Encountering external barriers and human obstacles when learning a language, or feeling inadequate despite having the will?

Hello, question asker! From your description, I can tell you're feeling pretty frustrated and helpless.

I really believe I can learn languages well, but I always give up for various reasons and can't continue learning.

I'd love to keep learning English while I'm learning Korean, but I feel like I'm lacking in the strength department! I'm not sure what to do. Is this something you can relate to?

It's totally understandable that it can be really challenging to learn a new language. It's not just about putting in the work. There are so many external factors that can influence the learning process.

☹️ Do you truly believe you can learn a language?

I can see that you've studied three languages before, and that there were some challenges along the way.

English: I didn't have the chance to meet a great teacher when I first started learning English. I didn't start until fifth grade. After that, I guess I just lost interest because I didn't feel like I was learning in a way that connected me to the real world.

Later on, because of the long gap, I sadly had to give up online classes.

The Japanese part-time teacher in our area wasn't the best, and the rigid, somewhat harsh teaching style didn't do much to spark my interest in Japanese.

I'm so sorry you had such a bad experience with the Korean teacher. It's so frustrating when things don't go well, isn't it? The good news is that I've now signed up for an online course with a former New Oriental teacher, so I'm really excited to see what it's like!

It's so great that you want to learn English again! But I can see that you're feeling a bit worried that it's too late for you. I totally get it. It's totally normal to have doubts, but I want you to know that you can do this!

You've done a great job of thinking about why you haven't learned a foreign language well. You've found lots of reasons, and there are plenty of them! It's totally understandable that it's been difficult for you to learn a language.

On the one hand, you feel that most of the reasons for your current situation are the fault of other people, such as your teachers or parents. You are only learning poorly because you have a learning disability or bad luck.

On the other hand, you haven't shared any tips on how to learn a foreign language.

Maybe, deep down, you think there are just too many external reasons to learn the language, that you're not capable, and that you're more likely to believe that you can't learn a foreign language.

Your beliefs will determine the outcome, so it's really important to make sure they're in a positive place!

☟ Let go of those preconceived ideas and try to find solutions to your problems from within.

If you really want to learn a foreign language, then try to let go of your complaints about the outside world and your doubts about yourself. You can do it!

We don't know if these thoughts and beliefs are correct, but they could very well become a reason for you to give up at any time.

It's time to focus on yourself! Let's put aside external reasons and start with you. What adjustments and changes can you make to make learning better and last longer?

I really hope this helps you get the results you're looking for!

Warmest regards!

Hello?

I'm a listening therapist from Yixinli.

After reading about your experience of learning several foreign languages, I feel sorry for you. You've come a long way but haven't received the desired results. I sense that you have confidence in language learning.

Language learning should be easy, right?

I want to talk to you about two things.

1. Your experience learning a foreign language.

2. A world hidden under a sense of urgency.

I hope my ideas can help you.

The questioner has lots of experience and can analyze language learning from an impartial standpoint. They can evaluate teachers, teaching methods, curriculum design, after-school exercises, and other aspects. They can draw their own conclusions about the current foreign language education environment.

In the past, you found a good English teacher in primary school and a well-known educational institution. You learned how important teachers are in education and how worrying the consequences of insufficient professionalism are.

I see why you used "countless" twice.

If you don't make progress in a foreign language, you're stuck in a trap. I know from my own experience.

The point of language learning is not exams or showing off. It's about describing life, sharing thoughts, and communicating with others.

The language is part of us!

Does the questioner have this in life? Observation? When someone speaks, how much is true and how much is false? What is he/she really expressing?

Why did he/she say that? Language is connected to our brain. Our brain contains our entire world.

When we learn a language, we create our own "foreign language world." Our learning must also interact with this world. Just as every child learns a language at a level we can only dream of.

We often talk about "application." Jack Ma is a good example. How much should we focus on "application"?

The questioner is feeling urgent.

I hope this helps! ?

Language skills take time to improve. Don't give up! Practice every day, read and speak, and make your vocabulary and pronunciation more standard.

If you always have obstacles, you should think about how to overcome them. Sometimes it's because there's no good teacher, no good learning environment, no learning atmosphere, or no support in terms of money and time.

If we can change our environment, we can learn a language at the right time and place. A teacher may not be professional, and you may learn late.

The best time to learn language skills is around age three. This is when the Broca area of the brain is active, helping children absorb language and master their native language, whether English or another language. Standard pronunciation is also important.

It would be better if you could be taught by a Chinese English teacher with standard pronunciation or some foreign teachers. Perhaps your transition after high school was not smooth. You want to learn, but there will always be difficulties.

Later, people you meet may make you feel uncomfortable, and your teachers may not be good. It takes a lot of experience to find someone you can rely on. So you still need to find the right platform and channels for self-study, such as Hujiang or websites that specialize in training. You can also read articles in a foreign language every day. There are many public accounts, including CGTN's, that have current affairs content. They can also help young people get translation certificates. Good luck!

ZQ?

Hello!

You want to learn well, but you're tired and have doubts.

If you don't learn the right way, you won't learn much. We learn in three areas: comfort, stretching, and difficulty. The best way is to stretch at the edge of your comfort zone.

Your comfort zone is what you can understand and master without any effort. Stretching at the edges means choosing parts that are slightly more difficult but that you can solve with effort. This will expand your comfort zone. Taking one step from the comfort zone into the difficult zone will make it easy to give up.

The other is effective feedback. You can't learn without feedback. It's also fine to tell the teacher what you've learned from him, to share what you've gained, and to get positive feedback. This kind of instant encouragement will also give us more confidence. But we need to stretch and train, rather than just learning blindly.

I'm talking about how to set up your own learning plan. Look inside first, then look outside. It's okay to choose a teacher with the right teaching style.

I hope this helps.

Hello, questioner. From your writing, I can tell you're really invested in making foreign language learning effective.

I agree with you that it's best to start learning a language as early as possible. It's also important to find a good teacher who can inspire you and keep your interest. But what if you missed the best time to start learning a language?

Is there any way to get around it? These two points should be of particular interest to the questioner.

First, it's important to understand the process of language learning.

If you want to learn a foreign language and use it effectively, you need to understand how language is acquired.

From the moment we're born, when we don't know anything, to learning to speak, and then to being able to write and read our native language, we go through several stages.

The first thing you need to do is listen, listen a lot, understand, and then imitate. That's how I was able to speak simple words, which is something you should be able to do by the age of one.

Learning grammatical rules also comes from hearing how others say things, imitating them, and then understanding the meaning.

So, the first thing you need to do when learning a foreign language is listen a lot and imitate.

Once you've accumulated enough, you'll start to see a qualitative change.

Next up is reading and writing.

Once we've gone through the process of expressing ourselves from simple to complex, we move on to reading and writing. This is just how language learning works.

As adults, we can do both at the same time. We can develop our reading and writing skills while also listening and imitating a lot.

Finally, periodic review is the only way to form long-term memory.

If you want to speak, read, and write, you need to build up your vocabulary. If you memorize lots of words and remember them, it helps you to form long-term memory.

If you want to form long-term memories, you need to review them periodically. Follow Ebbinghaus's forgetting curve and set up a reasonable review schedule.

Finally, we've tried a few foreign languages and haven't reached our goal. Is it really just external factors? Is there something going on inside us?

What are we afraid of? What are we worried about?

What's our motivation for learning a foreign language?

What's driving us? That's what we need to figure out.

Once you identify the root cause of your concerns and add a logical and evidence-based learning approach, I believe you will achieve your desired outcome.

I hope this has been helpful. Best regards!

Hello there! I totally get where you're coming from.

First, from what you've told me, it seems like you've already learned English, Japanese, and Korean. English is a pretty easy language to understand, and it's a subject that's required in school. Japanese and Korean, on the other hand, are languages you've chosen for yourself. So, I'd love to know why you want to learn a foreign language!

I'd love to know what motivates you to learn! And what are your plans after you've learned it?

Secondly, it seems like you're struggling a bit with learning a language. It's totally understandable! We all have our own strengths and weaknesses. You want to learn, but you're not sure how.

It seems like you're blaming your lack of progress on external factors. The good news is that there are plenty of great online resources out there, so you can easily find a good teacher and a good way to learn if you're willing to look.

Could it be that you don't really feel the need to learn the language, which might be why you're not getting the results you want?

So, to learn a new skill, it's really important to have a goal that you're excited about, and to have the motivation to stick with it. And of course, learning the right methods and strategies is key! If your goal isn't your own, it can be easy to lose motivation when you hit a bump in the road.

If you don't feel motivated, you might find yourself just muddling through and doing the bare minimum to please others. And if there's no suitable method or strategy, it can be really hard to learn.

I really hope this helps!

Hello, I'm Yi Ming, your heart exploration coach.

I'm Yi Ming, a heart exploration coach.

I get it. I'd be happy to walk through it with you. Hopefully, this will be a small inspiration for you.

1. Be aware of the challenges you're facing.

You say, "I know I can learn it well, but I feel like I have the willpower, but not the strength. I have so many fears that it's too late, and so many doubts."

You have faith in your abilities.

Just thinking back to my experience of learning languages, I feel like there are lots of obstacles and a sense of having the heart but not the strength.

Our inner conflicts and turmoil are largely due to the fact that our hearts have a lot of different desires that we want to fulfill at the same time.

For instance, we want to learn a new language well, but at the same time we hope it'll be a relatively smooth process.

Now we're worried it's too late, and we're also unsure.

So, we just unconsciously consume our energy.

What if we studied without hesitation, without considering other aspects, and focused solely on learning the language itself? Wouldn't our learning efficiency be much higher?

Take a look at your own expectations, such as the hope of meeting a great teacher and the smooth realization of our desire to learn a language, and so on.

But we also have to accept that sometimes things won't go exactly as we expect.

Sometimes it can feel like there are obstacles in our way, deliberately put there to make us doubt ourselves.

Right now, it's important to take a step back and recognize your own thoughts and emotions, rather than letting them get the better of you.

Take another look at all the difficulties and see what you can do to stop doubting and worrying that it's too late.

2. Stay focused on the present and think about what you can do.

There are three key areas to consider when looking at responsibility for a situation: the self, the situation itself, and other people involved.

When we hit a snag in our language learning journey, we can also try to approach it from these three angles.

Finding a great teacher can really help us learn more effectively. As you mentioned, taking an online course taught by a New Oriental original is a great way to go.

Context is something we can all understand. It's simply about looking at the conditions we're under.

If you start learning English in fifth grade and your English teacher is also your Chinese teacher, it's not going to be easy. Another example is, "It's okay in middle school."

If you don't make a smooth transition from school to the real world, you'll waste your time. It's possible that our lack of a language environment for foreign languages is not conducive to improving our proficiency in foreign languages.

Once we've got all this sorted, we can see that learning a foreign language isn't just down to personal effort.

We also need to think about how the teacher and the learning environment at the time can affect things.

Don't be too hard on yourself.

On the other hand, we need to figure out what we can do in these unfavorable conditions to make learning develop in the direction we want.

Give yourself a bit of a boost and be a bit kinder to yourself.

And there's no time like the present to learn.

The best time to plant a tree was ten years ago, and the next best time is now.

The best time to plant a tree was ten years ago, and the second-best time is now.

This should help you feel more reassured that you're not too late.

We can't undo the last ten years.

It's crucial to seize the moment.

3. Find a method that works for you.

When we stop blaming ourselves and doubting our abilities, and we feel less conflicted inside, we can focus more on learning the language.

Right now, we need to find a method that works for us.

We all have different learning styles when it comes to language.

It's possible that many people who have studied a foreign language for years but never feel like they've mastered it haven't actually found the right method.

What works for some people may not necessarily work for you.

It's important to find a method that works for you.

Some people who are learning English will watch a lot of foreign language movies and improve their foreign language skills without even realizing it.

Some people just keep listening to a foreign language, even if they don't know how to spell it.

Please feel free to share these.

Best wishes!

Dear Sir/Madam, Thank you for your question. Best regards,

From your description, it appears that you consistently face external challenges when learning languages and feel unable to overcome these obstacles. The solution is to adopt a more positive outlook.

After carefully reviewing your story, I have the impression that you tend to attribute failures to external factors. For instance, you blame the relatively low quality of substitute teachers, your parents' negligence in your early education, or external environmental factors for your inability to learn a language effectively.

External attribution impedes progress and perpetuates the same pattern. It is akin to falling into the same pit repeatedly. As long as the cognitive pattern of external attribution persists, there will always be justifications for avoiding responsibility.

"Countless fears of being too late and countless doubts" are a combination of anxiety and inferiority, which create internal conflict and impede progress.

Take a moment to reflect on your resources and aspirations. What are your goals? Set achievable targets that you can work towards.

In other words, goals that can be followed can be set according to one's own actual situation.

Next, take stock of your current resources and create a list, focusing on positive resources, past positive experiences, and your strengths and weaknesses. Align your resources with your goals, identify an entry point, and even a small amount of progress will bring you closer to your goal.

Finally, build on your positive experiences, build up your achievements, and gradually internalise them. Over time, this will lead to significant progress.

I am writing to share my experience in the hope that it will be of benefit to you. Best regards,