One year on WaniKani today. I saw another “1 year” post and one question that was asked was [paraphrased], “What can you do today that you couldn’t do last year?” I liked that question so I figure I’ll just answer it now without being asked.
I’m pretty consistent using languagereactor.com for listening and reading practice. I probably average about 3hrs/wk of watching Netflix through Language Reactor - mostly Terrace House because it’s “slice of life” (ね?). Whereas it used to take me two weeks to watch one episode - lots of kanji/vocab/grammar lookups; reading and re-reading subtitles. Now, I can easily watch an episode in a single 50 min sitting and only read the subtitles about half the time and while I do still lookup kanji and vocab, the bulk of my lookups are for grammar.
I have a long long way to go to get to ペラペラ but today I feel good about my progress. Glad I came across WaniKani.
One piece of advice I would give to those that are struggling is first, give yourself a break. If you’re like me, you might not have much time to invest in Japanese studies - less than 1 hr/day usually for me and you might even have less than that. It can be disheartening and, because reviews pile up, it can be overwhelming. But keep plugging away at it. The way the WaniKani (SRS) system works is that eventually, the pile of reviews will balance with the amount of time you have to do them. It takes a while to get to that “balance” though… like weeks+ but it’ll happen, promise. So, here’s my simple advice: never fail to do at least 10 reviews and 5 lessons everyday - the 10&5 rule 
(abuse that “Wrap Up” button!). You’re just trying to establish a habit. That’s crucial. On those days you find more time, sit down and do as many as you can otherwise, 10&5. And get ok with ignoring the rest, seriously. They’re not today’s reviews/lesssons anyway… they’re tomorrow’s 
.
Hope I remember to update this post next year… 頑張ろう！
