Ive been feeling incredibly stuck recently. I've kinda fallen into the trap of learning vocabulary just to learn vocabulary and despite knowing what feels like a lot of words, I can't actually understand whenever anyone says anything to me.

I cant stop trying to translate the stuff in my head and by the time I'm done with one sentence the next sentence is already over and I missed it.

Conjunctions are kind of a pain in the ass. Also, I started using Anki as a precaution for when I start going into a dormant state. I actually came to find it as a treat of some sort, but I'm neurodivergent, so...

There are some words that I already know the meaning to before I could retrieve the English word in my mind, those are what I put into "Easy", the ones where the English word comes first I put into "Good", and those where I stumble on or shuffle through is "Hard".

(Btw for those using AnkiDroid, Learning Ahead limit is automatically set at 20 so when you press 'Again' the card will immediately be available, which defeats the purpose of spaced repetition. So, I set it at 0.)

For once I feel like I actually might be doing sustainable progress. Doing Anki requires minimal setup and I made sure daily study on there will take only a few minutes at most. I have this problem where for months I would be obsessed with the language I'm learning and make huge progress but then on some months I am dormant.

I used to learn Japanese but of course, I fell short on the kanji, and I haven't played Japanese MMOs in a while so I haven't had any reinforcement in a while. But with Latin I actually learned how to spontaneously generate sentences. My internal thoughts often fire randomly and sometimes it's in Latin. I never had that with Japanese!

There is just something so satisfying with the thought of gaining an additional ability to understand more of the world. I have read and was moved by a fanfiction on Ao3 that was written in French and only because there was Google Translate. But say, if someday such services no longer existed, how would I be able to understand and read it again?

Only doing 30 mins of Japanese these days and 30 mins of Spanish. Using Lingq now for Spanish instead of Migaku. Migaku felt very lobsided in how you recall words, but Lingq does a lot more testing you for each word which I find more beneficial. Also relying more on Busuu for Spanish as well. Also hoping Lingq's Irish improves so when I'm ready for that I can just pick that up.

Still not much immersion either. This last week has just been very lazy for me compared to the prior week. Feeling somewhat burnt out but still want to stay committed and do the full mandatory workloads.

My maths is fine, and in someways I'm enjoying that a lot more than my language lessons. Things are finally clicking with me in regards to committing time to maths and I don't even need to Pavlov train myself into doing the maths with fizzy drinks anymore.

Languages I get stuck for hours doing and working myself up for, but maths I just do it once and it's done and over with and it's actually less mentally strenuous than flashcards.

Yeah, things are okay.

I'd love to say it's been great, but I spent all week sick. Not much got done, including much language work.

I did manage to get through some more basic daily interactions at the checkout and in stores. I'm still getting more comfortable with speaking simple sentences/structures. Vocabulary and conjugation continue to be tough to recall on the fly.

The reading didn't happen much, but I'm a bit further through Mord Unter Den Linden (A2), a German learning book with murder mystery/crime stories.

I did also manage to read most of a letter I got back from the Berlin Senate about transit issues. I wrote them about some questions regarding local transit upgrades. They wrote back and I picked up 80% of it without any translation help.

My general speed for reading signage is getting better. I can tell many daily words are starting to become closer to full speed reading. That feels great.

Started reading some level 2 (Japanese) Tadoku (paperback) books this week. I had received some level 3s last year, but finally saw the 2s on sale a couple months ago. Breath of fresh air going down to stories at my level.

Feeling more improvement understanding podcasts. My attention is kinda shot for videos though. Feels like I get bored too fast with learner videos, but don't get much out of anime or native content yet.

Work hosted a brief primer to American Sign Language this week. I didn't retain much of the little bit they shared, but fun thing to get a taste of.