I can’t quite believe it’s already July. We’re officially half-way through 2023, and I thought I’d take this opportunity to look back at what I’ve done over the past six months, and reflect on progress against the very loose goals I set for myself at the beginning of the year – they’re mostly the same every year; read more books, watch more films and learn more languages. It’s a simple little set of priorities, but it works for me – I don’t like to be too specific, because if I know that sometimes I go through periods of being very demotivated, and if I’d told myself at the beginning of the year that I wanted to reach A2 in Slovak by the end of August and I hadn’t reached that arbitrary target, then that would be demotivating and would probably put me off being productive for the rest of the year. So I like to keep it simple: learn more, improve more, enjoy more and don’t sweat it. So let’s have a look and see how I’ve been doing, shall we?
In 2022, I set myself the challenge of reading 15 books. Now, I know that doesn’t seem like a lot – especially for someone who studied literature and someone who actively enjoys reading – but that’s because it absolutely isn’t. And even so, I only managed 11 books before the end of December. I’m still a little ashamed of that, but hey – I did what I could do. This year, I set the goal at 15 again but really, I just wanted to beat the amount of books I read last year – so how am I doing, I hear you cry? Well, as it happens, this year I’ve read 16 books already. Who could have seen that coming? I’ve been living my bookworm fantasy – sitting in a comfy armchair, lighting candles and listening to rain storms, losing myself in a good book. And a couple of not-so-good books. But you’ll hear more about those in April when I write my yearly book review post, I’m sure.
As for films, well, looking back to last year, I had set myself the lofty target of 50 films – a figure plucked completely from thin air – and by the end of the year, I’d only managed 25. So I decided to reduce the target to 30, and again, just try and beat my total for last year. As of right now, my figure stands at a lowly 8 films. So… could do better, but I’m not beating myself up about this one. I’m just getting tired of being asked, ‘Oh, have you seen [insert name of film here]?’ and having to go ‘No, sorry…’ because I’d only seen about four films, most of which were the Bridget Jones’s Diary franchise. So I’m doing better than that, at least. I need to step up my game if I’m going to get through another 22 films by the end of the year, though – I should go to the cinema more, because I always enjoy it, but I don’t go often enough. So that’s something to work on in the latter half of the year. I’d especially like to watch more ‘classic’ films, so I’m looking for recommendations if you have any – I’m also getting really into animated Japanese films, I’m going through my weeb phase a little late in life but quite honestly, aside from Studio Ghibli I’m not entirely sure where to start. So recommendations are more than welcome for that too!
Languages, well, where do I start. I freely admit that I’ve been pretty lazy for the past six months. I’ve been doing less and less, but for the past month or so I’ve been back on my bullshit – and this coming week, I’ve got a week off work while I look after my parents’ dog (my fuzzy little brother) and I brought some toys with me (pictured over to the right). I’ve started doing a bit of Scottish Gaelic on Duolingo, and I ordered the official A1-level coursebook from SpeakGaelic, who also do a range of Gaelic-language programming on BBC Alba and YouTube, so that’s been fun to dip back into. I’ve been slowly plugging along with my Welsh textbook – it’s slow progress, but any progress at all counts as a win in my book. And I’ve even brought my much-neglected Korean textbooks, which I’m going to start over from the beginning because I was going through that weird period in my life where I was convinced I had to make handwritten notes, and didn’t feel the need to keep an electronic copy. Which I’ve now lost. So… I guess I’m starting again! That’ll keep me busy this week.
And that’s it. I think, on balance, I’m doing pretty well so far! Still need to read a book this year that’s in a language other than English, but I’ve already started one so I think I should be more than able to complete that before the end of the year, even knowing how easily I get distracted by my ongoing book club and trips to bookshops. It’s all looking pretty positive for this year! How are you doing with your goals this year? There’s still plenty of time, even if you’re struggling a little – and even if you don’t make it, don’t beat yourself up about it. You’re doing what you can, when you have the energy for it – that’s all anybody (even you) can ask.
And that’s it for this month! If you’d like to get in touch, I can be found on Twitter and Instagram (where I’m @sprakskatan on both), and also now on Mastodon (where I’m @sprakskatan@toot.wales). And as always, thanks for reading, take care of yourselves, and see you next month!
— J.
den språkliga skatan 