Updating your goals and sub goals is very important to be successful. By doing so you change learn new ways and new approaches to thing. This also helps you to avoid slumps and the mundane. Often times we tend to stop learning or progressing simply because we get tired of the same old thing. We want to accomplish the goal for sure, but we are bored with the process. Thus we need to change the process and set new goals and/or change your existing goals based on what you have learned.
Recently, I fell into the mundane day in and day out I would do SRS, lightly review grammar points, listen to Japanese Music and Podcasts and watch Anime. Because of this it got routine and while routine is good it became mundane and I didn’t mind skipping for a day, then another and another and another. Before I knew it I had not studied in over a week and when I kicked myself enough to start studying I could tell I hadn’t. I then realized I was only going after the ultimate goal. Fluency in Japanese. I had accomplished my minor goals, but never set any after that.
However, I can now say I am out of my slump and cooking with gas. Here are some of the ways to break out of your current slump. Some of them are from experience and some from talking with others.
- Why? – define why you want to learn Japanese. Japanese is the ultimate goal, but there has to be a reason why. Also that reason might change. By redefining the why you can change how you learn to get closer to that goal. For me I realized I liked reading raw manga so I have now started working towards things that will help me to read and understand manga better.
- What is your current immediate goal? – what is it? is it feasible in the next week or so if not how can you break it down further? Break down what you want to learn into smaller parts and work on those parts instead f the over all goal all at one time.
- Change your goals completely – Go ahead and just change them try doing something completely different completely out of the ordinary goal wise something you never thought you would be interested in. If all you want to do is understand what people are saying so you can watch anime maybe set a goal to translate on the fly that way it can help your comprehension at a faster pace.
- Take a break – this one is fairly controversial with some people, but sometimes people just need a break from themselves. And a guilt free one at that. Go ahead and take a week of do something new and DON’T study at all. Come back refreshed and ready to hit the studying again hard and heavy.
- Talk About Goals and Learning Strategies with Others – For me this one always motivates me. When I read a new blog post or can engage with someone for a while be it online or in person about the trials and tribulations they have gone through with learning Japanese it helps to motivate me to get back and start studying again. Usually, as soon as I get home.
- Blog About It – Seriously blog about your learning process what you learn, how, the problems you had. All these things. Nothing is off limits, even if someone else posted exactly what you wanted to say. This gives you an opportunity to analyze what you have done and maybe helps you to talk with others about learning and they can give advise to help you through a problem
This seemed to turn more towards and re-motivate yourself most than a changing goals post, but they kind of both go hand-in-hand. I wanted to make this post because it seems the more I learn the more my goals change here and there even if only slightly so I start working on different ways to learn. This might be helpful for you too.
What are some of the things you have seen by changing your goals or how you re-motivated yourself?
{ 1 trackback }
{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
The picture. Just curious how the picture relates?
It was the closest thing I could find to a picture that was expressing: confusion, mundane, warn-out, unmotivated, being unsure. Most of my pictures I try to convey a feeling unless I can find a 1 to 1 picture that expressly says what it is about.
You know what, I totally relate to this process, and I can empathise with what you have been through. I'm constantly blogging about the problems that I have faced whilst learning Japanese, and it has been a great mechanism for releasing the pressure, let me tell you! Only downside now I suppose is that everybody thinks I'm useless at Japanese, which I like to think is not the case!