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PMs TAC 2015 crazy? French course mission | ||
Tags: TellMeMore | Fluenz | Linguaphone | Flash cards | Michel Thomas | Self-Study | Spaced Repetition (SRS) | Diploma/Certificate | Study Plan | Fluency | Dutch | Pimsleur | FSI | Total Annihilation Challenge (TAC) | Assimil | French | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| garyb Triglot Senior Member ScotlandRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5208 days ago 1468 posts - 2413 votes  Speaks: English*, Italian, French Studies: Spanish | Message 369 of 451 19 May 2015 at 10:27am | IP Logged | |||||||||||
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I can relate to the last post. I'm also the sort of person who goes to extremes, tries to do too much, then gets burnt out. Recently I've had to learn to calm down a bit for the sake of my health, physical and mental. I already have problems with stress and depression, and it's stupid to exacerbate them by taking my hobbies too seriously, especially when these are things that are supposed to be for fun and relaxation.
I have an office job where I'm sitting down all day and there are always some sugary treats going around. Then I come home and I sit down for another few hours to study or to practise music. I'm sure this doesn't help matters either. The stuff about ego is also familiar; every so often I have to step back and question my motivations. I learn languages because I like to connect with people and cultures, but that can take an unhealthy turn towards seeking their approval and feeling like I need to speak the language well for them to accept me. At one point last year I realised that a major motivation for French was that after various negative experience with French speakers I felt a need to "prove myself" to them, and upon realising that, I took a break from the language for some time. It was very effective motivation, sure, but it was for the wrong reasons, and the more you tap that sort of motivation the more you become convinced of the faulty reasoning behind it. Taking that break helped me remember my original positive motivations of love for the language and culture. Take it easy and hope you feel better soon! 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| Teango Triglot Winner TAC 2010 & 2012 Senior Member United States teango.wordpress.comRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5557 days ago 2210 posts - 3734 votes Speaks: English*, German, Russian Studies: Hawaiian, French, Toki Pona | Message 370 of 451 20 May 2015 at 5:09am | IP Logged | |||||||||||
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I was sorry to read youʻd unregistered from the 6 Week Challenge; I got used to seeing your name at the top of the list. Being an erratic hare who tends to study in starts and stops, seeing your distant silhouette on the target language horizon was a real motivator for me to push a little bit more each day.
Battling health problems myself at the moment, I totally get your need for prioritising things though, and I hope you feel much better soon and find the right balance you're seeking. E mālama pono ʻoe i kou kino! (Haw: Take good care of yourself!) Edited by Teango on 20 May 2015 at 6:10am 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| PeterMollenburg Senior Member AustraliaRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5477 days ago 821 posts - 1273 votes Speaks: English* Studies: FrenchB1 | Message 371 of 451 20 May 2015 at 5:36am | IP Logged | |||||||||||
Thanks for sharing garyb, Yes I've done this with every aspect of my life almost. Exercise, study, sleep, food, TV, whatever it is, except work ;) -innate road block there, i've gone from one extreme to the other at one or multiple points in my life. All the while I've known how good balance is yet just not applied it for extensive periods. My ego is the issue. I see myself up on some kind of pedastool in some aspect of life, or I get so involved (obsessed) with sth I do it to the extreme.
Yeah it surely doesn't help (all the sitting). Research has certainly shown this. Then again research nowaday.. pfft.... a lot of it is financially biased rubbish that claims to be science. Nontheless it makes perfect sense that human beings are not supposed to be sitting as much as we do, so I lean in favour of the research. As for sugary treats- I know the feeling. I am seen as incredibly health at my workplace, but if there are treats around forever tempting me I have often either 1) eaten a few, got the taste, and upon leaving work gone to the nearest sugarly house of love (supermarket) and bought enough chocolate to sink a ship for my (seated) drive home, or 2) resisted the sweets at work so well that I then upon leaving work do the same as above, or 3) decided that they must be shared equally and there's not nearly enough of them for what I want, and then upon leaving work do the same as above.
Interesting experience there garyb and self-reflection. For me attaining a near perfect accent has always been part of my enjoyment in learning/'decoding' the language and helps I believe assist communication (strong accents can't be difficult for native speakers to deal with). I know you're not suggesting that based on your aforementioned experiences that you resolve to deliberately have an accent. I'm sure you still work on it, but for me I've not noticed that I do it for the approval of others. I think my flaw lies in seeking a perfect goal in which I learn French as fast as possible with an almost flawless accent so that I can live the life I have nicely pictured up in my head with fairies and chocolate smelling sugar free-roses in the garden and so on. To be fair i've always been realistic about the goal in it's imagary I think- I describe it that way to just illustrate how much of a 'carrot' or 'chest of gold' aspirational plans can be. And in the quest to achieve them, or turn them into reality we can lose sight of what's important in life.
What I really need to do with all things in my life is stop focusing on achievements or a certain picture in my mind as the be all and end all to the point i'm not living in the present enough and disrupting the balance of various aspects of my life. Balance is what I seek. And to achieve this I must be sensible with my language studies and still be present in the now. I can still progress in French nicely (and I'm proud of how far I've come now too) by doing some each day and enjoy the other simple things in life. For this reason I dropped out of the 6WC. I don't need the 6WC for motivation. I've plenty of this now. I don't need to be in the 6WC to find balance, study consistently, but not overdo it. I'm just going to enjoy the ride of learning this beautiful language however long it takes to get to my target, and I'm sure I'll still get a lot done. I may even stop counting my hours of study personally/month by month. We'll see. Fry a fry for fries' sake- they need it, ain't that the truth 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| PeterMollenburg Senior Member AustraliaRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5477 days ago 821 posts - 1273 votes Speaks: English* Studies: FrenchB1 | Message 372 of 451 20 May 2015 at 5:45am | IP Logged | |||||||||||
Thanks teango, Ahh you're making feel a tad of regret from withdrawing. I think its for the best tho. I'm still out there studying! And feeling a lot better too btw. I don't believe that my big study amounts each day are what directly made me sick just to be clear (not suggesting you implied that either). I just think that my seeking glory in whatever aspect in life leads to imbalance for me personally, which is not what I need right now. I'm feeling almost completly recovered btw, just need to approach my diet very wisely and tentatively. My ego still wants glory, i'm fighting an inner battle with this "go for it, smash that leaderboard to pieces!" "no, be sensible, in the end it's only a few weeks in your life that mean little, seek balance and follow through for the long term" I sincerely hope your own health issues teango improve significantly soon, and I wish you all the best with your language learning :) (including the 6WC) 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| garyb Triglot Senior Member ScotlandRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5208 days ago 1468 posts - 2413 votes Speaks: English*, Italian, French Studies: Spanish | Message 373 of 451 20 May 2015 at 10:52am | IP Logged | |||||||||||
Haha, this sounds right. If only I had the same sort of motivation and dedication for my career that I have for my interests!
This is a good point, I also tend to have a certain picture in my mind of my goal, where I'm socialising with native speakers and speaking fluently with a good accent. That goal might be unrealistic, or it might be realistic but require an amount of time and effort that isn't worth it and would be better spent on more important things in life. I mentioned the approval aspect because it's been a personal issue for me with ego and languages. That's due to general social issues I've had in the past, which is a whole other topic and something I'm working on, but it's relevant in my interests and especially languages. Languages are a social tool for me, so it's natural for my social problems to get tied up with them, like my example of feeling I needed better French to be accepted by French speakers. In reality, I doubt my French was the reason I had these bad experiences; it was far more likely other problems (including the very fact of seeking their approval) or just plain old incompatibility between people, and perfect French wouldn't have changed much. Again as I say this is just a personal experience, but I think it's a good example of the ego causing imbalances and unhealthy motivations, like your example of seeking glory. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| PeterMollenburg Senior Member AustraliaRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5477 days ago 821 posts - 1273 votes Speaks: English* Studies: FrenchB1 | Message 374 of 451 26 May 2015 at 12:33pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
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J'ai décidé que j'ai voulu écrire quelque chose.. cette fois en français, puisque
c'est la langue que j'étudie... ----- I decided that I wanted to write something.. this time in French, since it's the language i'm studying... ------------------------------------------------------------ ------ Ma santé La situation améliore. Je n'ai plus de mal au ventre, mais quelquefois j'ai un peu de nausée. J'espère que ça va améliorer aussi mais je dois faire beaucoup attention à la nourriture que je mange ces jours-là. J'ai aussi besoin de dormir mieux à la place de lire des choses sur mon portable (en français) tard après minuit- stupide ! ----- The situation is improving. I no longer have stomach ache/pain, but sometimes I have a bit of nausea. I hope that that's going to improve as well but I have to pay a lot of attention to the food that I eat now(adays). I also need to sleep better instead of reading things on my phone (in French) late after midnight- stupid! ------------------------------------ 6WC D'un côté je regrette d'avoir quitté le défi, mais à l'autre côté c'était une bonne décision. Je sais que si je participais encore au défi je serais vers le haut du palmerès, mais je sais aussi que si je participais encore je me sentirais plus de pression d'étudier encore plus, tous les jours. Au moins maintenant que je l'ai quitté je continue à étudier entre 1 et 3 heures tous les jours sans la pressions d'etre vers le haut du liste. ----- On the one hand I regret having left the challeng, but on the other hand it was a good decision. I know that if I was still taking part in the challenge I would be near the top of the leaderboard, but I also know that if I were still participating I would feel more pressure to study more, every day. At least now that I have left I am continuing to study between 1 and 3 hours a day every day without the pressure of being near the top of the list. ---------------------------------------------------- Mes cours, mes ressources J'ai définitivement décidé que je dois utiliser une combinaison de matériaux intensifs (des cours, SRS, Yabla, des magazines pour apprendre le français) et de matériaux extensifs (livres, séries françaises, lectures de sous-titres en français) pour m'exposer plus à la langue sans analyser chaque mot que je ne reconnais pas avec un dictionnaire . Dans le passé j'ai cru que j'ai seulement du utiliser des cours et que ça suffira. Je suis finalement certain qu'une combinaison et la meilleure méthode. Je vais analyser tout ce que je veux pendant que j'utilise mes cours par exemple en ajoutant chaque nouveau mot aux SRS, et le contraire pendant mes études extensives. Je crois que la moitié du temps consacré à la langue doit être des études extensives pendant que l'autre moitié comprend des études intensives de la langue. -------- I've decided once and for all that I should use a combination of intensive (courses, SRS, Yabla, magazines for learning French) and extensive material (books, French series, reading subtitles in French) to get more exposure to the language without analysing every word I don't recognize in a dictionary. In the past I believed that I only needed to use courses and that would suffice. I'm finally certain that a combination is the best method. I'm going to analyse everything I want to while I use my courses for example while adding every new word to my SRS, and the opposite during my extensive studies. I believe that half of the time dedicated to the language should involve extensive studies while the other half comprises intensive studies of the language. ----------------------------------------------------- J'utilise trop de cours maintenant, mais j'espère de commencer à parvenir à la fin de quelques-uns bientôt. Je veux utiliser seulement deux cours 'au bureau' en même temps et peut-être un cours d'audio en conduisant la voiture. Maintent la situation est que j'utilise 5 cours au bureau. C'est trop. ------- I use too many courses now, but I expect to begin to reach the end of some of them soon. I only want to use two courses 'in the office/at my desk' at the same time and perhaps one audio course while driving the car. The situation now is that I'm using 5 courses in the office. ------------------------------------------------- Travail à l'étranger/ habiter à l'étranger Récemment j'ai encore décidé de voir ce qui entraîne travailler comme unfirmier dans un pays francophone. J'ai lu beaucoup de blogs. C'etait facile de les comprendre en raison du vocabulaire commun et pas complexe. J'ai réalisé que la situation en Wallonia et terrible. Pour cette raison j'ai absolument rejetté la possibilité d'y travailler comme infirmier. C'est affreaux ! ---- Recently I again decided to take a look at what working as nurse in a Francophone country entails. I read a lot of blogs. It was easy to understand them due to the vocabulary being of an every day nature and not complex. I realised that the situation in Wallonia is terrible. For that reason I absolutely rejected the possibility of working there as a nurse. It's awful! ---------------------------------------------- En Nouvelle Calédonie la vie est très très chère. Et ce n'est pas exactement facile d'y trouver un emplois. Et je crois que ce serait difficile de faire examiner mon diplôme là-bas. ----- In New Caledonia life is very very expensive. And it's not exactly easy to find work there. And I believe that it would be difficult to have my degree assessed there. ---------------------------------------------------- Au Québec comme tous ces endroits ça durait beaucoup de temps et du mal de finalement y travailler comme infirmier, mais c'est peut-être un des deux meilleurs choix ici je crois. ----- In Quebec like all these places it would take a lot of time and difficulty to finally work there as a nurse, but it's perhaps one of the two best choices here I believe. -------------------------------------------------------- L'autre bon choix et la Suisse. Mais en lisant les blogs il y a des sentiments du pessimisme en raison du référendum l'année dernière. il y aura de quotas bientôts, des quotas pour les travailleurs étrangers qui veulent travailler en Suisse. Tout cela donne un air d'incertitude. ---------- The other good choice is Switzerland. But in reading the blogs there are pessimistic sentiments due to last years referendum. Soon there will be quotas, quotas for foreign workers who want to work in Switzerland. Job security will be low and all this gives an air of incertainty. ------------------------------------------------------ France - La version courte - trop difficile ! France- the short version - too difficult! ---------------------------------------------------- Tout cela donne peut-être l'impression que je vois moi-même tous ces pays avec beaucoup de pessimisme. En fait c'est possible je crois de trouver un emploi dans un de ces pays si je le veux vraiment. Mais avec un bébé, une maison et le désir de vivre hors réseaux à l'avenir, je crois que je dois investir mon argent dans un avenir dans lequel ma famille et moi aurons peu d'inquiétudes et plus de liberté de voyager à l'étranger sans avoir nous tracasser tous le temps comment on peut le faire sans argent. ----- All that perhaps gives the impression that I myself see all these countries in a pessimistic way. In fact it's possible I believe to find a job in one of these countries if I really want it. But with a baby, a house and the desire to live off the grid in the future, I believe that I should invest my money in a future in which my family and I will have few concerns and more freedom to travel overseas without having to worry all the time how we are going to be able to do it without money. PM 4 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| Jeffers Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4910 days ago 2151 posts - 3960 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Hindi, Ancient Greek, French, Sanskrit, German | Message 375 of 451 26 May 2015 at 2:03pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
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It sounds like wisdom and good sense are taking over, PM.
2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| PeterMollenburg Senior Member AustraliaRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5477 days ago 821 posts - 1273 votes Speaks: English* Studies: FrenchB1 | Message 376 of 451 26 May 2015 at 4:09pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
Cheers Jeffenburg 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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