant to be shared. Share your ride in real time with Share My Trip on Uber. One more way Uber is putting safety at every turn, learn more on the Uber app. I didn't like what you said, Odin pauses, about the future. This is the love story of Real Hinge Couple Odin and Edward, written and read by me Curtis Garner. Listen to the free audiobook now. In this episode, we look at the benefits of learning a second language. And I'm excited because this is Tiny Leaps. Welcome to another episode of Tiny Leaps. Welcome to another episode of Tiny Leaps, Tiny Leaps. And as a result, there is real value to be gained in becoming bilingual. Bilingualism is defined as attaining proficiency in communicating through any two languages. And here's a fun fact. The majority of the planet, the majority of the people on this planet, are bilingual or multilingual. In a 2006 survey conducted by the European Commission, 56% of respondents reported that they could communicate in a language other than their mother tongue. Many countries have even higher rates of multilingualism. For example, 99% of Luxembourgers and 95% of Latvians speak more than one language. Quote, even in the United States, which is widely considered to be monolingual, one fifth of those over the age of five reported speaking a language other than English at home in 2007, an increase of 140% since 1980. End quote. Outside of the house, when they are at work or in the classroom, millions of Americans speak a language other than English. It's incredibly important as a way to connect with cultures around you and even change the way you think about the world, but the benefits go even further. Researchers have been able to look deeper into the brain to explore how bilingualism communicates with and affects the cognitive and neurological processes thanks to technological advancements in recent decades. Findings have been pretty well established at this point with it coming back that being bilingual helps develop your problem-solving skills, form your worldview, and even help you avoid diseases like Alzheimer's. So in this episode, I want to drive into some of the benefits. My goal to get you convinced that you need to start learning a new language ASAP. Now I'm personally learning Japanese right now, and I'd love a study partner. I promise I'm not just doing this to be selfish, but yeah, if after this episode you decide you want to learn Japanese, hit a brother up on Instagram at Tiny Leaps. But before we jump into the rest of the episode, I want to let you know about an awesome free challenge me and the team are putting on here at Tiny Leaps. From May 12th to May 31st, we are doing a free meditation challenge. Again, the challenge is 100% free. All you have to do to join is enter your name and email. After that, you'll receive meditation prompts each day for 20 days, as well as some guided meditations from a wellness coach we're partnered with. By the end of the 20 days, you'll be well on your way to developing a solid meditation habit or refining the one you already have. Cool, right? But that's not all. Just by signing up, you'll be entered for a chance to win one of three mystery boxes. There's the Dixon mystery box, which is designed to help support you on your daily grind to improvement. The ablaze mystery box, which is all about firing you up and getting you motivated to tackle any challenge. And finally, the sky mystery box, which is all about calming you down at the end of the day and helping you get the rest you need to keep moving forward. To learn more, all you have to do is head over to tlbc.co/challenge or click the link in the description of this episode. All right, let's dig into the benefits one by one. The first thing is that you'll open up more career opportunities. Many employers favor candidates who have learned to speak more than one language, because it demonstrates a good work ethic and the ability to meet a challenge. Businesses with foreign customers need someone who's not only fluent in another language, but also culturally conscious and open-minded. According to the U.S. Department of Labor, "Translators and interpreters are expected to be one of the 15 fastest growing occupations in the United States," end quote. And according to a survey by the new American economy, on the increasing demand for bilinguals and major industries in the U.S., employers are looking for more bilingual workers in sectors that need a lot of social interaction. Among the top companies looking for bilingual employees were Bank of America, H&R Block, and Humana. So, to put it simply, by learning a second language to some degree of proficiency, you're actually going to open up career paths that you might not even be considering right now. Which of course leads to the potential for more fulfillment in your day-to-day life, more money, more opportunities going forward. And the second big thing we need to look at is that it's going to help you be more creative. See, while creativity can be a difficult thing to accurately measure, researchers have attempted to quantify and measure creative ability in several ways. One of the tools that they use is called the Torrance Test of Creative Thinking, or the TTCT. It was first introduced in 1962 by Ellis Paul Torrance. And it measures an individual's capacity for what's referred to as "divergent thinking" in four key areas - fluency, flexibility, originality, and elaboration. Divergent thinking is essentially how well and the speed with which you can solve a problem. And on the TTCT, a group of bilinguals were compared to their monolingual counterparts in a study conducted by the University of Mashad. Bilinguals outperformed monolinguals in each of the TTCT's four steps according to the findings. Now this may be due to bilinguals being presented with circumstances where different viewpoints help them address issues more effectively, but the results are clear. Being bilingual helps change the way that you approach problems in front of you. And of course, there is the most common reason for wanting to learn a new language and that is the social benefits. When you are familiar with another person's first language, sharing thoughts becomes easier. This can lead to better social interactions and more fulfilled relationships. Since language is related to culture, speaking many languages can help you understand and appreciate other cultures. This helps you to form deeper ties with people from different cultures. Nelson Mandela once said, "If you talk to a man in a language he understands that goes to his head. If you talk to him in his language that goes to his heart." Communicating in a person's native tongue is not only a wonderful way to show appreciation, but it also allows you to form a deeper personal bond that goes beyond simply being understood. And it often has the benefit of getting people to let down their guards at relaxes that making them feel more open and making it easier to connect with you in deeper ways. And the last benefit here is that there are some major, major, cognitive benefits. See, as I already mentioned, there have been numerous studies on learning a second language. And in those studies, they found that a second language can strengthen neural pathways and boost your brain's performance in other areas. bilingual speakers outperform monolinguals in abilities such as removing irrelevant information and concentrating on more important information, according to recent studies. Bilinguals are better at prioritizing because of these abilities, and it may be the reason why they scored higher on the creative tests that we just discussed. But I know I said the last one was the last benefit. There is one more quick one, a quick bonus benefit here just to push some of you over the edge that might be still on the fence, you're still debating, do I want to learn a second language? Did you know that being bilingual can boost your chances while dating. According to a survey conducted by language software providers. or rocket languages. 79% of people agree that someone who is bilingual is more desirable. And 77% believe that someone who speaks another language is more intelligent. So, not only does learning a second language help you understand another person, it might help you understand another person if you go what I'm saying. Sorry, that was weird. The point is this, no matter what second language you've always been curious about, I encourage you to start learning it. There are any number of benefits. Even ones we didn't discuss here. And honestly, it's just a super fun way to use your time. And if you end up picking up Japanese or if you are listening to this, you're a native Japanese speaker looking to trade English practice for Japanese practice, hit me up on Instagram @tinyleaps and let's chat. That's all I've got for this episode. Big shout out to Somrady Jen for writing the original script of this. Also shout out to Sophie Somrady for the original edit on this. I'm going to link to both of them in the description of this episode. So make sure you check them out. And I'm also going to link to the free challenge that I talked about earlier. It starts May 12th to May 31st. It is 100% free. By the end of it, you are going to have everything you need to maintain a meditation habit that could serve you for the rest of your life. And you get a chance to win one of three mystery boxes, which is just fun. Like, why not take that chance? Head over to tlbc.co/challenge right now to learn more or click the link in the description of this episode. Thank you again. I've been Greg Clunus and remember that all big changes come from the tiny leaps you take. Every day, every day, every day.