I have been feeling increasingly annoyed and frustrated with myself. I've been in Korea for 20 months. I was here a year, before that, in 1991. I still haven't learned but the barest modicum of Korean language.
I spent 16 months in Mexico, when I was twenty, and bootstrapped myself into near-fluency. I'm willing to acknowledge all the differences: difference in age, difference in personal attitude and outlook, difference in the "luck" of my work situation and friendships (in Mexico) or lack thereof (in Korea). But it still angers me that I can't seem to make anything even close to the same progress with this language.
I'm a fundamentally shy person. That doesn't help. I'm 20 years older, which is a handicap for both reason of brain chemistry as well as for reasons of culture: Korea's ageism is profound and pervasive, and it seems to make building friendships even harder than they would otherwise be for me.
I'm really sad and depressed about learning Korean, right now. I often make excuses, but it is, at core, the main reason I came here. So what gives? Why can't I? I blame my laziness. I feel guilty whenever I don't study, or when linguistic anxiety prevents me from taking on a challenging situation. I feel guilty constantly, about it. And feeling guilty doesn't help, either.
I have a student who, in the bottom left of her paper, almost always writes: "If you smile, you will be happy." I assume this is a sort of motto or pep-talk to herself. But I need to do something with it, too. Still… that doesn't make learning Korean any easier, either.