1) Watch a movie in your target language.
Some of the time its hard to see why memorizing endless streams of vocabulary words is necessary. Some of the time you need an a-ha moment to remind you why you’re learning language in the first place.
When you watch a movie in your target language after studying and absorbing vocabulary, you might be surprised to find that you understand a lot more of it than you did before. If you’ve ever experienced this – it’s a pretty awesome moment. It gives you the satisfaction of knowing that your effort is not wasted and it propels you to want to learn even more.
2) Give up.
That’s right, give up. The reason why you may be de-motivated is because you are putting too much pressure on yourself to succeed and this is a terrible place to be in mentally if you want to actually learn something. Walk away from it for a bit and surround yourself with the aspirational goals and reasons that made you decide to start learning in the first place.
3) Read some history.
Chances are, there are some really cool annecdotes and personalities involved with the country in which your target language is spoken. When language is reduced to an abstract vocabulary list, it may be hard to see what the point of learning the language in the first place may be. Dive into the history of the country of your target language, find a person that inspires you and it may fan the flames of learning motivation once again.
4) Eat some food.
Ethnic restaurants are pretty much everywhere and if you’re learning a target language that has a tied-in ethnic cuisine you’re in luck, (if not I guess you’ll have to look up a recipe on-line.) Eating the food of the country that your target language is spoken in is a tactile experience that is real and will help jump start your brain! By visiting the ethnic restaurant you are bound to bump into your target language and maybe even some people who speak it. If you can’t visit the restaurant, you can still inspire yourself, and your taste buds.
5) Look at some pictures.
The world is full of beautiful places, and some of those places are in the country that you want to eventually live in / travel to. Find the most beautiful places that you can in that country and ruminate on the photographs and then tell yourself that the only way you will be able to visit that country is if you learn the language. Google image search can be really handy here! You will find that you have an increased interest and sense of urgency in learning that language.
Learn Japanese, Cantonese, Mandarin 