Fear Factor
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I've been analyzing why I've not learned much Greek, despite spending a great deal of time in the country for the last 6 years. Certainly, some of it is laziness. I don't NEED to learn Greek. English is widely spoken, and the Greek man I'm dating is fluent. We tend towards cultural misunderstandings, not language misunderstandings. There are also not heaps of Greek language courses being taught either in person or online, like there are in Spanish. So there is a bit of an accessibility issue in regards to learning the language formally.
Ultimately though, I think it comes down to fear. Some of that is fear of failure, fear of not being able to do it. But really? I think I'm afraid of being EMBARRASSED. I have a certain degree of vanity, and I well know that to learn a language is to make mistake after mistake after mistake. Continuing to make such mistakes makes me feel stupid, but also make me feel like I LOOK stupid. I am pretty hard on myself when I make mistakes, even insignificant ones, and I hate being wrong. So given that learning a language requires a lot of mistake making to improve, embarking on learning Greek is an exercise in putting aside my vanity and trying to approach the whole business with a degree of humility, openness, and humour, the latter of which I tend to have very little when I make a mistake. And then, to try to be gentle with that fearful part of me when I do.
**Someone asked me if the language learning app I mentioned is only for Greek. No it isn't! I think it has about 30 languages, and there are intermediate as well as beginner levels, so if you are even just wanting to brush up on a language it's a fun way to learn and practice. If you plan to try it out, please use my code to download the app, which gets me 20 free minutes. And a huge THANK YOU to those of you who have used my code!
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