Hey everyone! Today I want to share some tips with you.
The topic I want to talk to you is "Learning Success Strategies".
Why are we talking about this topic? It’s because I have spent a lot of time thinking about it recently.
By looking at my current Chinese level and seeing how it is,
And to be honest, I think my Chinese is very poor, compared to before. So I think my Chinese has regressed.
Of course I think this is a bad thing! I work at Skritter every day, and I practice writing Chinese characters in Skritter every day.
But if I were to give myself some feedback, I would feel "Wow! Gao Jian, your current Chinese seems to be a step backward compared to before"
So, I spent a lot of time thinking about why, I think there are many reasons, so we won't cover them all in this video.
But, today I want to share with you some strategies for learning success.
Okay, without further ado, let's get on with it.
Sorry, it may be disordered today... Because I don't have a script, I didn't write it down.
I only wrote down some key things I wanna discuss, so occasionally I will check my phone to see what I wrote.
So first, I think if you want to succeed, no matter what we're learning, one must have a goal if you want to succeed.
The goal you choose is actually very important. Why is it important?
Because if your goal is too big, you may have no choice but to fail and give up more easily.
For example, you are a newbie, you can't even say one word...
Then I ask you "What are you going to do?" "I want to speak Chinese, I want to speak fluent Chinese?"
OK, that’s a good goal, but then what? How are you gonna do it?
If you don’t have a plan, it's easy to fail.
So your goal is actually very important, very important to success.
So what counts as a good goal?
I think it's one that you can achieve.
And that goal is a little harder than your current level.
Where do you want to improve? You have to think clearly.
So maybe a good goal, I personally... I found that after the decline in my Chinese skills, my goal is to improve my overall level.
How can I do it? My goal is to make myself feel more comfortable communicating with others.
So I found a teacher and started doing one-to-one lessons on the Internet.
I do it once a week, the first lesson...wow! I really felt that my Chinese had regressed.
Like, "Gao Jian, you are not wrong, your Chinese has really deteriorated."
But the second week, the third week, the fourth week, the fifth week, I found that I was making some progress.
So my goal is to improve my proficiency
But, I wanted to be more specific, I could say that my goal is to read at least one article every week,
Write down some interesting words in the article and turn it into my own words.
Practice should start first with input and then output, so I spend a little time practicing every week.
Then I try to practice "learn now, sell now", so I will try to use what I learn right away.
It doesn’t matter if you use it wrong, just keep practicing over and over and over... Get used to these words.
So first you must have a good goal, your goal will be different from other people’s, It doesn't matter, but you need to know what your goal is.
OK, that is the first one. The second one I think you have to have a plan, you have to have a good one...
Why is a good plan important? Because if you have a good plan, it's easy to follow that, and you get what you need from it.
If you have a day without a specific plan, our minds are actually quite lazy, we are all lazy.
We have to find the path of least resistance. We don’t want to think too much, or spend too much time on it, we just want to succeed.
If you observe someone doing a really good job, it's probably because they have a solid plan and schedule.
So after you have a goal, you need to spend some time making a solid plan to reach it.
You have to write down all your thoughts and opinions.
You can listen to some opinions of others, or you could read a book.
But you have to spend at least a moment to write down your plan. What will you do every day, week, and month,
In order to reach your goal. You need to have a solid plan.
Thirdly, you must not rely on motivation or good intentions only, but rather, rely on good habits.
When you first start... many people, including myself rely on motivation.
When I was in college, when I was freshman, I was motivated and I wanted to learn Chinese.
I had some friends who all spoke Chinese, and I wanted to be like them. So my motivation came from that.
But, motivation/intent by itself is actually very unreliable
Let's say you wake up one day, you feel sick and you have a headache. Are you motivated to study? No, you're not.
But if you have good habits in place, you may feel that you are less likely to give up on something.
So, motivation and intent are good driving forces in the beginning, but if you want to succeed, you have to create good habits.
How do we do it? I think everyone can spend at least five minutes a day to do at least one thing.
If you want to learn Chinese, or languages, or take up painting, you have to learn...whatever you want, you have to spend at least five minutes to do it.
If your plan is to take an hour, you have to ask yourself, can you do it? Can you do it every day?
Not necessarily. But you can probably do five minutes. Five minutes is a short time.
You can listen to Chinese-speaking radio while driving.
You can read/study while you're on the loo.
When you're waiting for your coffee, you can study or speak a bit.
Or when taking a shower, you can talk to yourself, or sing...
So I think you can do five minutes. If you really don't think you have five minutes... I dunno what to say!
You wanna think hard on it. You do have that time. Turn off your phone, turn off Youtube, don't watch IG, don't read Facebook.
Then you'll find five minutes. And you will find that five minutes can easily become ten minutes or fifteen minutes.
But you have to start doing it. If you think five minutes is too difficult, then one minute is fine, but you have to practice every day.
You have to turn your motivation, your goal, into a daily habit.
I recommend that you take a moment to think and analyze what you have done so far.
I mean, you do a certain thing, you prepare your plan, you have your goal,
You need to know right away, is this good for your goals? Is this useful?
If it doesn't work well, don't do it. Give it up. You have to replace it with something else, another plan,
But if you don't take the time to think and analyze what you are doing, you will run into problems.
You will spend a long time doing the wrong thing, then you'll be completely off course, in the wrong direction.
So you have to take control of your time.
So what should we do?Just think, take a little time to think,
How am I doing right now? Am I succeeding? Do I enjoy it?
So I recommended It! Take time to think and analyze!
Number 5. I actually think this is a very important thing...
Don’t compare yourself to others.
So what I mean is, nowadays, it’s easy to see a lot of people just say "Oh, within three months, I'll be fluent in Chinese"
"I spoke fluent Chinese within a year."
"You can see I'm a non-native speaker, but my Chinese is very good."
Okay, well done! You are doing well. You are great! But, their success has nothing to do with you.
Their background, their experience, and their life is completely different from yours?
Of course you can consider what they said, if they wrote a book, you can learn from them and take what you think is important, or what is useful,
and try it for yourself. But what are the advantages of comparing with others?
You are not them, and they're not you. Your lives are different, so don't compare.
Okay, we don't need to dwell on this... You can compare with yourself, but I don't think you should compare with others.
Because others are different, you have no way to control others, you can only control yourself.
So don’t spend too much time thinking, “Wow, they're doing a good job. they're so rich, blah blah blah...
It doesn't matter, it has nothing to do with you, you focus on yourself, and don't look at others and think on it too much.
Finally, it's actually similar to the last point... Don't blame others.
Because you have no way to control others, so why do you also try to blame others as well? If you wanna blame someone, blame yourself.
"Gao Jian, your Chinese has regressed, whose fault is that?"
That was my own fault. I haven't spent much time since 2013 learning Chinese
Of course my Chinese has regressed. Is that the fault of other people? No, that was my own mistake.
Just speak to yourself honestly, and own up to things. "Am I doing well? Am I doing badly?"
Don't pass blame.
If you go to school and you feel that the teacher is not good, then you change the teacher.
If you download a piece of software and you think that piece of software is useless, then you change it.
If you think this book is not good, then don't read this book, you find other books.
If you go to school, and you think the school is useless, then you go to another school.
Do you understand? So don't blame others, you must take ownership. If you're not successful, that's on you, not someone else.
Of course we can all be your cheerleaders, and give you props and motivation, But you can only control your own behavior, direction, and thoughts.
So don't blame others. When you encounter problems, you need to find a way of dealing with them.
"Your goal did not succeed, you failed, you gave up, it was all on you."
I'm sorry to spend so much time just talking, But today I really wanted to share with you some things that I have been thinking about myself.
Do you agree or not? Leave a comment below.
Do you have any strategies for learning success? I welcome you all to let us know.
Then without ranting on, thank you everyone for watching this video, See you next time
Peace.