S4E39: You don’t need to save that project for best

Full transcript:

Good morning, happy Thursday and welcome to the Language Confidence Project, the daily dose of language courage for those who love languages and those who really don’t, but have to learn one anyway. And today is just a reminder that if you have a great idea for a topic you want to study, a conversation you want to have, or a project that sounds really interesting in your new language, you don’t need to save it for best.

Because so many of us hang onto our best ideas, because we’re so worried that we’re not good enough to do them justice yet. We put them aside, sort of mentally file them away, and tell ourselves we’ll have to revisit them way down the line when we’re at a certain level, we’ve got more vocabulary, or we know more grammar rules. 

But the inspiration struck now. This topic feels relevant to you right now. It feels like a good idea, now.

So what if you just started now, with whatever language you do already have?

Even if that means you’re starting right from scratch on that topic, and you have precisely zero vocabulary from that semantic field at the start, what would happen if you made it your mission to get ten of the most important words to do with that topic today? What if you just found a few short social media posts about it, or a few newspaper headlines, and just started working on what they mean? 

What if you started this project now, in whatever way you can, and then just come back to it every now and again when you have a bit more grammar, and bit more vocabulary, and a bit more confidence? What if you started it in a really small way, so that you can use your language to explore the things that make you feel like you?

And I do mean, today, even though it’s a Thursday. You don’t have to wait until a Monday, or the first of a month, or to start first thing in the morning. Because it feels like a good idea now. You have that glowy feeling of inspiration now. See if you can just carve out 20 minutes today to just get that ball rolling. Search some stuff about it while you’re waiting for a bus or boiling the kettle.

Just, don’t leave it as a someday project.

And if you don’t want to work on your projects alone, the LCP online creative space for Patreon supporters is opening the first Monday of July! It’s going to be a really informal 3 hour costudying or cocreating space every Monday on Zoom, in the morning New York time, afternoon UK or Central European time, where we can keep each other company as we dive into whatever we’re studying, and work on assignments or creative projects that we have for the week. Check out my Patreon, the link is in the podcast shownotes and also in my IG bio, and look for Out of the Fog. I hope to see you there!

Have a wonderful day, and I will see you tomorrow.