That’s the correct approach 
burnout can come really easily when trying to do everything at the same time. But these courses are held in the summer when university studies are on hold, which is why I was able to participate on them being a full time student as well. But of course this isn’t the only option, just one that I can personally guarantee to be good. But I guess my point is that you might end up with serious discrepancies in your Japanese if you don’t take any courses with a proper teacher. On the courses you will not learn just about the language, but about the culture as well which is important.
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Right. If they’re on summer then it might be possible. We will see once the summer comes round. As for now, I’ll keep going, trying to wrap my head around this kanji stuff and then move to grammar and see how things go.
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Hey, sorry to jump on you like this.
I’m curious what was going wrong and how you tackled that to get levels back down to 10 days or so?
Well first level took me a week. Second one around that. I felt what you are feeling and i am sure all of us did.
First of all, welcome to the community!
I won’t repeat what other people have already said, but I’d like to contribute with some experience I got from the past months I spent on WaniKani.
There are times in which life demands us to pay attention to other important things rather than learning kanji and it’s crucial that you don’t neglect either your friends/family or your work in order to simply level up fast.
I got stuck for several weeks at some levels during these hard times of pademics, because I’m a doctor and I had responsabilities far more urgent than doing reviews. However, ocasionally being here sometimes has proven me to be a real escape from the harsh world and a rare moment of tranquility.
Thus, don’t make it an obligation. Give yourself all the time you need and, eventually, we will all get there =)
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To answer the actual title of the thread, some people (like myself) can go fast because of how their job works, and/or because they are sacrificing a significant amount of their free time to do this. You don’t ned to do this. Go at a pace, and then occasionally see if the pace you are going at is satisfactory to you. If not, see what you can do to fix it. Don’t compare yourself to other people, because that doesn’t lead down a good road for anyone.
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I’ve been here over five years now, and am only level 46. I swear I have to be the slowest one here, that is here consistently.
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Hey there!
Well, actually I started WK this Jan and then figured out I want to take JLPT4 at Jul… And WK is not much JLPT-firendly, so I postponed it a bit to focus on N4 curriculum. Back than all this lockdown stuff was not such a thing and I still believed I could take the test… but they moved it to Dec after all, so this idea turned to be not such a great one. 
Then Jul was ruined as well with my neighbours became turbo-noisy even at night making it impossible to live in my old apart let alone any studies of new stuff. So after some delibiration I moved back to my parents, where managed to maintain proper study schedule after all.
It’s not as comfy and neat as living alone back then, but at least I can focus on my studies properly (not to mention helping my eldery parents bit more than usual is always good thing).
This totally suit my plan of moving to live&work in Japan as well, so I just consider my current state as sort of poverty language school 
tl;dr there were obstacles. I removed them, read guides how to build proper WK schedule and focused on studies.
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Damn, I knew it!
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A more serious answer though:
Everyone’s situation is different! Many people here, including me, knew many kanji and vocab before starting Wanikani (the only reason I leveled up quickly), and many more already live in Japan, so have much more exposure.
Don’t beat yourself up 
You’re not thick brained, you’re just learning a new language- one that is very hard for non-natives to speak and read, and are still getting used to it! 
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Personally I think it’s magic.
It takes me 10-15 days per level and I think that’s really fast.
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*hides in case Who is holding a knife*
It’s ok, it’s not my bedtime yet
deep (quiet) breaths
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If it makes you feel better I’ve restarted wani at least 3 or 4 times, and have never made it through level 3.
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Sigh. It just doesn’t get any easier. Maybe it’s just me and the way every time the app shows I’ve made a mistake I either get really frustrated or feel like a failure. Then I lose my cool, make more mistakes and it becomes a cycle. Just can’t stand such negative feedback. Just take it really personally, even if it’s just from an app like this.
Someone here suggested to put finnish translations in but the thing is, my issue isn’t with the meanings of the words, its the readings. They just don’t stick to my head at all. Especially for vocab where they get longer and more involved. Just feels like complete uphill battle when there is absolutely nothing that connects the reading to the concept. Mnemonics don’t help since they feel like additional layer to learn and remember. First you gotta remember how the kanji or kanji+hiragana looks, then you have to remember what it means, then you have to remember the reading OR remember the mnemonic AND the reading. With my inability to do any sort of rote memorization that just feels too much. Trying to remember the mnemonics has just ended up with me confusing it either with the meaning or the reading in such a way that it has failed.
And the worst part is that there is no way around this. Gotta just memorize this shit. Nothing to do about it. And I just feel like I can’t do it. I feel like I don’t learn, I end up feeling shitty due to the constant ‘-apprentice’ and other red messages and I feel pressured to keep doing this constantly because the reviews just keep on coming.
How can I ever do this if it makes me feel so miserable all the damn time?
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Moi, ja hauska tavata!
I don’t think I have seen this answer to your main question: many (perhaps most) speedrunners of WK already have years and years of Japanese experience under their belt, including some kanji practice. I know that’s the main reason why I can do 7-8 day level ups.
I wonder if laying off kanji for a bit might actually help you. I studied vocabulary and grammar independent of kanji for a long time, and while it was not effective, it helped me think of words as words. I just relied VERY heavily on furigana. It getting me reading a bit fast did help with motivation, and I eventually learned to recognize the vague outlines of kanji without being able to reproduce them.
Is WK the main thing making you miserable? If that’s the case, it sounds more productive to me to just focus on a different part of Japanese, or find a slower way to do kanji for a while, maybe with more rote memorization and handwriting than SRS. There is no one way.
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I think it does get easier, but not before it gets harder. I felt like I struggled more on level 2-9 than the entire 10-19 set. But eventually, once you get the hang of it, get a stride going it gets easier, even as the kanji get more complex.
If you’re having trouble remembering large batches of items, or getting them confused with eachother, try smaller sets. 5 items at a time has got to be easier to handle than 25. Get 5 to Guru, move on to the next 5. If that becomes too easy, move to ten.
Also there’s no shame in reviewing trouble items outside the prescribed SRS timings. Personally I go through items halfway between the lesson and first SRS review, and then again halfway between first and second, and that helps my retention immensely.
The failures hit me hard too – the more I fail, the more I fail 
But as you move through the levels, you have more words/kanji/radicals – so more chances to succeed!
I’ve also been using a setting in the mobile app, to reorder reviews so that the oldest ones come before the newer ones – usually I know those ones much better, so getting lots of them right before getting to the more recent reviews helps me.
Torille.
I would second the idea @ms12345 said. It’s probably better to try to get the language “in your head” first with for example a basic textbook and some simple listening. Just rote memorizing kanji can be tough and demotivating when you don’t know any of the words they are supposed to represent.
I know it’s not easy, but try not to focus on the negative feedback. You are here to learn! Failing means you will get the item more and you will learn it better. You are supposed to fail and can’t avoid it. Getting over the fear of failure is the biggest boost you can give your language learning. I myself still struggle with it sometimes (like reading a book and thinking: “I should know this word, I’m an idiot!”), but it does get better over time. Forgetting is fine and part of learning. I try to remember I’m having fun learning Japanese and not proving anything to anyone (even to myself).
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Different people have different ways to learn, and that is okay. Your goal is to learn Japanese. While kanji is a part of the language, there are plenty of other things you can be spending your time on and perhaps learn more Japanese at the same time. (I know, what audacity!)
Other people have suggested textbooks, which is a great idea. One of the more popular ones right now is kalled Genki. Otherwise, there are plenty of options around, and simply taking a popular audio-focused lesson like Pimsleur or JapanesePod101. I’m not sure where you’re at in your learning process, but I got started with the lessons from NHK. I see they’ve changed them quite a bit since I started, but for me these were super fun and super helpful.
Once you know the words or at least some of them, attaching them to symbols becomes way, way easier. Coincidentally, there’s part of the answer to your question. A lot of the people who “speedrun” WK already have some Japanese under their belt, and will more or less instinctively understand the difference between 入る and 入れる (or may know the kanji and grammar outright, which makes it an ez 100% correct review), For someone with less experience, the difference must be hammered in, and unfortunately, I’m not sure Wanikani is a good hammer, in that exact context.
Best of luck.