I was talking to my dad today, and I had a moment where I thought to myself, “I am capable of so much more than I realize.” Let me give you the context for this fairly random epiphany: a discussion about language learning.My father is a native French speaker, however he did not speak to me in French as I grew up. As a result of that I have spent many, many years trying to learn French on my own with varying levels of success (at the moment my level is pretty basic). I have asked him before to talk to me only in French, but he’ll typically do it only for a little while then switch back to English.
During our conversation about my 4 yr old cousin, Oracle, who lives in Paris (who was picking up English very well the last time I saw him in France), it occurred to me that I always beat myself up for my lackluster language skills, when in fact I am decent enough in French to get around and I am actually fairly conversational in German. In thinking about my time in Deutschland, I was reminded that it’s kind of crazy how much you can accomplish when you have no choice/tell yourself that there is no other option but to succeed and move forward.
When I got to Germany last August I knew absolutely no German- the extent of my knowledge was “auf wiedersehen” (because that’s what Heidi Klum would say when people were sent home on Project Runway) and Edel Weiss (God bless The Sound of Music). For the first couple of weeks, I didn’t learn much Deutsch because all my teammates spoke English too well (it was an interesting problem to have 😉 ). It wasn’t until I started taking a class that my learning took off.
My teacher, Frau Kindermann, was a lovely woman who was originally from Argentina and spoke only Español and Deutsch. Seeing as how my 2 years of high school Spanish were a joke; her Spanish ability didn’t really make a difference for me… Sounds like a difficult and extremely intimidating situation, doesn’t it? It was. I remember feeling completely exhausted- both mentally and physically- after my first class. I don’t think I’ve ever had to think/work that hard before in my life. We (my roommate and I) joined the class late, and all the other students had already been living in Germany for months (even years) so we walked into a room where both the teacher and the students were speaking only Deutsch. There was no German to English translation (or vice versa), nothing. Initially I was overwhelmed, but I am so glad I had that experience. It forced me out of my comfort zone and I knew that I had the choice to either sit there in a stoic frustration for months or to challenge myself to be more intuitive and work my way through each day. I am happy to say that I took the second route and learned sooooo much over the next few months!
So what’s the point I’m really trying to make here- that you have to go to another country to learn a language?! Haha, no! My point is that there are so many times in life where we really want to do something, but we talk ourselves out of it or quit before we ever really even start because the task/thing seems impossible or unattainable. Why? Why don’t we take that challenge and use it as fuel to motivate us? I am going to be fluent in both French and German. How? By forcing myself out of my comfort zone and making the effort (watching German/French TV & movies, listening to the radio, having conversations with native speakers) to immerse myself in the language.
And this not only applies to language learning, but to every other facet of my life. So instead of giving up on things because they’re a little difficult, I’m going to push myself even harder to achieve success. I’m going to stop doubting myself and simply go for what I want.
Looking at 30 