S4E5: But look at what you did do

Full transcript:

Good morning, happy Friday, and welcome to the LCP, the daily dose of language courage for people who love languages, and those who really don’t, but have to learn one anyway.

And today, I’m just popping in to say I know how easy it is to get to the end of Friday, look back over your week, and only see the things that you haven’t managed to do, or haven’t finished, or all the spaces where you feel like your time could have been better spent. And if this is you, I just wanted to send you a reminder that you’re probably missing a whole lot of stuff that you did do.

Look at the words that you’ve learned, even if at the time, it didn’t feel like much. Look at all the time where you just showed up, even if you didn’t feel like it, even if it was hard. Look at what you’ve studied this week. Look at all the times you used the language, even if you made mistakes and it didn’t feel like your best work. You don’t need to have studied for hours on end or had any great epiphanies for that progress to count… it all counts. And it also counts if you found it hard, and it also counts if you finished your session early or got distracted a few times.

And look at what else you did. Nobody studies in a vacuum, and I know we say this a lot around here but you are a whole person learning a language. What else happened this week? What non-language things did you do? What else was going on around you? Are you being fair to yourself when you tell yourself you could have done better?

So as you go into your Friday today, if those voices are grumbling away that you’ve wasted your time and done nothing, I’d love to encourage you to look over your week in a balanced way and find out if that was actually true. I bet it wasn’t. And even if you know deep down that you’ve dropped the ball this week, and maybe put all your efforts into things that don’t necessarily align with your overarching life goals, it’s okay. It’s all redeemable next week. Learning a language, or learning anything, isn’t just about learning the thing. It’s about learning how learn, how to focus, how to remember, how to form habits, and how to keep going when things get tough. Perhaps this week, that’s the training ground you’ve been in. And you still deserve rest, and you still deserve to be kind to yourself, and you’re still making progress.

And if you like what I do, please support me in the work I do at the Language Confidence Project! There are so many ways that you could lend a hand right now. If you know someone who would benefit from listening to this podcast, send them a quick message with the episode attached. If you can and you want to, support me on Patreon, because I have a Patreon now, and the link is in my bio! And finally, if you’re new around here or I haven’t met you yet,  or come and talk to me! Leave a comment on today’s episode on a positit on Instagram, send me a DM, or even better, book a call as part of the 100 Conversations Project with me! The link to that is also in my Instagram bio at @teawithemily.

Your achievements matter, language learners.

Have a wonderful weekend, and I will see you bright and early at 7am, UK time on Monday.