Saturday 12 January 2013

Less could result in more.

So, here is my (slightly long-winded) New Year's post!
I hope the New Year has started off well for everyone! Personally, I love it. Not for the opportunity to get extremely drunk and forget the very beginning of the year (although, that can be very fun) but because I see it as a opportunity to start something new, or completely start afresh if things in life aren't where you want them to be. I always make resolutions too, with at least two of them relating to diet and exercise! The problem is, I rarely keep them up and don't reach my goals. This leaves me frustrated and feeling like a failure (I could write a whole other blog on this and how it affects my weight, but we're not here for that!), and over the years I've realised what's been going wrong.

These are the following elements that have contributed to me giving things up in the past.  I'm an all or nothing person, which is both a blessing and a curse. I also love to learn new things, travel and have new experiences, which has lead to the creation of a list of 46 things I want to accomplish in my life. And lastly, when I was younger I thought that when I reached 21 I should have learnt everything to an advanced level and if I hadn't then I was too old to learn anything new anyway. I'm sure you can see a problem? If not, I shall clarify.
The combination of all these together resulted in me believing that I had to put 1-2 hours in everyday with everything that I was learning or practising (at one time this was flute, piano, guitar, triathlon training and Italian) while studying or working full time. There is no way I could progress at the pace I wanted, because the days aren't long enough! And if I missed something one day, due to a busy schedule or tiredness or a football match, I would think that because I skipped a day of practice that I had failed and would then maybe not do anything for a week, vowing to start afresh next week, only to repeat the whole process again. Putting it simply, I was subject to irrational thinking. Extremely irrational!

I have been experimenting for years with ways to stop this destructive and irrational behaviour. And the best strategy I have worked out, isn't really a strategy at all, but common sense.  My dad worked with an Italian man, who I saw regularly when I worked in a stationery shop and one day he said to me 'Even if you practise something for just 20 minutes a day, you will improve'. As he told me this I remember thinking, 'yep, that makes perfect sense', but for some reason the part of me that saw how clear and obvious that advice was, remained hidden and another part of me kept thinking 'no, we have to do 2 hours of Italian, 2 hours on every instrument and exercise for 1-2 hours too or we will get nowhere in life'.  I took a while to see how negative this thinking was.

So, what has this got to do with languages? Well, wanting to do so many things as much as possible everyday (and being slightly impatient about it) doesn't work. Right now my goals are to reach C2 level in German, rapidly get my Italian to where it was in 2011 and then improve it to C1 level before moving on to Spanish. I want to achieve this by my birthday in July, as well as other non-language related things, and I've started the year out with this '20 minutes a day' approach.  Of course for what I want to achieve linguistically can't be done in 20 minutes a day and I have allocated a couple of hours to German and Italian everyday, but I've reduced or re-introduced my other hobbies to just 20 minutes a day, 5 times a week, knowing that with that I will keep my current level of ability and slowly improve.

The reason why I wrote this is because I know there are a lot of people who struggle with something similar or believe that because of they're age or the fact that they can't dedicate the whole day to studying a language means they will never learn one. Rubbish! The age thing is just crazy! I must of wasted at least three years of my life with that thinking, but now I see myself in my 60's and 70's still doing and learning new things.  Age really is only a number, and who doesn't find older people who sky-dive or travel the world cool? Those are the ones who inspire me! Finding the time is an obstacle that everyone has. Everyone needs to work, has kids, has a social life.  But with a little bit of practice everyday and patience you'll improve in anything you want to! It could be a language, a instrument, even a martial art and I think you will learn quicker than you think. Consistency is key.  Trust me, it is a lot better than going completely nuts with something for a week, to not doing anything for the next two. Less is more.