25 min
Is It Worth Learning Japanese? 3 Questions to Ask Yourself the Way to Japan
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- Society & Culture
You might not be offended by the F WORD, but I am.
In the last month, I’ve had two consultation calls with Japanese learners where they just kept dropping the F BOMB – without even thinking about it.
Fluency.
The learners, both complete beginners, wanted to get fluent in Japanese. Quick! Now! Yesterday if possible! One had a time scale of 6 months, and the other a year. Now, I’m not one to rain on anyone’s parade, but I needed to break to the sad news that going from zero to Japanese hero in such a short time would be… well, unlikely.
One of them took it well. The other was insulted. But why do you think I can’t become fluent in a year if I study every day? she said. I explained that it very much depended on what fluency really means to her. Also, she would need to be highly motivated to reach that level so quickly, and devote almost all of her time to this goal to make it happen.
On the other hand, I just spoke to a guy who has been studying Japanese for a long time, but who is now feeling particularly unmotivated, given the global pandemic situation in 2020. Millions of trips to Japan have been cancelled or postponed indefinitely. He said: why bother now when I don’t even know when I’ll be able to go to Japan?
I know that there have been lots of headlines about people learning languages during lockdown.
So, I’d like to focus on 3 really important questions to ask yourself when it comes to making a decision on whether learning Japanese is right for you, right now. And, importantly, what Japanese to learn.
What Problem Will Learning Japanese Solve in My Life?What Does Fluency Mean to Me, Personally?What’s Stopping You?Hope you find this episode helpful!
I have defined 6 simple steps to OMOSHIROI learning, which I can’t wait to share with you in this series of podcasts!
Start uncovering your UNIQUE visions, goals and tactics to learn the Japanese that YOU WANT!
To grab a copy of the playbook that accompanies this series, click here:
The OMOSHIROI Method Fill-in-the-Blanks Playbook
Visit JapaneseLondon.com to get more info about learning Japanese, and enjoying a Japan-full life in London.
Vanessa connects learners with 1-1 native speaking Japanese tutors for private lessons and runs the Japanese London Conversation Club.
She also blogs about Japanese living in London, and can be found on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter.
Yoroshiku onegaishimasu. ♡
You might not be offended by the F WORD, but I am.
In the last month, I’ve had two consultation calls with Japanese learners where they just kept dropping the F BOMB – without even thinking about it.
Fluency.
The learners, both complete beginners, wanted to get fluent in Japanese. Quick! Now! Yesterday if possible! One had a time scale of 6 months, and the other a year. Now, I’m not one to rain on anyone’s parade, but I needed to break to the sad news that going from zero to Japanese hero in such a short time would be… well, unlikely.
One of them took it well. The other was insulted. But why do you think I can’t become fluent in a year if I study every day? she said. I explained that it very much depended on what fluency really means to her. Also, she would need to be highly motivated to reach that level so quickly, and devote almost all of her time to this goal to make it happen.
On the other hand, I just spoke to a guy who has been studying Japanese for a long time, but who is now feeling particularly unmotivated, given the global pandemic situation in 2020. Millions of trips to Japan have been cancelled or postponed indefinitely. He said: why bother now when I don’t even know when I’ll be able to go to Japan?
I know that there have been lots of headlines about people learning languages during lockdown.
So, I’d like to focus on 3 really important questions to ask yourself when it comes to making a decision on whether learning Japanese is right for you, right now. And, importantly, what Japanese to learn.
What Problem Will Learning Japanese Solve in My Life?What Does Fluency Mean to Me, Personally?What’s Stopping You?Hope you find this episode helpful!
I have defined 6 simple steps to OMOSHIROI learning, which I can’t wait to share with you in this series of podcasts!
Start uncovering your UNIQUE visions, goals and tactics to learn the Japanese that YOU WANT!
To grab a copy of the playbook that accompanies this series, click here:
The OMOSHIROI Method Fill-in-the-Blanks Playbook
Visit JapaneseLondon.com to get more info about learning Japanese, and enjoying a Japan-full life in London.
Vanessa connects learners with 1-1 native speaking Japanese tutors for private lessons and runs the Japanese London Conversation Club.
She also blogs about Japanese living in London, and can be found on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter.
Yoroshiku onegaishimasu. ♡
25 min