When I listened to Arianna Huffington's voice, something shifted inside. There she was on the stage, powerfully joking about her journey with her accent during her opening speech for the University of Santa Monica's Class 2015. She shared how she had tried to lose her accent for years. I immediately related to her story.
I speak three languages fluently, with an accent. Yes, this includes my native Finnish somehow I managed to create an accent even before I moved abroad. I still remember the day when it was brought to my attention. I had just started 7th grade and moved to a bigger school where my class size had almost tripled. We introduced ourselves during the Finnish class. I was nervous about speaking in front of my new classmates, and could feel my heart pounding as I went through my introduction in my head. When my turn came, I managed to say what I wanted, but then the teacher asked me a question. She inquired if one of my parents was a non-native speaker as according to her my accent was a bit off. I still remember how some of my classmates laughed. I felt hot, but not in a good way. I wanted the Earth to swallow me up... In those days, I preferred to blend rather than stand out. I now felt cast out, as the girl with a funny accent. God knows where I had got it from, maybe I carried it over from my past lives.
On that day I came to the unconscious conclusion that it was not a good thing to speak with an accent, people would ridicule me. During the years I became very skilled at feeling ashamed of my accent, an internal harsh dialogue would start as soon as somebody inquired about it.
When I moved to California 18 months ago, I got many queries along the lines of "I hear an accent, where are you from?" Every time I squirmed, as it made me feel that I wasn't good enough. Each query increased my hesitation to speak up. I felt how my self-confidence dropped immediately and I became again the shy girl from 7th grade. I did my best to avoid saying sounds that I found challenging. It didn't matter when I got compliments about my accent or my voice. I just focused on the comments that I had said something wrong... I just wished that I could download a perfect American English accent, but that didn't happen. As the saying goes, what you resist persists. My accent has stayed with me all these years and my feelings towards it have been full of shame.
When I listened to Arianna something shifted. She shared her story about how she chose to relax with her accent and let it be. I realized that although I created a negative association with my accent, it did not make me not good enough, it did not make me less worthy. Those were just stories that I had made up. My value is not related to my accent. I could choose to see my way of speaking in a different light. I could reframe it as a unique selling point - there is no other person in the world who speaks exactly like me.
The very next day I got a chance to explore the shift that had taken place. I had a lunch with an acquaintance, and he commented that I had pronounced a word wrongly. I was halfway along the familiar walk of shame when I realized that he had come to test my reaction. I laughed at how beautifully this person reminded me that I had chosen to relax about my accent, like Arianna. I turned the situation around. I embraced my wounded ego and said to myself that I was still worthy and valuable. I embraced my unique way of communicating. Then I asked how he pronounced the word and bravely tried it the new way.
As I'm overcoming my own challenge and changing my attitude towards my accent, I'd also like to encourage others on their journey. An accent is not something to be ashamed of! My current English accent is a collection of lovely memories. It reminds me of my home country Finland, my years living in the UK and Spain, my friends all over the world from Norway to South Africa, and now I'm collecting memories from California.
It took me years to learn this, but I get it now. I have the courage to take the microphone and speak up from my heart. The message is more important than the pronunciation. I give my accent an A for teaching me this valuable lesson.