Happy Birthday!
In tune with your inner monologue
Welcome, aspiring polyglot! How many of your days do you remember? I’m sure if you thought about it, you would say you remember most. But how many do you remember vividly; and how many of those were special days? I remember almost every birthday I’ve ever had. The same is true for most holidays when I sit and think about it. Those memories, the ones that are so vivid they could be called core memories, deserve to live in two languages. This is one of the most challenging language learning exercises you will find.
Translating your thoughts
As I have said time and again, learning a language fluently requires you to think in the new language. The best way to train yourself to do this is by learning to translate your thoughts in real time. Eventually, that will lead to you simply bypassing that step and thinking directly in the new language. However, it is going to take several hundred hours of thinking in order to get to that point. Stated frankly, the sooner you start working on this the faster you can stop working on it.
Start small, don’t try to take on an entire day’s worth of thoughts right away. Whenever you get tired, take a break and when you feel rejuvenated give it another shot. In all likelihood, the exhaustion will come after the frustration at first. If you find yourself getting frustrated, step away for a second and resume at a different time. Languages are the same as most other things, sometimes you are simply too close to see the true problems. After taking a step back, you might just find that everything makes more sense upon your return.
What truly matters is that you remain consistent and build up daily. Progressively overloading your brain works in the exact same way as progressively overloading your muscles. Intensity is important, you have to bring it every session, but consistency is paramount. Building up this skill on a daily basis will provide you with all of the tools you need to start sounding like a native speaker. That said, it is going to be necessary that you force yourself to use the language without an opportunity to bail out.
Level up and write it down
Taking things to the next level, as you might imagine, involves writing. Not only should you be translating your thoughts, you should also be saving them so that you can refine them. The best way to start making your thought translation stick is through writing them down. I understand how little people want to write about their day to day life. I know this, because I am this. When I journal, it is after or before events.
Significant life events are perfect stimulants for creative thought and, when you do not have any that are happening or impending, thinking back to your favorite birthday or your favorite vacation or your least favorite of either is the perfect way to get moving. Start with 5 sentences, but always fight for more. Once you start, you might just find that you enjoy getting out the thoughts and that the exercise is bringing you back to some of the greatest moments of your life.
As you are writing, you will be faced with the exact same challenges you have faced in the past when trying to translate your thoughts. Since you are writing this time, you should be able to work through these more efficiently. Rather than trying to restructure sentences when you are stuck thinking, you have the opportunity to look up and begin using new words on the spot. This immediate implementation will go a long way in improving your retention.
Not only that, but since you now know how to more precisely express that particular thought, you can begin to use it in the future to express similar sentiments and explore more complex thoughts. This continuous improvements over months is powerful and it facilitates the process of learning to think in the new language overall. Furthermore, it should provide more clarity for your thoughts in your native language.
Improve the quality of your thinking
Now that you have them written, you have the opportunity to do something few people do. Revisit your thoughts. So much happens every day that, even if we spend time thinking, most of those thoughts will disappear never to be seen again. It is why writing down ideas is so important. If you are anything like me you probably have said to yourself, “surely I’ll remember this, it is such a good idea”, only to find out a few hours later that it was not, in fact, such a good idea as to be unforgettable.
Since you have chosen not to do that, you have the opportunity to avoid making that same mistake during your second language acquisition. Furthermore, you have the opportunity to work with ideas that you write down to refine them. Making your arguments more precise, adjusting your visualizations to ensure the greatest chance at success, and give your thoughts a chance at realization. Doing this consistently will affect the way you think generally.
Over time you will notice that you have to do less refining because the things you are thinking about are clear. Mental clarity is a side effect of bilingualism, at least for those who take the time to write and think in their respective languages. Yes, things will get muddied across languages, but that is because some words truly do capture concepts better in other languages. That is why direct translation will always only ever be the first step in one’s language learning journey.
Lastly, you can use this new skill to play mental chess with yourself and prepare for any and all conversations that you might have. If you need a refresher on what I call “mental chess” check out this article:
Learning How to Think in a New Language
Welcome, aspiring polyglot! People have been asking recently if it is possible to really think in a new language. The view around here is, of course, not only can you think in a new language, if you truly want to be bilingual you must think in a new language. While there are several approaches to getting to that point, there is one thing that works better than most others.
Train your brain to think ahead in everything and do it by training yourself to think in a new language. This is probably the most difficult thing for me to teach to people, but if you just start by translating the things you are looking at throughout the day, I promise the rest will fall into place with enough consistency. Preplanning conversations that you have consistently is another perfect way to ensure fluidity when it matters most.
Conclusion
Irrespective of what you choose to write about, what matters most is the effort you put towards getting away from direct translation. This exercise is difficult because it is one of the final steps before fluency. It is slow, then sudden. So reminisce about your birthdays, your Christmas’, your Arbor Days, anything that inspires you anything you want to remember, is perfect for this exercise. Even if it starts with only 5 minutes, that is 5 minutes more than yesterday.
Consistency with this is the most difficult thing, because when you are thinking you always have the options to simply stop. Fighting that urge gets easier over time, but at first it can be almost overwhelming. It will be difficult, but you can do difficult things and be great, so go out and do some difficult things and become great. Refine your thoughts to compound this all. I am rooting for you and I will be here endeavoring to do the same.
