On Learning Languages

The Champion brand is one of the more commonly pirated brands here in China.  Check out these few examples of 'wannabees'.  

There are many others.  

It all makes me think about the difficulty of language learning.  

I don't fault any Chinese person for not being good at English, I know full well how difficult it is to learn the other language. 

But it does cause me to understand more deeply how important it is to pay attention to details while learning languages.  'Chimptwo', 'Decameter' and 'Ckemqairm' (or whatever that one says), and the others simply do not say 'Champion'.  

Thankfully over the years, I've had the blessed opportunity of learning the language of the Spirit.  It also is an upward curve.  Details need to be attended to.  It takes lots of experience and lots of practice. But it's a beautiful, rewarding journey. 

I love the phrase President Eyring used about this process in his October 2023 conference talk.  He referred to it in this way: "guided by a series of experiences with the Holy Ghost".  (my emphasis) This shines light on the fact that learning a language is a constant flow of experiences with the language.  President Eyring continues, "This assures me that we can be taught by and learn from the Spirit line upon line, receiving what we need, and then when we are ready, we will receive more."

At first our experiences in learning from the Spirit might yield results like "Decameter" when you really mean "Champion".  But as we learn, practice, notice errors, repent, ask for more, we can move closer and closer to acquiring better spiritual language fluency.  Such as this closer approximation:

 

Several weeks ago I was overwhelmed with learning Chinese.  It is such a difficult language.  There is so little correlation to English, the word order is difficult, the tones cause me headaches, the number of homophones kills me, and 'daily life language' is not the same as the formal language that one needs to learn first. The characters might be the easiest thing of the language--if that is even possible.  As I was praying about my painfully slow language acquisition, with a fair amount of discouragement in my voice, I was stopped mid sentence when a few thoughts were placed in my mind.  They were these:  You are wrong if you want to overstep the incremental steps of growth.  To want things in any other way than by small and simple things goes against the teachings of Jesus Christ.  It is how He builds.  Wishing for growth in a way other way opens the door for Satan to work on you with discouragement and overwhelmed-ness. "  It was such a beautiful, revelatory moment.  I am learning.  I am making progress.  It *is* small and simple.  But that is Jesus Christ's pattern for growth and accomplishment.  I may never be able to speak well, but I am putting forth enough effort that the Lord can use me if needed.  I am, as President Eyring taught, putting myself in a 'series of experiences with the' Chinese language.  "This assures me that [I] can be taught by and learn from the Spirit line upon line, receiving what [I] need, and then when [I am] ready, [I] will receive more."  So for the time being, my approximations on Chinese are more like "Claoepkem" when I'm really trying to say "Champion", and that is okay.  Progress is progress.  My Chinese is far better than it was a year ago.  Slow and steady.  A series of experiences.  Unnoticeable growth.  The divine pattern of Jesus Christ, applicable to all paths of growth.