2022 Language Learning Reflections + Goals Updates

Every year I look back on my language learning in 2022, how I did with the goals I set for myself at the start of this year, and what I’ll be doing differently next year. This year might not have been the best for my language learning, but I still accomplished a bit and learned a lot!
My 2023 goals video is coming later this week!
Original 2022 goals video: • My 2022 Language Learn...
6-month update: • 2022 Language Goals: 6...
Thank you to my current patrons Andy R, Josh K, and Narwhal for supporting my content! I appreciate you so much :)
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Chapters:
Overall Reflection 0:00-5:33
Things I Learned
General Goals -16:47
Bulgarian 16:47-22:03
French 22:03-25:51
German 25:51-29:35
American Sign Language 29:35-32:30
Spanish 32:30-34:26
Italian 34:36-36:47
Not Starting Japanese, Dabbling in Scottish Gaelic + Ukrainian 36:47-39:18
Outro 39:18-39:53

[@melaniegrace7707]

It seems so many people had a rough mental health year. I really wish you the best you’ve been a huge influence in my learning journey and I’m excited to see the progress 2023 will bring :)

[@soundlyawake]

I’ve been super discouraged and unmotivated lately with my languages, like literally just doing the bare minimum, and this video just gave me some renewed motivation for the year so thank you!

[@whitneyszypula5539]

Thanks for such an open and honest review of your year in language. Hearing you be so kind and understanding with yourself has made me feel a little better about what I was considering my failures of this year. I learned French really quickly from 0 to quite advanced (B2/C1) in the last 2 years but I actually stopped making progress in my French since starting official university classes in it. I think I thought advanced classes would substitute for home study but I found that the university standard for "advanced" is much lower than mine and I am going to be applying to school in France so I have to get back to it now. I believe I will have to take the DELF/DALF for entry so it was interesting to hear your experience of studying for that test. I hope I can keep it fun enough that it does not stress me out too much. I also started learning Russian technically in October and learned the alphabet and basic phrases in less than a week and felt good about starting off strong but then it quickly fell off as I got busy with my classes. All I can do is stop thinking I lost 3 months of study time and start fresh in this new year. I definitely need to plan better and be realistic about how much time I have to study. I am traveling to France, Italy and Portugal in January so I am trying to balance French and Italian and get back into Russian. I will only have the time to study basic tourist phrases for Portugal unfortunately. I feel much better about the year I have had considering I was not in the best state of mental health too so thank you again for your openness.

[@joreneelanguages]

Ahaa I have also decided to try monthly goals for 2023 😆 I had a great 2022 for language learning overall, but also a very meh mental health year and tbh I know that a good portion of my “success” was me avoiding dealing with my mental health 😅 I hope you have a great 2023!

[@kristimoore8763]

4:05: Your response to your situation is probably the one you needed at the time. Don't be harsh with yourself. Use the reflection to help you plan for 2023 in a new way. :); 8:20: I like that your reflection brought you to a new way to strategize your learning for the year. Lining it up with your job also sounds smart, because you are already thinking month to month. :) Good for you! You are being flexible with yourself.

[@Matt-yp7io]

Phineas and Ferb has a good Bulgarian dubbed version btw

[@PolyglotProgress]

Good to know! thank you!!

[@M_SC]

This is a very cool share

[@zizigooloo1119]

You were a tough cookie last year!💪 And it seems that you did great through of a hard time. Best of luck this year. 🌻

[@lahagemo]

two videos this close together? love to see it! hope you’re doing well and happy new year 😊

[@PolyglotProgress]

And 2 more coming soon! We really love to see it 😌 I hope you're doing well! Happy New Years!!!

[@languagetraveladoptee]

Thank you for such thoughtful and vulnerable reflections Abigail! I barely met any goals either and had to get over a lot of mental health issues this year. Your reflections remind me of how I was doing in 2021. I think as we dive deeper into language learning we find just how much we must adjust our language studies to personal events, drastic changes, mental health, and so much more that life inevitably throws at all of us. None of us will be able to hit every goal consistently, and no matter how much we think we did or didn't do, we still learned something valuable, whether that has to do with language learning or not. Thank you for so much detail!

[@erburu]

I'm going to watch this video in pieces because I also need to get away from my phone, but I still wanted to take the time to thank you for talking so openly about your mental health and for always being so articulate and honest. I hope you have a peaceful and fun 2023 💗

[@adventureswithmadison]

My mindset for 2023 is to *Make 2023 the year 2022 should have been* and this could truly mean for anything, but I'm using it for productively. I have high, high plans and goals for the year and I'm going to push myself to complete them

[@PolyglotProgress]

I love that! I feel like we're going into the year with pretty similar mindsets, but I especially love how you worded it! I hope you hit all your goals and have a great year

[@OpheliaVert]

The best LangTuber making the video I look forward to every year! Always relatable (also love the hair and lots of love to you)

[@NataliaGarza]

You talking about that language exam sounds like me and my relationship with the Korean proficiency exam... a motivation sucking experience... it always kills my desire to learn korean..

[@sophiaoplachko6453]

Hi Abigail. You are so beautiful! I wish you a Happy New Year and happiness. I hope 2023 you achieve all of your goals. Hello from Ukraine 🌟

[@cliffer6715]

Dragon prince has a cool asl character in it, not a lot of instances but still fun to watch and a good watch in general

[@MVTX]

Been following this channel from the beginning. You look great, Abby.

[@PolyglotProgress]

Thank you! And thanks for sticking around for so long

[@claireabadie3981]

I am so happy to see your review of this year, I had been waiting for it!

[@SomedayKorean]

I've never thought about ASL causing wrist pain but it totally makes sense. Best of luck in the new year!!

[@M_SC]

The woman playing the mother on that show with the deaf teenager switched at birth developed a severe issue from having to sign fluently 16 hours a day from nothing. Take care

[@SomedayKorean]

@@M_SC Wow, so unfortunate!

[@PolyglotProgress]

Wow I didn't know that! I think in general it's not something most people need to worry about, but I have pre-existing carpal tunnel that flares up pretty quickly when I sign for even smaller periods of time consistently. I hadn't thought about it either til I started learning, but unfortunately it's definitely possible!

[@Danalt86]

Congrats on your achievements this year! I also found setting quarterly goals didn't work for me. I currently set monthly goals for each language and review them halfway through the month allowing myself to be flexible and change things that are not going as expected

[@MarchingBandsFromHome]

Yowzers, 40 min…lets go! 😁👍🏼Love goals. I don’t usually set any but 2023 will change.

[@M_SC]

I increase the speed to 1.25

[@DespicableGru]

Happy New Year, Abigail! 😊 I hope your 2023 success and happiness.

[@PolyglotProgress]

Thank you! Happy New Year to you too 😊

[@sheeliekittie9298]

So happy to find your videos! I would like to ask your opinion on learning a new language - do you work on making progress and achieving fluency in that one only, like really focus on that one alone until progress is made and you feel you can speak more fluently...then move on to other language(s) you may be interested in? Do you put all other languages aside temporarily on hold until you really make progress in that new language? Thank you so much dear =)

[@betinaceciliafeld9854]

Hi Abigail! If you feel comfortable with it, could you share some more about how you managed to overcome your motivation issues related to language learning? My language learning year was terrible, I basically dropped everything by the middle of the year because I was just tired all the time (no health issues here, just an exausting, energy consuming job) but I'd like to be more consistent next year since I still hold to me dreams related to language learning. Thank you! I hope you'll have a great new year!

[@itoko2243]

Wow! We had similar years. I sympathized with that feeling like the whole year was flat in a way? I also spent too much time on my phone so I tried minimizing the amounts of apps and such I have- tech is hard to control isn’t it. Kept my language apps though 👀 My main 2 languages are Japanese and Spanish, I only recently got into Spanish (later half of the year) and it’s going well, I do have it as a class in school, so that’s a nice motivator. Japanese was slow this year. Little things here and there, but I kept putting it off unfortunately. Although something that helped all year was I always put on Japanese subtitles or audio when I could- so that kept what I knew fresh in my mind at least. Mid year I kinda just- got into Chinese? Haha it lasted about a month and a half but sometimes a language just pulls you in. I might continue that sometime in 2023. I do understand the wrist pain for ASL, I get that tooo, I really thought I’d be the only one because people use it as their main form of communication all the time- but hey now we aren’t alone :) I wish you the bestest of luck this year with Bulgarian, French, Spanish, ASL, Japanese and all the other languages you’ll venture to!! I really enjoyed this video it got me hyped for 2023 >:)))))) Also I really love your haircut!! That’s how I’m getting mine cut soon :D

[@paulwalther5237]

I barely watch your channel but watched this video and was thinking you must have really slacked after watching the first half of the video. Wrong. Omg. I wonder what it would be like to listen to an annual update after a strong year. Polyglots are crazy. I threw myself at Korean but I’m frustrated as hell with the progress. I took months off at a time to play Warcraft but also actually got to visit Korea for three weeks. I hope my Korean improves a lot this year. I was not happy being incapable of speaking when I visited.

[@katherineelisabeth4387]

It's so good to have you back and posting regularly again! What was the name of the German textbook you mentioned during your German goal reflection?

[@PolyglotProgress]

Aspekte Neu!

[@katherineelisabeth4387]

@@PolyglotProgress Thanks so much!

[@user-mx1rb2vz3v]

My japanese goal is to hit 20.000 cards on anki and 2000 hours of japanese, at the start of the year I had 9.500 anki cards and I started tracking my time since december 10th, i currently have 210 hours since then

[@valesca6004]

Do you recommend Bulgarian for people interested in getting into Slavic languages? Or would it be better to stick with more spoken ones 🧐😄

[@aquamirrorX]

what does "getting into" even mean.. If you want to learn Russian, just learn Russian or whatever.

[@PolyglotProgress]

I absolutely love Bulgarian but it’s a little hard for me to say as I’ve not studied any other Slavic languages seriously and I never went into Bulgarian hoping it would open up other Slavic languages (this may be the only one I ever study and that’s okay with me!), I started learning Bulgarian because I wanted specifically to learn Bulgarian. I think if you have an interest in a few Slavic languages and Bulgarian is the one you’re most excited about then start there, but if your heart is more with another or you have some practical reasons to learn other Slavic languages start there instead of picking Bulgarian randomly. I have heard it’s a bit different from other Slavic languages in terms of verbs though so if you are looking to learn multiple Slavic languages Bulgarian will have that unique feature!

[@liscatcat8756]

I reccommend polish as it's the core of the Slavic languages if you understand polish you will be able to understand Czech, Russian, Slovakian Bulgarian etc they are all very similar and you'll feel great suddenly understanding these languages my Czech friends can understand polish:)

[@TWForeeever]

Central Texas? Are you based in Austin, San Antonio, or elsewhere? I’ve been trying to find a language learning community out here

[@PolyglotProgress]

I'm in Austin :)

[@renaudluxe3637]

Hi there, sorry this is out of tropical but short haïr and your blue eyes make you so pretty.

[@thowata]

If you want to watch a Bulgarian movie. I suggest Bulgarian Treasure Planet (Планетата на съкровищата). You can find a decent copy here on KZbin.

[@aquamirrorX]

nice meme

[@nowahblanco9935]

You are so CUTE

[@GreenCamaro]

you look cute : D

[@PolyglotProgress]

Thank you!

[@_____snake]

Where is Matt?

[@liscatcat8756]

You obviously haven't watched for years and years, this is Abigail's channel

[@PolyglotProgress]

She's been doing her own thing for a few years now! Mostly poetry and translation :)