Are you thrilled with your language learning results and process?
Are you developing meaningful relationships in your target language?
Does your language learning take minimal time out of your schedule?
Probably not! That's why you're here.
Most language learners spend too much time and effort on things that don't matter, aren't yet using the target language for communication, and are not satisfied with their results or with the learning process itself.
Yet the whole reason you're studying a foreign language in the first place is that you want to experience the pleasure, ease, and fluid self-identity that comes with communicating fluently and skillfully in a foreign language. You also likely want to become part of a community of people who speak your target language.
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| Isn't this ultimately why you're learning a language? (a scene from the Tbilisi Language Exchange Club, which I founded in 2011) |
If this resonates with you, you're in the right place. With over 20 years of practice, I've learned how to pick up languages elegantly and frictionlessly. And I'd like to teach you this skill and mindset so that you, too, can integrate the language(s) of your choice into your social and/or professional life.
GET YOUR FREE DOWNLOAD:
Find out how to build command quickly and easily in my brochure:
GET YOUR FREE DOWNLOAD:
Find out how to build command quickly and easily in my brochure:
You can hear me tell my story on the Actual Fluency Podcast. If you scroll down the page, you'll find this testimonial:
A profound paradigm shift is possible
At the heart of ineffective language learning (and ineffective learning in general) are two common traps, or misconceptions, that keep you perpetually in language study mode, preventing you from applying your language skills in real life and becoming a speaker of your target language.
It is actually quite easy to fix both misconceptions and begin making rapid, frictionless progress in your language skills without spending more time on the language than you already do.
TRAP #1: too much study, too little practice
There is simply no way you can properly integrate the vocabulary you are trying to learn if you are spending more time studying (writing down, looking up, analyzing, reviewing, memorizing, completing assignments, etc.) than communicating in the language.
Excessive study inevitably creates a backlog of unlearned material. This backlog weighs on your mind, causing frustration. Ironically, many people's response to the frustration is to double down on the unlearned material through additional study!
GIVE UP YOUR STUDY HABIT. There is only one way out of the backlog problem: communicate more, study less!
START APPLYING YOUR SKILLS. A variety of offline and online opportunities exist for high-quality communication practice, including immersion, language clubs, conversation coaches, and learning partners.
TRAP #2: study-driven practice instead of practice-driven study
A deep-seated assumption exists that if you want to learn a language, you should first study new material, then practice it. This formula seems so self-evident that no one questions it. And yet not one of us learned our native language by focusing on new material! We only spoke what we had heard repeatedly in similar situations, guided by our inner sense of relevance, not by some contrived study plan.
TRUTH. It is easy to make unfamiliar material familiar. It is also not hard to master familiar, relevant material. What is truly exhausting is trying to master unfamiliar, irrelevant material!
Most language instruction programs require you to learn, then practice material that is lacking in both familiarity and relevance. A much better way is to first set up communication practice and then focus on mastering only the most familiar and relevant material which emerges out of that practice.
TRUST YOUR SUBCONSCIOUS. As long as you are getting sufficient language exposure, your brain will register large amounts of material effortlessly, gradually turning "unfamiliar" into "familiar." Your conscious effort is much better spent pursuing command, not familiarity.
GET YOUR FREE DOWNLOAD:
Find out how to build command quickly and easily in my brochure:
Find out how to build command quickly and easily in my brochure:
Summary
Two common traps keep you perpetually in language study mode, preventing you from applying your language skills in real life and becoming a speaker of your target language:
1. studying too much relative to the amount of language practice you're getting
2. treating language practice as a means to solidify what you've studied, rather than using language study to solidify what comes up during language practice
These misconceptions are actively reinforced by the language instruction industry and arise out of our own wishful thinking, insecurities, and trust in authority figures.
Anyone who has successfully integrated a foreign language into their social and/or professional life has found a way to overcome or avoid these traps. For some it was a burning desire to experience the language and culture first-hand that months or years of language "study" could never squelch. For others it was pure pragmatism or an act of rebellion. For others it was entirely accidental.
It's never too late to take this step!
Next steps
- Join our Frictionless Mastery group on Facebook.
- Purchase my handbook Foreign Language on the Fly: the Frictionless Mastery Method or check out the Amazon reviews.
- Sign up for the Frictionless Mastery newsletter.
- Read / view Q&A about the Frictionless Mastery method.
- Browse my videos.
- Learn about frictionless language teaching.
- Find out how I juggle my 9 languages.
- Speak Russian? Visit the Russian version of this site.