Had to restart...again

So, at the end of the summer I'm cruising along with my hanzi 汉字 learning characters like there is no tomorrow. Then, on a whim, I decide to try the Heisig method of learning Chinese characters. Granted he did it for studying kanji which are Chinese characters used in the Japanese writing system, but its the same thing basically. Anyway, I download an excerpt from his newest book Remembering Simplified Hanzi, and I do 50 in one day. I couldn't believe it! The most I had done my way was 20. But I did 50 easily, and the only reason I didn't do all 94 in the excerpt was because I was so pissed that it was so easy! Here I am busting my ass doing it the traditional way for 2 months and then I come across this method. It destroyed my motivation to study characters. Then, I went to Shanghai for a week and didn't do my SRS repetitions so when I got back I had like 200 reps to do. Today, after much agonizing, I decided to delete over 350 characters I entered over a 2 month period and start from scratch using only the Heisig method.

I was really getting burned out on learning Chinese after this new discovery. Other things occupied my time like teaching and what not. So, for a while learning Chinese was on the back burner. But, another weekend in small town China with nothing to do has cured me. It's back to learning. I think the reason most people don't learn a second language to a native level is simple because they give up. Either they reach a point where they are satisfied with their ability, or they realize the enormous effort just isn't worth it and stop completely. So, to prevent this from happening I got rid of over 350 character's that were really pissing me off and ruining my fun. Starting over sucks, but it's not like I'm deleting knowledge from my mind, just a computer program I use. What I have learned will stay with me as long as I keep on going, and don't stop.

The other thing I have been thinking about lately is that I don't seem to be getting any better. I still can't have a real conversation, just say a few words and sentences. But, I think about it like this. When I was a kid I'd always ask my mom to measure me and see if I'd grown any taller. I did this every day. And eventually I realized I wasn't going to see changes every day, it would take months and years before I could notice any difference in the marks on the wall. It's the same with learning Chinese. If I compare myself to 1 month ago, there isn't much difference, but when I compare myself to when I first came, there is a huge difference. I just gotta keep it up...