“A dream without a plan is just a wish.” – Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

One of my dreams since about 2007ish (middle school era where all dreams begin) has been to become fluent in a second language. Reading, writing, speaking, listening. Fluent in all areas. It was just a wish back then.

The past two years, I’ve been studying Japanese to such a degree that it is now part of my lifestyle. I enjoy my daily anki and daily immersion. Seeing a grammar point or vocabulary word I learned that morning in a podcast or anime is a dopamine rush stronger than anything coffee or cake could bring me. As such, learning Japanese is truly a fulfilling practice that I have no interest in giving up or toning down in any way. And yet.

Back in middle school, my best friend was from El Salvador and we had a small group of Spanish speakers + me, a monolingual white girl. I had no idea what a rare opportunity that was to learn Spanish. Didn’t even consider it. I chose French instead because my relatives who lived nine hours away in Canada spoke French as their first language. To this day I am baffled I didn’t choose the language my best friend and a significant portion of my own country spoke. Maddening.

So, in middle school and high school I studied French, just as I did for the first few semesters of college. Omg I’ll be fluent in French soon! My dream! I was only one semester away from completing my language requirement, but one thing led to another and I found myself in summer school. Studying Mandarin by choice. Definitely didn’t have to be there. The classes were pretty hardcore for me. It was a summer crash-course that met four hours a day, Monday-Friday. One entire school year of Mandarin in three months. It was grueling, horrible for my mental health, and also incredibly valuable. However, that fall semester, I couldn’t keep up with the class and ended up failing, something I’d never once done in my entire school history.

Then, fortune struck and there was an exchange program opportunity. I went to live in Beijing for 3 months towards the end of 2015. There, I studied Mandarin with friends, took lots of photographs and ate so much food that the staff at a local restaurant recognized me as a regular and wished me luck when it was time to leave. Got back to the US and ACED my next Mandarin class. From complete failure to success. It’s a redemption story I would later tell many sad students after passing them back a failed test. A kind of failing sucks but you can’t avoid it, so keep going talk.

After two intense schoolyears of study, I was speaking Mandarin at an intermediate-to-advanced level. Not fluent, but getting there. I could talk about current events, share my opinions, complain about things and encourage others. Omg I’ll be fluent in Mandarin soon! My dream! Oh really? I haven’t studied Mandarin since I graduated in 2016. I’ve missed it for nine years and have always planned to return to my studies one day. One day.

Naturally, when I started learning Japanese I felt a little guilty. First, I discarded French to study Mandarin. Then, I discarded Mandarin to [do whatever I was doing from 2016-2023] study Japanese. Where is my sense of loyalty? Where is the determination to achieve my dream? Am I incapable of finishing anything at all? Can I even wash all the dishes in one go?

I now find myself in a similar predicament as Middle School Eva. At my job, most of my coworkers and clients are native Mandarin speakers. I’m at work 40 hours a week. I could become conversationally fluent in a relatively short amount of time. This is the ultimate opportunity! The redemption from my childhood I could so easily take for my own! Rule the worl– achieve my dreams!

And all I want to do is study Japanese. What the hell is wrong with me? And how much does a sacrifice weigh? Do I surrender my love of Japanese for an old dream? Waste a precious opportunity for my current obsession? Perhaps the answer lies with an old student of mine.

I once had a Brazilian student (I was an ESL teacher for 3 years) who was in his 60s and was a joy to have in class. A cliche line that holds up in this case. He argued that a person should be fluent in at least one language in its entirety. All receptive and productive skills you’re physically able to do – listen, read, write, speak – at least one language must be mastered. He said a person should also be conversational or even fluent in speaking in at least three others. Four total. The language your country speaks, two major languages, and the language of where you want to travel or whose media you want to consume.

To learn a language “efficiently,” it’s imperative to pour as much time and attention as you can into it. I can’t dial down my Japanese study if my end-game is to engage with native material and native speakers. Just like I can’t dial up my Mandarin study to the same intensity as Japanese. Aside from the common advice, “don’t learn two similar languages at once,” I just don’t have it in me.

So when I think of my student’s opinion, which is so different from a typical monolingual person from the States, I can relax a little. I’m not giving up Japanese. Je refuse! But to be surrounded by native Mandarin speakers without even trying to engage in their language is an absolute waste I couldn’t forgive myself for.

I’ll keep doing what I’m doing in Japanese. After all, if there’s one thing a person needs to become fluent, it’s motivation. But maybe I give up chess on Duolingo in favor of Mandarin. [Yeah, you can learn chess now. I’m terrible.] Take that basic Chinese vocab and speak to my coworkers more. Just small talk for now (you can imagine where I’m at in the “use it or lose it” timeline). Put more than zero effort into Mandarin again, grease up those wheels. If it damages my Japanese study, I’ll reassess.

If you’re on a language-learning journey too, keep going!

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