I've always been an introvert. A lot of people find this hard to believe, because I like to go out with friends, move from place to place, and meet as many new people as possible. At the end of the day, though, my energy source is alone time, not time spent with other people.

I used to be pretty shy, too, especially when it came to speaking a language that I wasn't comfortable in. Add to this that I have a pretty bad habit of being broke, spending all my money on extra-long trips that, realistically speaking, I can't afford. This all adds up to bad news for speaking practice:

Introverted + Shy About Imperfect Japanese + No Money for Lessons
=
Lack of speaking ability

Looking at that equation, I can totally see why I neglected my speaking practice for so long when I was first diving into Japanese. At the same time, I see how I was just making excuses so that I could ignore the problem.

Speaking in a new language is uncomfortable—you feel stupid; you sound stupid; you can't express yourself the way you want to; your brain gets tired; people around you don't know what to say to you. But we can't let these things come between us and our desire to speak this language fluently.

I hope that the content in this guide will be enough to give you the courage, confidence, and motivation to start speaking this language even if you're still at a beginner stage. As such, I'd like to share some small mindset tweaks that have helped me personally get over my hesitation to dive into structured speaking practice.

Learn to laugh at yourself. Frankly, I have no idea how anyone makes it past the beginning stages of learning a language without having the ability to laugh at themselves when they make stupid, embarrassing mistakes. There have been so many times when I made a mistake—probably the same mistake I've already made 8,000 times—and I found myself facing two options: (1) get angry at myself, or (2) laugh at myself. And I've found that, with a little bit of effort, two is always a feasible option. We have to make mistakes in order to improve. If we fear mistakes, then we also fear improving.

Flip your concept of inferiority around other students of Japanese. I think that the hardest thing to do is to speak a foreign language around other students of the language that are far better than you. This is my defense mechanism in such situations: First, think about how you feel when you're around somebody who's much better than you at [insert foreign language]. Does it make you feel good? Probably not. It makes you feel embarrassed and inferior. On the other hand, think about how you feel when you're around somebody who's not as good as you at [insert anything]. How does that make you feel? Proud of yourself? Confident? Finally, how do you want the people around you to feel? Most likely, you want to make them feel happy, proud of themselves, confident. And you can't do that by being perfect. So don't try to be perfect. Being bad at something is an awesome opportunity to lift up the people around you, to make them feel awesome. If I'm bad at something, there's no need for me to feel bad about being bad. Instead, I can feel good about making people feel good that I'm not as good as them.

Flip your concept of inferiority around native Japanese speakers. It's easy to be embarrassed that your Japanese is imperfect and full of mistakes, but at the same time the very fact that you are speaking Japanese with a native speaker means that they are equally to blame for the inability to communicate. I used to tell this to my Japanese students of English all the time when they told me about how they're so embarrassed about their English skills. I told them that the very fact that the conversation must take place in English means that the person you're talking to is more to blame for this inability to communicate. The same goes for speaking Japanese with Japanese people who are unable or unwilling to speak English. You win, because you're the one making the effort. (This only works for Japanese people who don't speak English. It doesn't address the entirely opposite problem of Japanese people insisting on speaking English, even when your Japanese is much better than their English.)

Stop caring about who's better than who. It doesn't even matter in the first place. You can't make learning Japanese into a competition, because you will lose every time. You will lose every time, because the opponent in your head doesn't even exist—it's some all-powerful, native-speaker-level ninja boss that you'll never meet. If you meet someone who's better than you, congratulate them and ask them for advice. If you meet someone who's worse than you, see if you can help them improve (if they want help, that is).

The only embarrassing thing is your reaction. This one I originally learned from this post about making mistakes on FluentIn3Months. If you totally embrace your mistakes (for example, by laughing at yourself), then no one feels uncomfortable… which means that there is nothing to be embarrassed about. Sweet!

You can afford it. Not having money is probably my all-time favorite excuse for not taking language lessons. Only, Japanese speaking practice is free if you really want it to be free. There are so many Japanese students of English on sites like italki or MyLanguageExchange that are dying to have serious, productive language exchanges. It's easy. You both buy textbooks, and then you take turns. Give 30 minutes of structured English practice. Get 30 minutes of structured Japanese practice. Even if you pay for lessons, most of them are under $20, and a lot of them are even under $10. When I'm really 100% honest with myself, not practicing speaking has always been about my lack of effort. It's pretty hard for me to convince that introvert brain of mine that taking a Japanese lesson is more important than making 30 new flashcards. I'm getting better, but, yeah… it's a work in progress.

Have fun! First and foremost, learning languages is about connecting with other people. We can learn, build relationships, find love, mysteries, and lifelong friendships. Language only has meaning because it connects us to real life—that is, life with other people. It's not about getting your grammar perfect or memorizing a million vocab words. Because at the end of the day, things like that are nothing more than tools for us to have a deeper and more fulfilling interaction with the world around us. So have fun. Don't worry about mistakes. Don't worry about not having enough money for a proper lesson. Don't worry about stumbling through a disaster of a conversation. Worry about putting a smile on someone's face. Worry about hearing something new from a person who, without your language-learning efforts, you never would have been able to connect with at all. Find out about their dreams and fears and knowledge and experiences. At its core, learning a language is a deeply fulfilling and deeply entertaining adventure. So let's take it for what it is.

Whatever your mental block, do whatever you need to do to get past it and commit to start practice speaking in a safe, comforting, productive environment. I'll show you how to create that environment right now…

I think that the most important thing about Phase #3, Chain Item #3 is getting started. We can talk about your regular quotas for speaking and/or grammar practice later. More importantly, get started by taking that leap.

I recommend booking a lesson one week in advance, then scrambling to prepare for it.

Phase #3 Assignment, Chain Item #3 On Day #1 of Phase #3, schedule a lesson or language exchange meeting for Day #7 of Phase #3.

To give an example, I'll walk you through booking a lesson on italki or Cafetalk, then preparing in the days that lead up to it.

The first thing you'll need to do is to decide what type of lessons you want to take. In deciding this, I think it's a good idea to go back and look at the grammar resources in Phase #1. Looking at the list of different grammar resources, you'll probably notice that some of them are more suited for classroom study than others.

For example, although I think Tae Kim's Grammar Guide has the best explanation for a beginning student of Japanese grammar, it's better suited for self-study. Also, while JapanesePod101 probably has the most extensive amount of resources for grammar study, all of those are tied to a lesson that your teacher probably won't have access to.

If I were a beginner, and I were planning to schedule a Japanese lesson, I would almost certainly take a lesson that focuses on either the Genki series or the Minna no Nihongo series. There are two reasons for this: (1) They're both designed for classroom study and (2) All Japanese teaches should be familiar with and experienced at teaching at least one of the two.

For example, let's imagine that I'm an absolute beginner, and I want to go through the entire Genki series. If I go on Cafetalk, I can search for “Genki" in the search bar, and there are lessons tailored for that series. From the homepage, I go to Lessons --> Languages:

If I'm still not sure about what lesson I want to take, I can browse Japanese lessons by using the “Select Language" drop-down, or I can use the search bar on the right, which is what I'm going to do now:

I search for “Genki:"

This brings up a handful of (quite affordable) Genki-based lessons by Japanese teachers:

Looking at some of those, I see that a number of these teachers also offer the same course for the Minna no Nihongo series. Sweet!

If I'd rather use italki, I can do pretty much the same thing on their website:

I can choose either professional lessons or informal tutoring, then I can browse through the various teachers and request a lesson with whoever seems cool to me. The one bummer about italki is that their site is more teacher-based, whereas Cafetalk is more lesson-based. So it's easy to find which teachers are using the resources I want on Cafetalk. However, I'd be surprised if any teacher wasn't using at least one of the textbooks described so far.

Depending on your level of Japanese, you may also want to consider the teacher's level of English, as it might be useful to have someone that can explain difficult concepts to you in English. Also, it's probably just less scary overall for a beginner. Luckily, both of these sites list the language level of teachers.

If your Japanese is lower-intermediate or above, you probably don't need to use English in your lessons, and you'd also have a bit more freedom in choosing lessons, as a lot of them have cool “Free Talk" options and whatnot.

By the way, I have both a review of Cafetalk and a review of italki on my website, which may help you in choosing an online school.

There are a lot of other factors that can go into choosing a language teacher. If you look at this article on BrazilianGringo.com, you can see how some people put a lot of thought into choosing a teacher. Knowing myself, though, if I put too much thought into it, I'd probably spend around 16 years “choosing a teacher," which is another way of saying “putting off my lessons." So personally I'd aim to choose my teacher, contact them, and request a lesson all within 5-15 minutes. We're trying to “dive into lessons," after all, right? Then, if my teacher sucked, I'd just take a different one the second time. Good language-learners are like good entrepreneurs—they make mistakes fast, learn from them, then improve slightly for Round #2, slowly working their way up to Round #31,987, when language-business nirvana is attained and all is good in the world.

If you're following the guide exactly, it will be Phase #3, Day #1 when you schedule a lesson for Phase #3, Day #7. This gives you 1 week to prepare for your first lesson, and if you're a true beginner of Japanese, then the moment you schedule that lesson, you might panic, thinking, “I don't know any Japanese! What have I done?!"

Don't worry. I got you.

Towards the end of this guide, there is a section called the “Caveman Conversation Course." The entire purpose of this guide is to prepare you during Phase #1 Days #1-7. It's not a comprehensive grammar guide. If you want one of those, you should go back to grammar resources in Phase #1. Instead, we just need to get you set up with the bare minimum for diving into your first Japanese lesson.

Phase #3 Assignment, Chain Item #3 On Day #1 of Phase #3, schedule a lesson or language exchange meeting for Day #7 of Phase #3. On Day #1-7 of Phase #3, plow through the Caveman Conversation Course.

Specifically, the Caveman Conversation Course Covers:

• Super basic greetings.
• In-lesson survival phrases:
  • “How do I say…?"
  • “What does X mean?"
  • “Please slow down."
  • “One more time, please."

Actually, it includes a bit more than that, but those are the first sections, and they're the only thing you need to read to prepare for your first lesson. To be completely honest, you don't really have to prepare at all for your first lesson, because that's your teacher's problem, but you'll probably have a much better experience if you do…

Let's keep following with the Genki lesson above. If I were an absolute beginner, and I were preparing for a lesson that follows the Genki textbook, this is what I would do…

No notes. No memorizing. I would just relax on the couch and read every word in the lesson.

2. Read through the lesson again, making Anki flashcards for new vocabulary and grammar concepts.

This time around I would type all of the sentences (with new vocabulary words) that I wanted to memorize into my personal vocabulary deck on Anki. In effect, I would be memorizing everything in my textbook one step at a time.

3. Read through the lesson a third time, doing all of the exercises by myself.

This is basically a chance for me to walk through my lesson as if I were with my teacher. I could make sentences when prompted to do so, fill in blank lines, all that good stuff.

4. Do the workbook assignment that accompanies my lesson.

Both Minna no Nihongo and the Genki series have workbooks that accompany them. So for that extra bit of practice, it's not a bad idea to go through them on your own. If you do buy the workbooks, be sure to get the Answer Key that goes along with them. That way you don't need to have your teacher check your answers. You can just check your own answers and make notes about questions that you have for your teacher.

5. Take the lesson with a teacher!

Here I would meet with my teacher, and I'd pretty much let them run the show. I'm guessing that we'd just walk through each of the exercises and try to get as much speaking practice as possible. I should only need to hear minimal explanations, because I've already studied in advance, and I wouldn't be wasting any of the time that I'm paying for with the teacher by doing the written exercises. All of this would be prepared for in advance, meaning that I maximize my speaking practice time.

While I take the lesson, I'd use a free program like this one to automatically record the audio of the conversation. Then later, I could put that audio onto a listening device and use it for review and to check my pronunciation (assuming that I can bear to listen to a recording of my own voice).

Before the lesson, I would let the teacher know that I want them to type down my mistakes when possible. Most lessons will be done via Skype, and it's quite easy to type corrections into the chat box. I do it when teaching English all the time. However, I would let my teacher know that I want them to write all corrections using full Japanese with kanji. Most teachers will only use hiragana with beginner students. Or, worse, they'll use some hideous form of Romanization that I can't read at all. Since the corrections that the teacher writes in the chat box will later be added to my personal vocabulary deck on Anki, I want them to have the full kanji. If they don't, I will have to go find it myself (either when I make the cards or later when my Japanese improves), which means more work in the future for me, which means wasted time.

6. Review and schedule the next lesson.

After the lesson, I'd make Anki flashcards for appropriate items, listen to the audio track for review, and schedule another meeting with my teacher (or a different teacher if my first one was horrible). I could keep repeating Steps #1-5 until I got through every lesson in every book of my grammar series, thus bringing my Japanese level up to Intermediate. I could then find a higher-level study resource that appeals to me and continue in a similar fashion.

Looking at that list of how I'd prepare for a lesson in an ideal world, it might seem a little bit overwhelming to take Japanese lessons. The thing is, though, all of that stuff is optional. If you have a full-time job and kids and sports and whatever else and no time to be sitting around preparing for lessons all day, then don't worry about it. The only important thing is that you're doing something in a structured manner over a long period of time.

Don't stress yourself out. Lessons should be fun. Enjoy yourself. So bomb your first conversation. Bomb your second conversation. Who cares? Just laugh at yourself for every mistake you make, big or small. The effort is all that matters.

Phase #3 Assignment, Chain Item #3 On Day #1 of Phase #3, schedule a lesson or language exchange meeting for Day #7 of Phase #3. On Day #1-7 of Phase #3, plow through the Caveman Conversation Course. On Day #7, take your first (online) Japanese lesson.

Really, this is up to you. But I'm recommending at least one lesson per week. If you have extra time, you can take two or more lessons. Or you could use that extra time to prepare for lessons or to do any of the stuff that I've talked about in this guide.

A day you take a lesson is a day you get a Blue X on your calendar for “Grammar/Speaking."

Phase #3 Assignment, Chain Item #3 – Dive into Speaking On Day #1 of Phase #3, schedule a lesson or language exchange meeting for Day #7 of Phase #3. On Day #1-7 of Phase #3, plow through the Caveman Conversation Course. On Day #7, take your first (online) Japanese lesson. Take at least one lesson per week, every week.