I felt like a failure last week.

I created this beautiful challenge for my inner circle - I thought it was beautiful - to help them speak more like a native.

We focused on describing things like a native.

And it was a total, complete disaster.

Here's what I asked them to do:

Pick an everyday event. Describe it.

One adjective. Plus one sentence to help us understand the tone and intensity of that adjective.

Simple, right?

Bloody hell. No one got it.

For the first time - no one.

They just described what happened. No emotions. No colour. No texture.

Just... flat.

And I doubted myself so much that I cried.

I found myself at my darkest hour.

I kept asking: Was it me? Did I explain it wrong? Was the challenge too vague?

I knew there was a gap. I just didn't know how big this gap was.

I sat with it. Then I talked to Ms Shannon, another NETeacher on our team.

She's equally shocked as I am.

And that's when it hit me.

It's not a language barrier.

It's something deeper. Something about our Chinese thinking.

We're famous for getting straight to the point. No flowery words. No beating around the bush.

Efficient. Practical. Direct.

And that's exactly where the flatness begins.

We're so used to stripping away the emotion - because that's how we communicate in Chinese - that when we speak English, we sound... robotic.

We say the words. But we don't feel them.

So because of this painful failure - I'm creating something new.

An intensive that focuses on this one important skill: how to describe like a native.

With emotion. With colour. With the kind of texture that makes people want to listen.

I'll share more soon.

But for now, I just want to say this:

Failure isn't the end. It's the beginning of something better.

We will release the details of "Close-the-gap intensive" soon.

Keep learning,
Ms. Truda