I discovered Valentina and her work a few months ago when I signed up to her newsletter. I was a silent reader for a while, but one of her newsletter topics resonated with me, so I sent an email … firstly because I think it’s important to give people this feedback when we like their content, and secondly to ask Valentina whether she’d like to come on the podcast to talk about it!

We talked about:

Why Valentina decided to start her newsletter and her mentoring programme for freelance translators

And remember – if you’re not a translator, these points about marketing and finding clients can be applied to other areas and industries too!

If you’re looking for direct clients at the moment, what would you say is the biggest challenge?

Find out more about Valentina, her work, and how you can contact her by visiting the show notes page for our episode - htpps://www.englishwithkirsty.com/podcast/episode313

Christina and I met recently on LinkedIn and found that we have 3 languages in common! Rather than letting the easiest one for communication become the norm for us, we’re trying to use all of them … However, this podcast episode is only in English! I was curious about Christina’s work with language identity and I thought it would be an interesting topic to explore further on the podcast.

We talked about

Find out more about Christina and her work here: https://www.englishwithkirsty.com/podcast/episode312

Feeling ready and being ready aren’t the same! One of them can be influenced by a whole host of unrelated factors and the other one is based on facts. One depends on your mood, how much you want to listen to imposter syndrome today, or whether your old friends procrastination or perfectionism are knocking on your door. The other one is far more something 
that you can control.

Taking the next step in any journey can be a bit scary because we’re venturing into the unknown.

But my question for you today is … is there something that you’ve been putting off doing, either in your business or personal life, because you don’t yet “feel ready”? Is there anything you can do, or anyone who could help with that – to get from where you are to where you want to be?

And of course, if it has something to do with actively using your English in spontaneous conversations, let’s chat! I may be the person who can help you to move forward!

You can find out more about what I offer here: https://www.englishwithkirsty.com

Jadwiga is my final guest from the group of language professionals who agreed to share how they combine their love of animals, in Jadwiga’s case horses, with a career in languages. You’ll find out in the episode why Jadwiga wasn’t able to join us for episode 300, but it was great to catch up with her this month to find out more about her … and her animals of course!

We talked about :

I particularly liked Jadwiga’s take on the last point in terms of being open to identifying potential clients in the spaces where we already are and with the contacts that we already have. Sometimes you just need to have the courage to present yourself and explore those potential partnerships and collaborations.

Find out more on the show notes page - https://www.englishwithkirsty.com/episode310

I’ve been following Cátia’s blog for a while now – since the time when I first started meeting more Portuguese people and eventually decided to learn Portuguese myself. Recently I decided to find out more about her work, her blog, and why she decided to write it. So, this is that conversation! If you want to know about Portugal – places, traditions, customs, and other interesting facts – head on over to the blog. If you’re learning a language other than Portuguese, stick around for the language tips – most of them can be applied to any language!
 
We talked about:
 
🎤 Why Cátia started writing her blog
🎤 Why it’s important for us as language teachers to bring information about culture, traditions, history, and interesting places to the language classroom
🎤 What Cátia enjoys about teaching Portuguese
🎤 Where Cátia’s blogging inspiration comes from
🎤 Tips for learners of Portuguese

Did you know about this blog? Have you discovered something new there recently? Is there an aspect of Portuguese culture or a place in Portugal that you’d maybe like to hear more about?

You can find all the links on the show notes page - https://englishwithkirsty.com/podcast/episode309/

You may remember Katharina from last year when we did an episode on the importance of networking. If you missed it, you can check back to episode 294.

Today we’re talking about self-care. It’s something we hear about a lot, but often it can feel like an afterthought or a nice-to-have-if-we-weren’t-so-busy. But especially for those of us with one-person-businesses, self-care is essential. And of course, as this is a language podcast, we also talk about how our additional languages can be part of our mindfulness activities and help us to focus on what’s happening here and now … and not in all the other times and places where our mind likes to wander.

We talked about

🎧 Katharina’s language story, including her interest in medical writing and why it’s so important to guarantee equal access to medical informatioin
🎧 How writing for ourselves or journalling can help us to process our thoughts and emotions
🎧 Why it’s important to take care of ourselves as freelancers and what forms this can take
🎧 How journalling in other languages can give us different perspectives and help us to be present.

We’d love to hear your ideas – so if you want to share what works for you in terms of self-care for freelancers, which language you choose for your journalling, and how the writing process has helped you, do let us know in the comments.

Find out more about Katharina on the show notes page: https://englishwithkirsty.com/podcast/episode308/

Sometimes it takes courage to get yourself out there and approach new potential clients. A lot of it can be done alone with nobody watching. You can research the companies, make a shortlist, and plan what you're going to write to them. That's safe enough! 

But if you want people to trust you enough to make you part of their teams and their workflows, there's a reasonable chance that they'll want  to talk with you and find out who's behind the email or LinkedIn message. Especially now, when people are often outsourcing parts of the lead generation process and initial message writing to AI... Potential clients want to know who you are, what you're offering, and more importantly - how you will add value to them.

And unlike your previous experience with agencies, who'll often have someone available who speaks your language, these conversations may need to be in a different one - either because it's the client's first language or because you'll need a bridge language in which you can both communicate.

These calls can be prepared to some extent - but there's also the spontanaity factor because it's a conversation between real people. And sometimes trusting yourself enough to go with that is harder than all of the preparation tasks!

If you're preparing for these calls in English, it's a topic that comes up in both my one-to-one mentoring programme and my reactivate your spoken English group programme for freelance translators. If it's in French or German, I can put you in touch with others who offer similar services for those languages.

Check the show notes page to find out how you can contact me to discuss what you need and how I can help, or to get the link for the LinkedIn event that I mentioned: https://www.englishwithkirsty.com/podcast/episode307

Today we have another episode in which we look at someone’s experience of learning and immersing themselves in other languages.

I recently met Alejandra Escamilla Sanchez on LinkedIn and wanted to find out more about her language adventures. We talked about

Alejandra has the kind of enthusiasm and energy that make it remind us why learning languages is fun! I hope you enjoy our conversation!

Find out more on the show notes page - https://www.englishwithkirsty.com/podcast/episode306

This short solo episode is based on the introduction to my last newsletter. If you want to receive the newsletter, you can sign up for it on any page of my site – https://www.englishwithkirsty.com

It’s always good to remember that we have choices. If we don’t, we can give our power away with the feeling that things are happening to us and we don’t have the agency to change them.

Today I’m talking about that feeling in an additional language when a conversation strays into unfamiliar or more difficult teritory. Do you focus on the feelings of inadequacy, the missing words, the fact that you could do better in your first language? Or do you focus on the recipient and the message, doing the best that you can with the skills and knowledge that you do have.

To be honest – I do both! But choosing the second way is a much better experience.

Sure, sometimes we have to be honest when we don’t have the answers. Sure, it’s also good to ask for help when we need it. But focusing on the other person and the message that we want to share often makes it easier to get past that initial flight response when we don’t think that we can do something.

In last week’s episode, I was speaking with Margarida and Cara about their groups for people who want to develop their Portuguese and Italian skills, to learn more about language and culture, and in Carla’s case, to read books in Italian.

I also have groups for people who want to develop their English skills and I have some thoughts on the topics that we discussed – how participating in groups can help us to learn, the sense of community that we can build, and some of the additional benefits that I’ve noticed during the last 4 years of running membership groups for English. Rather than making last week’s episode really long, I decided to share my thoughts here instead.

Find out more here: https://englishwithkirsty.com/podcast/episode304/
or send me a message if you have any questions - [email protected]