How do I learn a language with depression (severe)

[Desolate Kat]

I have no Motivation to do ANY thing. I have severe depression. I always want to sleep and watch YouTube videos, but never to study a language anymore. I started Japanese when I was eight, but I never really studied because I never really knew how, but now I just completely gave up on studying. When I try to learn any Language, I get easily discouraged and I give up. What can I do if I feel like this again? Is there a way to stop no motivation?

[rdearman]

I'm no expert on depression. But I think if you can just get yourself to do 15 minutes each day it will mean that you'll eventually learn the language. An acorn doesn't grow into a oak tree over night, but each night it grows a little bit more.

[Xmmm]

I have no Motivation to do ANY thing. I have severe depression. I always want to sleep and watch YouTube videos, but never to study a language anymore. I started Japanese when I was eight, but I never really studied because I never really knew how, but now I just completely gave up on studying. When I try to learn any Language, I get easily discouraged and I give up. What can I do if I feel like this again? Is there a way to stop no motivation?

Have you been to a doctor? Are you getting treatment? Most people with clinical depression respond well to anti-depressants or psychotherapy, but it takes several months or even a year to fully recover.

Lack of motivation is a symptom of depression ... so if you are depressed, logically you cannot force yourself to be motivated (or at least not for long) ...

[aokoye]

There are at least a handful of us here who have mentioned having severe depression, myself included. I'm also going to assume that the "no motivation" thing is more global than it is specific to language learning. I'm also going to assume that you are getting or trying to get professional help for your depression. If not and you're in the US and want to find a therapist I highly suggest Psychology Today's therapist database (it's the only thing useful that I've found from them but it is in fact a very powerful database) or the one at goodtherapy.org though there's a lot of overlap between the two in my experience. I'll say from the get go that I'm not going to give you advice/platitudes like "you should exercise more", "you should try to get more sun" (especially if you're living in the Northern hemisphere and your depression hasn't even kind of let up despite it being summer), or "you should just do X and it'll be better" because for all I know you've done all of that. Also that advice get's really old really quickly.

Ok, that out of the way. I honestly do find that watching videos/tv shows in my main L2 (German) is really helpful and is something that I can do when I have no real will to do anything else. It might not seem like it's studying, but I credit my high listening skills to my countless hours of watching TV in German. I don't do any of the shadowing, transcribing, or vocab work that some people suggest in connection with watching TV - I just sit down (or in reality, lay down) and watch TV.

Other things that help - finding ways to do things that don't make me miserable. It took me forever (years off and on) to find a flashcard system that I would actually stick to (so far...) and didn't contribute to my feeling awful. There are other people who just won't use flashcards because they haven't found the trade off worth it which I also think is logical.
I try not to set goals that involve finishing text/workbooks. Or rather - if I do I know that said goal is kind of a joke, because unless I'm in a course, it is exceedingly rare for me to finish a textbook. I get too distracted/unmotivated/disinterested, primarily because of my depression.
I try not to compare myself to others (that is getting awfully close to advice that I really hate getting). I know that I'm not able to learn X very high number of words a day. I know that I'm not going to be able to make strides in a language as quickly as some here are. I also know that as much as I'd like to tackle more than one language at a time I just can't do so with any real success. I'll probably try to tack on Dutch or one of the Scandinavian languages this Fall or Winter, but that's only because my German will likely be at a solid C1 level by then. I know that other people can do it, but it seems like a train wreck for me. I did take Modern Hebrew last Fall and Winter semesters, but I honestly didn't try all that hard and by the end I was done (I needed two terms of a non-Indo European language for my major).

The other thing is that in my case it became abundantly clear to my current therapist and I that waiting for my depression to go away before I try to do things like school was just not going to work. Turns out I'm feel at least a bit worse when I'm chronically not studying (so say, taking multiple terms off of school) than when I am. It sucks and it takes a lot out of me, but I really am better off in school that not.

[Serpent]

This thread may be helpful
Good luck!!!

[Sayonaroo]

uh.. learn from music like song lyrics. there's a firefox plugion rikaichan and somebody made rikaisama which improves on that which shows the meaning/reading of the word when you hover over it. actually that's what I did when I was depressed and was trying to figure out how to learn Japanese. Or read about how to learn languages.

[Cainntear]

I have no Motivation to do ANY thing. I have severe depression. I always want to sleep and watch YouTube videos, but never to study a language anymore. I started Japanese when I was eight, but I never really studied because I never really knew how, but now I just completely gave up on studying. When I try to learn any Language, I get easily discouraged and I give up. What can I do if I feel like this again? Is there a way to stop no motivation?

I'm no expert on depression, but I'll tell you that one of the most frustrating and demoralising things in language learning (irrespective of the learner's mental state otherwise) is trying to pick up a language that I'd started learning and stopped, because my brain had a tendency to say "I know that!" and not focus, and then get angry about not knowing stuff.

Maybe pick a completely new language that has good material available, and start as a true beginner with a course that suits you.

Once you get a feel for how to learn languages, then you can get back to the tricky job of getting a "lost" language back.

[tarvos]

Focus on the depression first. Don't stress yourself out when you can't concentrate - you wouldn't blame someone with a broken leg for not walking. Do what you can, and when you can't, move on to the next thing.

[Ketutar]

Hi, Kat!

Firstly I want to tell you you have my full sympathy. Depression is a f-ing beast. I am fully convinced that you will beat it, and I hope it happens sooner than later. I am sorry that I have only words to offer to you as any help, and most often they aren't much better than nothing.

If you have no energy or interest to do anything but watch videos, tv, movies, find this in the language you wish to learn. For some people with depression the language doesn't matter, it's more a question of flickering images, having something to distract oneself from going "there". The mere exposure, passive learning, isn't to be ignored.

It might feel like nothing, but it does work, and you are doing something - you can tell people you are not just passively staring at the television, you are studying And maybe you can feel that, that you are doing something... and that feeling might be enough for you to one day decide to something else.

Perhaps you'd want to look up a word or expression. Perhaps you'd like to know what a song means. Perhaps you'd like to hear more songs by the artist. Perhaps you'd like to brush up your Japanese signs.

You could try to find something very simple, like children's alphabet cards or picture books, in the language you want to learn, and have it in the bathroom. Because most people are not so depressed they don't go to the bathroom, and if you sit down for a minute or two, you could just as well use the time to look at pictures with text... Or you might want to have some comics there. Or books in simple language, or a word list, or flashcards, or something like that.

You could write simple words on post-its and post them around your home. I mean things like "door" and put it on the door. In the beginning, don't plan on getting post-its on everything at once, start with one post-it, and let it take as long as it takes. If it takes you a week to get the post-it on the door, be proud of having gotten the post-it on the door, and don't think about the time. Remind yourself that there was a time when there was no post-it on the door, and now there is, because you did that. You did something. You are taking steps to learn a language.

That is one thing that is very hard for me. The frustration of things not happening fast enough, even when I am so acutely aware of that there are days getting up from the bed is a huge victory.

That is also another thing to remember. Not easy, but important. There are moments when you are not depressed. These moments happen every day. There will be a day when you are more often not depressed, when these moments are the norm, and not the depressed moments. Depression is not a bottomless pit, it's a tunnel. There are times when the tunnel feels never-ending, and so deep one starts to question if there ever were sun and open air and blue skies. In C.S.Lewis' Silver Chair, there is a scene where the villain tries to convince the heroes of that the "above world" doesn't exist and has never existed. Depression is like that. But the villain was lying and the depression is lying. What I am trying to say with this is that learning languages might be really, really, really slow right now, but it doesn't need to stay that way forever, and even if it does... slow advancement is better than no advancement. The turtle wins the race. If you want to keep studying, keep studying and you will learn, even if it takes you 20 years in stead of 2. Focus on what you do, not on "what you could do if" or what others do, or what you didn't do. "No, I didn't actively study for 8 hours, but I watched a YouTube video about things they always say on Korean drama shows. I did something."

[zenmonkey]

Focus on the depression first. Don't stress yourself out when you can't concentrate - you wouldn't blame someone with a broken leg for not walking. Do what you can, and when you can't, move on to the next thing.

Sometimes, even with the best medical care, you end up with having to limp along.

My advice is short and only going to focus on the tactics of learning with depression. There is a lot of medical advice you may or may not be following - I am purposely not going to talk about that, except I hope you are getting the support you need. For learning:

1) Make it as un-stressful as possible - an activity that lets you escape from the difficulty of other activity. Make it a quite and safe space. Make sure you enjoy it. Anytime learning becomes difficult take a pause.

2) Keep sessions short. Make it a habit of making it your small good thing for the day.

3) Don't focus on results but just activity. Watch out for the inner negative voice - you aren't learning, you aren't getting there, etc... don't let it punish you ...

ps - there is some good advice in this thread.