One of the most challenging hurdles to clear when learning any new language is the illusory goal of actually thinking in the language. I have to say, it’s a pretty cool feeling when you realize that the words that just left your mouth did not first pass through your brain starting in English then waiting a beat or two while the translation machinery did it’s thing to spit out Japanese.
So how does one get there? Following is one simple (”simple, not easy”) method that can accelerate your journey.
Step 1: Look Around, What Do You See?
Take a look around you, right now, wherever you are. What are the objects in your line of sight? List 10-20 of them. Do you know what they’re called in Japanese? Look up the ones you don’t know, learn that new vocab and whenever you see any of those objects again, say the word to yourself. Do this repeatedly until you become “unconsciously competent” at naming the items around you in Japanese. When I see my wedding photo hanging on my office wall, I immediately think 結婚式の写真. When I look at the computer I’m using to type this, I think パソコン.
Starting off with nouns is helpful because they represent concrete things that you can visualize in your mind. Your brain works in images and what we call objects in any language is just a label. We want to go directly from the image (e.g. a car) to the label in Japanese, 車 [くるま].
Pro tip: focus on getting your pronunciation right from the beginning. It’s much easier to learn, practice and make it ingrained from the start rather than trying to undo bad habits down the road. Not to mention, this will help you recognize the words more easily when you hear them in the wild.
There are any number of ways you can do this, but to list just a couple you could hire a tutor online at iTalki, use an app like HelloTalk or Tandem to find a helpful native speaker, or search for usage of the word in a video on YouTube using YouGlish.
Step 2: Start Using Those Nouns
Unless you want to sound like a caveman just pointing, naming and grunting, you’ll need to add some actions (verbs) to your repertoire. Take the nouns you now know and build some simple sentences using them. “I am drinking coffee” becomes 「コーヒーを飲んでいる。」. “My computer is expensive” turns into 「パソコンは高い」. Simple is the key here — don’t try to get too complicated, too quickly.
This step helps you focus on growing the vocabulary that is related to those nouns you have already mastered. The relatedness greatly aids your memory because the nouns you already know form mental “hooks” for the new verbs to hang off and because the nouns you’ve learned are those things around you that you see often, the related verbs have relevancy, also important in strengthening memories.
As before, try to use real people to help validate your sentences. Machine translation has made great strides in the past few years but still can have a tendency to come up with some wonky translations, particularly when you’re making short sentences with little context.
Step 3: Narrate Your Life
The final stage is to talk to yourself about your everyday activities in your target language. What are you doing right now, this very instant? Start simple, then gradually build up into more complex sentences. For example, “I’m writing.” Then “I’m writing a blog post.” “I’m writing a blog post about language learning.” And on and on.
The more time you spend doing this, the faster your vocabulary will grow. Along the way, start to include verbal connectors that will make your speaking sound more natural. “First, I made some coffee. Then, I poured a cup and sat in my favorite chair. I felt like, you know, ‘now would be a great time to write,’ that kind of thing.”
You’ll spend a fair amount of time looking up unknown words, but that’s okay and it’s kind of the point, isn’t it? Look them up, use them in your narration. For those so inclined, put them in your notebook or SRS for later review but honestly, if you just use them as your learn them that’s fine. You may need to look some of them up several times and that’s okay — eventually they’ll stick.
Conclusion
That’s it: simple, not easy. Learn the words for those things around you that you see all the time, learn the verbs that are used with those nouns, then start talking to yourself as you go through your day. Start simply and build up complexity over time.
One more thing: as always, consistency is the most important thing. Do this regularly every day. Make it a habit to spend at least a few minutes following this routine. Over time you’ll find yourself doing it subconsciously and before you know it you’ll be thinking in Japanese!