I've noticed something strange about kanji.

It seems that the more familiar I get with this multitudinous mesh of character, the less I think about them. For years, kanji felt and seemed like this great hurdle I would never truly overcome.

And I'm talking about after I had completed the kanji challenge and learned all of the meanings of the general-use characters.

I worried about mastering the meanings. And then I worried about mastering the readings. And then I worried about differentiating kanji that had the same or similar meanings... in the same words!

For example, we have:

聞く　VS　聴く

聞く（きく）can mean "to ask" or "to listen," in a general sense.

But 聴く（きく）, which is the same word but with different kanji, also means "to listen."

So now what?!

Well, you'll see 聞く used in most cases, but if we're talking about what I'll call "special listening," like listening to your favorite song, then 聴く is more appropriate.

説明を聞く
せつめい　を　きく
to listen to an explanation

音楽を聴く
おんがく　を　きく
to listen to music

見る　VS　観る

The same thing happens with 見る（みる）and 観る（みる） for "to look; to see; to watch." People use 見る like 90% of the time, so that's the only one you worry about, but then your Japanese friend talks about how he wants to 観る a movie, and the world crumbles all around you. This, I have deemed "special watching."

I know what you're thinking now...

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How do I know which character to use?!!!

Fear not. I have some simple advice for this one: Don't worry about it.

No one cares if you use the wrong kanji. Except for perhaps a teacher thatneeds to grade something. Yeah, if you have a helpful Japanese friend or teacher, then by all means get them to point out which one is which, but I would rarely--perhaps never--spend more than a single minute trying to find out which kanji to use for a word when presented with multiple options.

It is a waste of your time. Time which is precious. Time that could be spent actually using that word, even if just in your head or talking to your cat, putting it out in the real, spoken world where kanji exists only as an idea.

And Japanese people mess these up, too, by the way. I have seen several Japanese people use the wrong kanji... only because I have wasted so much time looking up which kanji are appropriate for different situations.

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Picking these up gradually.

Although I'm saying don't worry about these, I'm not saying don't learn these. As A+ students, we should always be striving for excellence, so if we have a chance to ask a friend or teacher, or if we can quickly and easily look up differences between a kanji (which usually requires the ability to browse websites quickly in Japanese), then yeah, it's probably a worthwhile activity.

Also, sometimes you'll stumble across some rad lists of kanji differences.

Like right now!!

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足　VS　脚

足（あし）is "foot."

脚（あし）is "leg."

That was easy, yeah?

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辞める　VS　止める

辞める（やめる）means "to quit (a job); to resign."

止める（やめる）, on the other hand, means "to quit (doing something)" or "to stop (doing something)" in a general sense. Until very recently, I was always writing this just in hiragana as やめる, because I thought that's what everybody did, and I thought you only used 止める for とめる, which means "to stop (something that is moving)," the way you "stop" your bike or your car.

会社を辞める
かいしゃ　を　やめる
to quit a job
Literally: "company + を + quit."

邪魔するのやめて！
じゃま　する　の　やめて！
Get out of my way! // Stop holding me back!
Literally: "hindrance + do + の + stop!"

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開ける　VS　空ける

開ける（あける）means "to open (e.g. a door)."

空ける（あける）means "to empty; to clear out; to make room."

ドアを開ける
ドア　を　あける
to open a door

明日空けといて。
あした　あけといて。
Don't make any plans tomorrow. // Free up your schedule tomorrow.
Literally: "tomorrow + empty + prepare."
Note: In other words, we're hanging out tomorrow.

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Painful Level-Up Bonus

開ける（あける）is the verb "to open" in a sentence like, "I opened the door."

開く（あく）is the verb "to open" in a sentence like, "The door opens."

In other words, 開ける（あける）is transitive and 開く（あく）is intransitive. And just in case those grammatical terms aren't enough to confuse you, here's another bonus: 開く is sometimes read as あく and sometimes read as ひらく. This is because...

開く（ひらく）is the verb "to open" in a sentence like, "I opened the book."

In other words, we use 開く（ひらく）when we "spread something open," changing its condition or shape. This is why "to open a webpage" is ページを開く（ページをひらく）.

If that doesn't make sense, no worries--I was saying あく for every 開く for like 2 years, until a Japanese person FINALLY pointed out I was using the wrong word half the time.

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思う　VS　想う

These two words, both of which are read as おもう and translated as "to think," are particularly confusing. I was totally convinced that 想う（おもう）is only used for when you "think" of someone you love or that is precious to you.

Looking online, you see explanations like these (which are written by native speakers), saying that 思う（おもう）is for stuff that you think (i.e. "ideas") and 想う（おもう）is for stuff that you "picture" in your mind (e.g. when you "think" about your ex-lover).

I messaged Rei to confirm that this was correct, and she said:

思うと想うの違いわかんない。
わたしは思うしかつかったことないけど分けてる人もいる。
でもたぶん想うは正式な言葉じゃないと思う
おもう　と　おもう　の　ちがい　わかんない。
わたし　は　おもう　しか　つかった　こと　ない　けど　わけてる　ひと　も　いる。
でも　たぶん　おもう　は　せいしきな　ことば　じゃない　と　おもう。
I don't know the difference between 思う and 想う.
I've only ever used 思う, but some people separate the two.
But I think 想う probably isn't an official word.

And I'm back to thinking two things:
1) I don't know the difference.
2) Yep. That was a waste of time.

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A Note About Low-Use Characters

I once had a student ask me about using 訊く（きく）for "to ask; to listen."

When do we use that?!

I have no idea. I've (maybe) never seen this kanji used for this word. Presumably, though, it would work for "to ask," as that same kanji shows up in 訊ねる（たずねる）, "to ask; to inquire."

Hold up, the word たずねる also has a bunch of possible kanji like 尋ねる（たずねる）and 訪ねる（たずねる）. So what about those?

Again, I have no idea. I have passed JLPT N1 (and had two years of continually improving my Japanese after that), and I still don't know the difference between these three kanji for this specific word. Well, except for 訪ねる（たずねる）, because that just means "to visit." And that same kanji shows up in the highly similar word 訪れる（おとずれる）, which also means "to visit," and, before you even ask, NO, I don't know the difference between those two words, either.

I could look up the differences online right now. Or go bug Rei to explain the differences to me, but I'm not really convinced that it's worth my time.

Which is my roundabout way of getting to this point: I wouldn't try to find out the correct characters for words unless you have seen alternate spellings (=kanji) several times. Even then I'm not sure if it's worth your time, though. If you have enough exposure to the language, you should be able to learn which characters are appropriate for which usages of words naturally, stress-free, over time.

Because any area of the language that stresses you out can probably be put off until tomorrow... or until some time when you're feeling like Super-Student 3000. I mean, it takes hundreds and hundreds of hours to master a language. So let's spend those hours enjoying ourselves, laughing at our mistakes, then being 100% fascinated as the language unfolds before us.

Also, let's try to avoid kanji-hate at all costs.