Welcome to the Influency Podcast. I'm Hadar and today we will be speaking to my student, Fred Silva.
Today I'm interviewing Fred Silva, a student of mine in my program, New Sound.
Fred immediately stood out to me as a new student in my program.
He was someone that was ready to accept challenge, especially when it came to English.
Fred is an entrepreneur and he has his own English podcast where he interviews all kinds of awesome teachers and English speakers about their journey.
In this interview, I'm excited for you to get to know Fred even better as he talks about overcoming challenges, getting out of your comfort zone and what it truly means to show up in English.
Fred also interviewed me on his channel, so if you want to check out that interview, I'm going to add the link in the description below.
Alright, let's dive into the conversation with Fred.
Hello, hello, hello, Fred, how are you doing?
Hello Hadar, I'm doing great. How about you?
I'm doing fantastic, very excited to have you here and to talk to you about your English journey.
Thank you so much for having me. I'm so happy and excited about it too.
Cool, so why don't you quickly, I didn't introduce you, but I would love for you to tell us a little bit about who you are, what you do, and how you started with your English work.
Good, good. Well, I'm Fred Silva, I'm from Brazil, and I'm an entrepreneur and in the digital market in field.
And I'm passionate about English since I start to learn it, so I got passionate about it and right now I'm helping other people to gain confidence and speak English better.
So I'm not an English teacher, but I am a person that encourage other people to speak about English.
I have a channel, a podcast on YouTube, and I have been helping people to improve their confidence, their few aspects of their English.
When I am studying English since 2018, because of work, I wanted to get clients outside of Brazil, and then I decided to study Spanish and English.
But I fall in love with English, and I noticed that English is kind of a passion, I need to do something in this field too.
Because for me, I love to talk to people and to use English on a daily basis.
So this is a little bit about my journey, and since 2018, I'm learning English, I'm speaking and trying to improve.
And it's a long journey, so I'm in the middle of this journey, and I am so happy to be here with you in this podcast, in this interview.
Because I love to challenge myself, for me to be here is a good challenge, it's a big challenge.
So you like challenges, right? Because for example, you have a YouTube channel where you interview teachers and colleagues and content creators about English.
What made you decide to start to put yourself out there and become a content creator?
Yeah, the first thing was helping people. I noticed that when I help somebody else, I learned more.
And when I do something for another person, that a good thing comes back to me.
So in my English was improving, because I'm like encouraging people, I was like helping people to improve.
And I decided to start the YouTube channel, because I want to give others the perception that everybody can speak English, because I'm a shy person.
I am that guy that when I was a kid that sit in the front row and do talk with anybody, because I was so shy.
And when I started to develop my communication skills, I noticed that speaking is good, communication is important.
So I just start to improve my communication and my life, start to improve it too.
So when I noticed that I can help other people to improve their English, and I will be improving my own English, I will be improving my own life.
So I decided to start the channel, because I know that I could help people, and I could help myself too.
And I want to, as you mentioned, I love challenges, and I challenge myself to interview the greatest teachers on the internet.
So this is the reason I, to do you in my podcast, I interview a teacher Tiffany, that's a great teacher also.
Amazing.
And I'm in the middle of this challenge.
So this year, I want to interview a lot of the best English teachers on the internet.
So this is my big challenge, and I love challenging myself, because every time that I challenge myself, I start to improve my English and my personal life, my professional life too.
So I've seen, I've seen that this concept of challenge is like a repeating element in your, in your experience as a student, and also as a content creator.
It is.
Why is that? And if you also want to share how, what you think about not being challenged, being in your comfort zone, and why?
Yeah.
I love a quote. I don't know who said that, but I, I get from a song that said, the comfort zone is a dry land, where it's not, where nothing's grow.
So I believe that, I believe in the comfort zone, nothing good happens.
Because you know, you're just leaving your life, you're not doing something interesting.
So what would it look like for like traditional English learner to be in their comfort zone and their English learning journey? What would that look like?
Yeah, I would say that when you are in your comfort zone is something like you are swimming in a swimming pool, very, you know, have waves, you don't have anything that,
you know, danger, and then you are just, first of any English, you are just learning vocabulary, you're just learning expressions, but you know, open your mouth, you're not speaking with, with anybody, you are not, you know, using the language.
So I usually compare this with to swimming in a, in a pool. It's comfortable, it's okay. I don't have any trouble there.
I have, you know, if I have a problem, I can just hold in the border, so it's easy.
And to be out of your comfort zone, I usually compare with swimming in the ocean, like in the ocean you have sharks, you have big fish, you have, it's so deep, so it's dangerous.
But when you are there in that dangerous situation, you will learn and you grow so much, and then when you need to go back and swimming in a, you know, in a swimming pool, it's so amazing because you already are able to swim in the ocean.
So I like to compare this type of things because I can't believe in that. And for me, you know, to have a podcast and to help people is to swim in the ocean.
So to swim in the ocean for me, it's like that. And I try to challenge myself on a daily basis, because I think right now, if you put myself in, you know, to speak with investors or to speak with, in front of people, I'm ready because I'm doing things that are difficult also.
So I am to burn myself in a different way. So every challenge that you, you give myself or accept it because I never refuse a good challenge.
I think this is something that definitely a lot of people, I hope a lot of people get inspired by it because I need to be so incredibly important.
Would you say that being where you are today is a result of showing up for your English practice consistently, where you're good, English, diligent, English learner?
It is, it is. If you don't practice, if you don't prove your English, it's impossible to improve because, you know, how can I, I'm learning pronunciation.
You know, I just had to learn pronunciation this year with you in your sound because I was doing the podcast and I was like, hmm, sometimes I know that my pronunciation is not the best.
So I just had to focus on that.
If I don't use, you know, if I don't, in interviews like this, if I don't speak with people, if I don't show up in the meetings, if I don't use English with my clients,
how can I prove my new knowledge? How can I use it? How can I know that it's work or not?
So I totally believe that you need to put yourself out there, you know, to prove that you are learning.
And if you are, you know, struggling with something, no problem, just step back and do it again, try again until you get comfortable until you get like, oh, I'm doing a great job, I'm improving.
Because sometimes not easy to to notice that we are improving. Sometimes we got like, hmm, I am like hitting the ceiling, I'm not improving anymore.
So it's normal. But as much you, you prove your English as much you, you try to use, you will notice that it's, it's going to be better and better until you achieve the level that you want.
Yeah, that's good. And let's say someone wants to do that, but there is something preventing them from doing it. Like what would someone who wants to put themselves out there or to practice consistently?
Like what does someone need to believe in or to feel in order to be able to make that their reality?
Great question, great question. First thing, first thing, I think you need to believe in yourself that you are capable to do.
If you don't believe in yourself, nobody else will. So first thing, you need to believe in yourself. And second, I think it's important, you don't care about others' opinion.
Pretty seismic, or like people that are not, you know, gentle with you. Because in my own journey, I try to surround myself with positive people, people that will help me, not people that will judge me or things like that.
To be judged sometimes could, you know, make us to get like stuck because we are thinking about other people, thoughts.
So you are like, try to prove somebody else that you are good to know. You need to prove yourself that you can do it.
When I, the first time that I put myself in the ocean, you know, to challenge myself was when I was learning Spanish, I decided to record a video just to, you know, to see how it looks like.
And I did, and then we see a positive feedback. It's good. So let me do it. I'm not a video, I'm not a video. And then I start to do the same with English too. And I noticed that I start to improve. So because of my positive feedback that I received, I noticed that, yeah, I can do that.
So I can do more and more and more and then things start to improve because I was around of people that are there to help me not to criticize me, not to judge me.
So don't don't allow anybody else to judge yourself. Just think that nobody will judge you. You were speaking another language. You are amazing.
You are intelligent because you are, you know, I don't know the percentage of the percentage of people that don't speak a second language. You are doing it. So you're good.
It's much higher than those who speak two languages and more.
Exactly. Sometimes people are so afraid to speak with natives in the US, for example.
But they just speak English and you speak sometimes English, Spanish, and sometimes Portuguese. Sometimes I know people that speak five languages.
Yeah. So you're great.
Absolutely. And, you know, I liked what you said. I have a lot of students and, you know, who want to be content creators or business owners that who understand that showing up in English is critical for their business and success.
You know, both you and I were into digital marketing and content is so incredibly important and especially video because people really connect with you over video.
And they're afraid to show up on video because they're afraid of the criticism. But in fact, what you are saying that once you became content creator, not only that you didn't receive that negative feedback, which again might happen to some and that is okay.
It's part of the world that's part of the work.
But you say that actually it was the opposite. And because of that, that actually gave you more confidence instead of so it's it's counterintuitive because people would be afraid.
But you're saying, no, actually it would build up your confidence.
It was my fault to, you know, to do what I'm doing right now.
You know, to show up on the camera and start to speak with, you know, other students, English teachers, entrepreneurs, people that
it natives also, it gives me more energy and more, you know, power, more, you know, self confidence and everything.
So sometimes what scares you is the fool that you need to improve your English. So if you take this as a good thing, you will do amazing things.
And I noticed that to your students, they have this feeling to I need to show up on camera. I need to speak. I need to record videos.
I saw people on new sound that record 90, 90 videos.
90 videos. That's a daily video challenge. Yes.
Yeah. Amazing.
And this is amazing. I saw people that never spoke English before speaking like it's incredible.
Yeah, because you proved to yourself when you do these things that are challenging, you just proved to yourself that it's possible.
You build confidence and the person you want to become. Let me ask you this.
What are the most interesting things that you've learned from interviewing all these great people and teachers?
I learn these things every day, every interview I am learning something new.
But I think the most valuable thing that I learned was you need to care about other people.
When you are giving just giving good things come back to you. So I noticed that when I start to report, you know, interviews and speak on YouTube.
Because I received a lot of feedback like this. Fred, I was stuck. I just gave up to study English because your video, because your podcast, I just had to go back again and study.
Because I know that I'm not always that's possible. I noticed that this I can do it.
So because of that people start to study again. So I have learned that if you give good things come back to you.
So I think I became a more generous person because of that I think.
So it's not just related to English, you know, each change our life in general.
And I think that is that I became a better person because of that.
Right now I'm passionate about to help people.
But I think this is greatest in me, you know, it's it became my how can I say my main goal, my purpose to live to help people and the way I can.
So I think that that's it. I became a more generous person.
This is so profound because it really is about because when you're generous, not only that it makes everything worthwhile a lot more, you put the focus on the other person.
And when you focus on the other person, then you stop caring so much about your own performance all the time.
Right? You don't pick on every single mistake or mispronunciation because you're all geared towards the other person.
And what do they need for me right now? How can I show up for them so that they feel listen to and understood and that they can understand exactly what I'm trying to say.
And when that is the focus, it takes away all the negative self-talk and all the, you know, being self-indulgent in your own thinking and you're focusing on the other person.
So beyond the act of giving and providing help to others, I think also having that intention changes your entire English experience, which leads me to talking about mindset.
Because I know that inside of New Sound, you know, one of the things that you were working on in addition to pronunciation was mindset.
What is a healthy mindset for an English learner?
I think mindset is one of the most important things because if you don't develop this skill, you know, to have confidence.
Yeah, you have to develop because if you don't have confidence in yourself, if you don't have a, you know, a good mindset to learn and to know that this is a journey, it's a long journey.
It's not just a short one. So when you notice that mindset is important and you start to work on that.
I have heard people saying that one of the best models of New Sound is the mindset because of that because people are afraid to speak, they don't have confidence.
And when they notice that it's everything's related on me, I just need to change my, the way I think, I just need to think differently and then things that will start to improve.
I can come back to myself in 2018. I was shy, I was a person that was not a good communicator.
I'm still thinking that I'm not so good at it, but I'm working on it.
So when I start to notice that mindset is important and I start to develop this skill to think in, you know, in a good way, to believe in myself first and then start to try to help others in the same way.
I noticed that this is the key. If you, you can know a lot about English, you can know grammar, you can know pronunciation, you can know everything, but if you don't have confidence to speak, you won't speak.
I see a lot of people like this, I see people that if you ask something about grammar, they know everything, they know all the rules, they know everything.
But you say, hello, how are you? And then they just get stuck, you know, they don't open the mouth and they are great, they know a lot of things, they are smart.
But they have like a thing that is the mind, just getting there in the same place and then as I mentioned, if you don't have a good mindset, you can, you can move, you can do anything.
So I think mindset is one of the most important things.
And when I noticed that and I started to develop my English, I started to encourage people to do the same, working in the mind before, and then your English one should be better.
And then I, you know, there is something interesting. I had helped a lady from Spain.
She is over the 60s, years old, she is retired, she didn't have any reason to speak English.
And she was like, I can't do it, I'm too old to do that, I'm so, you know, and I started to help her, like, no, you can't do it, no, you are good, you are smart.
Record a video and you see, and then she started to record one video to videos.
In a few weeks, she was speaking very well because English was there, she was just playing, you know?
Yes, yes.
I've seen that so much, like, you know, I've had a student who studied for 12 years in English and she wasn't able to speak her, people around her would make fun of her.
And then inside of New Sound in two months, she was like making long videos, you know, and talking about it, the English is there for the most part, for a lot of people.
They just need to have that confidence.
Even if you think, okay, my English is not good, try it, you see that it's like freedom.
I'm a person that I tell everybody, record videos.
This will help you to go outside of the comfort zone.
Videos are amazing, and now you have, you know, everything that I totally believe that everybody needs to have in English learners.
You need to record videos and you need to have a YouTube channel or Instagram account just to share your journey.
You don't need to be a YouTuber or things like that, but if you show up on camera, expose yourself, you'll see that it's not a big deal.
Yeah.
Everybody can do it.
Absolutely.
I always say, like, if you're, you're an English learner, you become a content creator.
My students are content creators, ultimately.
Let's talk about pronunciation for a sec.
How has pronunciation work helped you build your fluency?
As I mentioned before, at the beginning, when I start my channel, I notice that I need pronunciation, because I never work on this.
I was speaking, but, you know, the way I can, but I notice that sometimes I'm not clear enough.
I need to, you know, prove this respect.
And I start to study with you, I start new sound.
And then I notice that pronunciation is habit.
It's a habit.
You need to build this habit.
And then you will start to put these little things in your communication.
And then you will start to improve.
So, I notice that after just to focus on pronunciation, my English start to get more clear.
Because sometimes I was speaking with people.
And I noticed that they got like this.
And trying to understand what I was saying.
And I noticed that because, you know, if I just change a thing in my word, it became another word.
Like, we have words that are really similar, similar in English.
And we learned this with you in the new sound, like the minimal pairs.
And we need to hear in this deep English the difference.
Because when we are talking, sometimes, for example, with me, I have a problem to do in the end of the word.
Sometimes I didn't say this.
And then the word became another word.
And could be challenging.
And my clarity is not, it will be a fact.
So, when I focus on my pronunciation, I start to notice that this is a habit.
I need to build this habit.
And then now I'm aware about the sounds.
So, even when I make a mistake, I know that I made a mistake.
So, I start to, okay, let's correct this.
How do you practice, how do you practice a pronunciation?
So, let's say a sound that you feel like you need to change or incorporate.
How do you practice it?
I usually, I love videos.
So, I usually go to your English to see how they would pronounce it.
And then I start to repeat as much I can.
Like, they would again and again and again until it becomes more natural to me in my mind.
Because, for example, I have a problem to pronounce words that are long in English like, for example, responsibility.
Things like that, sometimes I know that I make mistakes.
For example, I was speaking with somebody a few days ago.
No, it wasn't beyond.
I was speaking with Christina, I think.
Yeah, Christina.
And I need to say a word and then I said responsibility.
And a lot of sudden I got like, okay, responsibility.
So, I remember the sound.
Of course, responsibility is not wrong.
But I am working in my accent.
So, in my American accent.
And I noticed that, okay, say it again.
And then I said the right way that I want.
Because I am aware about the sound now.
So, I think studying pronunciation helped me to be aware about the sound and build new habits.
And then I think I'm conscious about the sound now.
And I'm still need to improve it.
For example, the TA that was a big challenge for me as a Brazilian.
We don't have this sound.
It's a big challenge sometimes.
I start to develop it.
And I noticed that it's getting better.
So, I noticed that the sounds are coming.
Yeah.
I love that.
All of them.
The sounds are coming.
This is really how it is, right?
Like you practice and you practice and you practice.
And then, you know, you don't feel it.
You don't necessarily use it.
And then all of a sudden they're coming.
Or all of a sudden, what comes out of your mouth is like, yeah, it actually is how it sounds in my head.
And I hear it like that for the first time, which is the beauty of this type of work.
And of course, it helps you build confidence.
And I also try to get difficult words, you know, too.
Because I have like a difficulty to learn.
I don't know why, but sometimes I will learn something.
I forgot very, very easily.
So, I try to get difficult words that I really struggle with.
And then I try to repeat as much I can.
I try to use in my speech as much I can.
And if I have a chance to use that word, I will do it.
And then I can see the feedback in someone else's face, you know.
It's okay.
I did wrong or I did it.
Good.
So, let's keep working on it.
You're so attentive and sensitive to what's going on around you.
Yeah, I need to be.
I need to be because, as I mentioned, I forgot things very quickly.
So, I try to put things in the more visual way that I can, because I'm...
So, and this is a thing that I think is really important.
You need to know what is your best way to learn, because I'm a visual person.
If you put graphics for me, I wouldn't stand and retain everything.
But if I just see, for example, if I try to read something, a book or something,
it's not the same for me.
I have more...
Yeah.
It's more difficult for me to learn.
All right, Fred, thank you so much for everything that you shared.
It's also incredibly valuable and really shows the very interesting, courageous journey
that you took in this English learning experience.
I'm going to ask you the same question that you asked me when you interviewed me for your channel,
which, by the way, we're going to link to my interview on Fred's channel,
so you can definitely watch it.
What would you recommend someone who feels stuck or in the plateau in their English learning journey?
Great question.
I think you need to challenge yourself.
Challenge yourself as much as you can.
Put yourself in danger.
Dangerous situations.
And you will start to improve your English, because no...
As I mentioned, the comfort zone is a dry land where it's nothing grows.
So don't be there.
Step out of the comfort zone.
Start to do things that really scares you.
And you will see...
You can message me later.
Fred, it doesn't work if he doesn't work for you.
Because I'm a proof of it.
I start to do this type of things.
I start to challenge myself on a databases.
And things start to happen to me in business, in English, in every aspect of my life.
If you challenge yourself, your English is going to improve you.
So I think it's the main thing.
Time yourself.
Working your mindset.
Surround yourself.
My good people, positive people.
Like Harbar.
So you see that your English is going to improve because you have people to support you.
You have people to help you.
And you will grow because people will help you to grow.
So I think that's it.
I love that.
Thank you so, so much, Fred.
And where can people find you and follow you?
Thank you so much, Haudar, for having me.
And my YouTube channel is called SilverCast.
You can search on YouTube.
And on Instagram is the same.
SilverCast is my brain.
So you can find me on YouTube and on Instagram too.
And we're definitely going to link to your channel, your Instagram account,
and also to the interview we had on your channel.
And I wish you many, many years of prolific, create content creation,
push all possible boundaries, challenge yourself.
And I have no doubt that you will continue seeing success and feeling accomplished
as you already feel and even more.
Thank you so much, Haudar, on the board of my heart.
And I think I will because I am, I am like following your, you know,
I look at your content and I got like, this is a good thing.
I can, I want to do something similar.
You are a great inspiration for me.
So, and this, it's helping me a lot to, you know, to improve my quality of my content.
And they desire to help other people.
So yeah, thank you so much for being this inspiration and for help me in, you know,
to improve my English and to gain more confidence to do what I'm doing.
So thank you so much for being this inspiration.
Thank you so much, Fred.
Thank you.
Take care and I wish you all the best.
Thank you.
See you soon.
I hope you enjoy this conversation, Fred.
Thank you so much for your time.
Remember that we also have an interview on Fred's channel.
So go check it out.
Have a beautiful, beautiful rest of the day.
Let us know in the comments what you think.
And I'll see you next week in the next video.
Bye.