are the British negative
04/09/2011

is there a difference in positivity between British and American cultures ?

a nasty attitude
The famous hypnotist and self-improvement guru, Paul McKenna was born in England and now lives in California.   In a recent interview for the Sunday Times Magazine he commented: ‘There is too much of a knocking mentality in Britain.  In the US they encourage you to better yourself, but here it’s all “Don’t get ideas above your station”.  It’s a nasty attitude that undermines this country.’

performing in America
Having worked in the UK and the USA, I do see such differences.  In an article I had published in the UK magazine MK Arts entitled: ’Performing in America and Britain – the difference’, I discussed how much more demonstrable and appreciative American audiences generally are and how they also tend to buy more CDs.

Engish singers

When I run my ‘Everyone Can Sing’ voice workshop in the UK, students attend who are clearly good singers, but from the outset many of these announce that they can’t sing or don’t know if they can sing.  By politely challenging their limiting beliefs in an ambience of positive reinforcement their confidence, positivity and objectivity are all enhanced.

are schools to blame ?
During his talk at a recent conference, one of my British clients commented how popular my confidence–building singing classes have been and then joked: “we can thank the English primary school system for that”.  It does seem that we are more self-critical in the UK and education and parenting could play an important part.