I had such a wonderful moment this morning! I was waiting for the bus and I started singing this Mandarin song that I heard on 我是歌詞 (I Am a Singer). Of course I watch foreign singing shows, don't act surprised. So, I was (attempting) singing this song and I wanted to learn the rest of the lyrics, other than the one part that I really like. We all do it: belt out that one part that we know, like we wrote the song ourselves, but mumble some remixed version of the rest of the lyrics. You know who you are...
I look up the song, using the Mandarin name, in Chinese characters. Of course the results are in Chinese. I sift through, until I find the site that I usually go to for Mandopop lyrics and I clicked it. Now, since I am still only on a lower intermediate level, I usually expect to only understand, maybe, a quarter to two quarters of the song, when reading (My listening ability is terrible, so it's even less than that when I actually hear the song).
So here I am, doing my usual routine for learning song lyrics, in any language. I look at the lyrics and try to sing them, by matching them to the melody that I remember. Trust that I've listened to the song dozens of times, by this point, before I actually decided to learn the rest of the words. I'm scrolling down the lyrics, just singing away, making adjustments and trying to figure out how the parts would match up. I hit a snag with one line, where I didn't know most of the words and therefore didn't understand the line. I skip it and all of its repetitions, and continue on with the song. When I finally finish the song, I realize: I understood the entire song! (minus that one line)
The reason this is such an amazing thing for me, is because I have been studying Mandarin for almost three years and I had come to a point where I wasn't seeing any more improvement. This caused me to lose a lot of the motivation and enthusiasm I had, coming into learning the language. When I look up my favorite Mandopop songs, I'm used to only being able to read and understand a small portion of the Characters and having to whip out the dictionary that I downloaded onto my phone or the one I purchased from Barnes&Noble. I look up whole sentences sometimes. But this time, I only looked up two words and I still need to look up that one line that I skipped.
It took me until I had finished the song to realized how smoothly and easily I had gone through the song. It was like reading my own native tongue, when I look up English song lyrics. I was just amazed with myself and I suddenly realized that the whole time, where I thought I wasn't making any significant progress, I had actually been moving up quite a bit. These types of moments, are the reason I keep going on doing what I love. When you have these "aha" moments or those wonderful feelings of accomplishment and purpose, it makes it seem like the struggle and tears and numerous efforts were all well worth it. (It's even better when you can prove someone wrong.)
I was so proud of myself and that moment made me want to start up my studies again. I really needed that after my program search for studying abroad in China turned sour. (See my Et Tu Brute post)
Guys, you gotta always do what you love. Even when things don't seem so great, or it doesn't seem like you'll ever go anywhere, just keep doing it. Trust me, the spark will return. To some people, my little reading session might not seem like such a big deal, but when you have people telling you "That's such a hard language learn", "You're gonna have a difficult time keeping up with everything" or they make fun of the language or there's someone more advanced than you showing off, that little moment is big fat middle finger going "F you guys, I CAN and WILL do this, because I am capable. Because I love it. Because I don't give a damn what you say, think, or how you feel about it, it's my choice and I choose to stick it out." Because we know our capabilities and will challenge ourselves however we see fit.
Do not let obstacles keep you from doing what you love. If you end up homeless in a box because you want to be a dancer, or take care of orphaned cats, or whatever your passion is, don't let your environment stop you. Don't let naysayers get in your head, because they do not pay any damn rent. Use your environment to motivate you. Pull whatever resources you have. Only surround yourself with supportive friends, family, or hell, even strangers! But most importantly, you have to believe in yourself, even when everything goes wrong. You are your own worst enemy and your biggest cheerleader. If you let yourself down, that's basically like letting the world down. You are your own first priority, when it comes to doing what you love.
Okay, guys, keep moving forward!
加油!
No comments:
Post a Comment