There's No Way Of Learning Chinese With A Messy Mind!
Or …
Is there?
Actually, yes. There is.
No matter how manic, no matter how depressed, no matter how much I've got on my plate, ALMOST every day, I fit language learning into my schedule.
One of my best tricks is this:
Win The Morning, Win The Day
Do you reach for your cell phone first thing?
And are you making the mistake of using it as an alarm clock so that you have no choice but to check it first thing?
If you're serious about learning a language, checking your messages and farting around on social media first thing in the morning is a big no-no. That's true even if you want to learn languages online.
Think about it. How many times have you gotten caught up in the "Twilight Zone" of Facebook only to notice that 15 minutes … 30 minutes … even an entire hour has slipped past.
For nothing!
So don't do it.
Here's How To Get Language Learning In First Thing So You Feel On Top Of Your Progress All Day Long
I hate having that feeling throughout the day that I'm neglecting what I love: memory and language learning.
So in addition to winning back oodles of time by not looking at my "dumb phone" and not turning on the computer, here's what's going on right now:
On the floor beside my bed, I have Langenscheidt's Chinesisch Schreibübungsbuch.
It's a book written in German that teaches how to write the Chinese characters. Tucked inside the book is the notebook I'm using to draw the characters.
I don't get out of bed until I've spent as long as it takes to practice drawing 8 characters 8 times.
Why 8?
No idea. That's just the number that came to mind. It's just part of what I've learned from Olly Richards:
You Must Have A Language Learning System!
Seriously. You must. Languages don't get learned Helter Skelter. They get learned based on consistent efforts executed consistently.
That's the first part of my system and a huge part of The Big Five Of Language Learning.
Next, I pop in my Human Charger and meditate. I do this for exactly 9 minutes.
Why 9 minutes?
Because that's how long it takes for the Human Charger to shoot its light into my ears. You may have heard me talk about other, more relaxed meditation approaches in the past, but I'm experimenting with this one and it works really well.
Next, I knock off another of The Big Five language learning activities:
Spend Time Listening To Your Language Every Day
Listening to Pimsleur language learning programs (Pimsleur for Mandarin Chinese no less) used to bore the snot out of me. Sorry to be vulgar, but it's true.
Think about it: You listen to this guy promoting you in English to say stuff in the language you're studying again and again and …
… again.
It's Like Pounding Nails Into Your Head!
But then I had an idea:
What if I "fuse" l
Published on 9 years, 9 months ago
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