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Do you lack motivation? | ||
Tags: Motivation | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| cathrynm Senior Member United States junglevision.co Joined 5937 days ago 910 posts - 1232 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: Japanese, Finnish | Message 9 of 20 01 January 2012 at 4:18am | IP Logged | |||||
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>I feel that studying a language when I am not living in a country that actively speaks
>it and have no contact with native speakers, is a little pointless. I make peace with the pointlessnes of it all. Things don't have to have a point, I think. Why worry about such a thing? 10 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| anjathilina Diglot Newbie United States Joined 6416 days ago 33 posts - 106 votes Speaks: English*, Japanese Studies: Spanish, Mandarin Studies: Hindi | Message 10 of 20 01 January 2012 at 5:03pm | IP Logged | |||||
I agree. There are many hobbies that people enjoy that are more or less pointless. If you enjoy it, don't feel that you need any other justification. Just go ahead and enjoy it. 3 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Peter97 Newbie United States Joined 4754 days ago 9 posts - 9 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Russian | Message 11 of 20 01 January 2012 at 9:11pm | IP Logged | |||||
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There is no "talent" in learning languages, just the ability to enjoy the tasks that others consider difficult/boring. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Cavesa Triglot Senior Member Czech Republic Joined 4821 days ago 3277 posts - 6779 votes Speaks: Czech*, FrenchC2, EnglishC1 Studies: Spanish, German, Italian | Message 12 of 20 01 January 2012 at 9:51pm | IP Logged | |||||
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I think there is a talent which can make your learning a bit easier, or at least in some parts (like someone can more easily understand and use the grammar and someone else will need less time for getting correct pronunciation etc). It is just like any other talent, so it is not as important by far as the effort you put in. Talent doesn't mean you don't need to work for it. If you do, than your results may come faster than those of someone without the gift. But if they work hard and you waste your talent by not using it, than it's value will be minimal.
But to the motivation. 1.Speaking with natives is not the only motivation possible. There are people who above all want to read books, understand lyrics or watch films in original. You may not be one of them (or rather one of us), but nonetheless you may think of these possible goals. Neither a book nor a movie character won't stop speaking after a few minutes just because you seem to not understand anything. And they will help you on your path to speaking as well. 2.Try the exchange sites. Your exchange partner will have a lot of understanding for your basic vocabulary and stupid mistakes because in a few minutes, you will have the same for theirs. 3.You can learn a language for job or study reasons because your boss wants it or it would just look good on your CV. In that case, the question "What for?" is very important. Or you can learn as a hobby. And in that case it is just as pointless as "Why do you ride a bike? You are too old to qualify to the Olympic games!" 4 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Jarvis1000 Diglot Groupie United States want2speakthai.com Joined 4700 days ago 74 posts - 101 votes Speaks: English*, Thai Studies: Spanish | Message 13 of 20 01 January 2012 at 9:54pm | IP Logged | |||||
So there is no Michael Jordan had no talent at basketball, just hard work to learn the game? I don't buy it. No I don't think talent is everything, but you can't tell me that 5 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| pesahson Diglot Senior Member Poland Joined 5540 days ago 448 posts - 840 votes Speaks: Polish*, English Studies: French, Portuguese, Norwegian | Message 14 of 20 04 January 2012 at 7:23pm | IP Logged | |||||
I think that success is a combination of two. But I'd say passion to spend hours upon hours practicing skills is the key. And that act of practicing creates talent, or maybe, people who see other people good at something prefer to think someone is talented, than admit that the reason they failed is because they didn't work hard enough. Edited by pesahson on 05 January 2012 at 5:34pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Michael K. Senior Member United States Joined 5541 days ago 568 posts - 886 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Esperanto | Message 15 of 20 05 January 2012 at 12:57pm | IP Logged | |||||
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I agree with pesahson. There are plenty of talented people out there who never do anything with their lives because they aren't disciplined enough or aren't willing to work hard to reach their goals. Anything worth doing is always hard.
Back to the OP: yes, I often lack motivation, especially when I don't think I'm acheiving anything in the language. I guess that's why I like the active wave of Assimil because you go back to the beginning and it seems like you've covered a lot of ground. Taking a break and trying another language might help, too. Prof. Arguelles made a video a while back on motivation & self-discipline. He's ProfASAr on YouTube. I don't know if anyone follows Steve Kaufman's YouTube channel, but he always says that there are 3 things that make for great language learning: time spent studying, the ability to notice, and the third thing escapes me, but I think it's attitude. In a Toastmasters speech I heard last week, the speaker said he attributes 3 things to his success: enthusiasm, persistence, and confidence. There are probably many other keys to success out there, too. 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Chevalier Diglot Groupie Brazil Joined 4519 days ago 53 posts - 104 votes Speaks: Portuguese*, English | Message 16 of 20 05 January 2012 at 3:50pm | IP Logged | |||||
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I live in a non tourist area in Brazil, where the only foreigners I can find are Spanish and Chinese speakers, but the only language I'm actually studying is English, so there's no chance to practise it in real life at all. I feel like I need to speak/write more and get some corrections, but for some reason I'm way more shy on the internet than in real life. I also tend to be more comfortable talking to people who learnt English as a second language to an advanced level than real native speakers.
Not finding a real opportunity to use it actively in real life makes me lack some motivation, but English is the most important foreign language in Brazil and my entertainment is mostly in English. It may not be like that to everyone, but every time I watch a movie without subtitles, I feel really good, because when I started learning I never thought one day I would be able to do that. But I understand that it could be different to English native speakers, because they already speak what everyone else in the world is learning. I believe in talent, but I also think that hard work can help you achieve as much as a talented person would do. How come people who study languages after years can't pronounce all the sounds properly? And some other people just started learning and master all the sounds perfectly well? This is talent, but that doesn't mean that the person with no talent wouldn't be able to pronounce everything after the hard work. I have a friend who has always been good at Physics, and he doesn't even spend time on it, this is not hard work, just talent. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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