Level 38 and ready to give up

Man, learning is not a speedrun.
You have to take your time.
Even if some of your level can take 10 days or a month, you should not take care about numbers.
What is really important is that you remember those kanji and that you learn and keep those kanjis in your heads.

Numbers are just … numbers

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I think your motivation is all wrong. You’re going through WaniKani for speed rather than for enjoyment. Just slow down and go at pace where you can actually have fun learning. I started over two years ago and I’m only level 32. Is this as far as I’d like to be right now? No, but I can honestly say that there’s not a single point I haven’t enjoyed learning Japanese here through all this time.

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I’m quite certain the font randomizer script would drive me straight to the madhouse.

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First of all, congratulations on making it to Level 39 :slightly_smiling_face: It takes a lot of perseverance to reach that level and give yourself credit where it is due :raised_hands:t2:

You don’t HAVE to go that fast. You don’t HAVE to do those reviews. I understand your motivation and breaking a streak, I have faced it multiple times as well and I can relate to your pain. I understand that your pride is tied to identity of a fast run. It’s not a defeat if you go a little slower than usual, you are adjusting to the circumstances. Now, no one else can decide the right path or decision for you. What matters the most for you? Going at the highest speed even if it means not reaching your goal or reaching your goal even if you go a little slower? That’s something you need to decide for yourself. Think of why you started WaniKani, what is the end goal?

You don’t have to dedicate more time to Japanese. You can chose the most important one and stick with it until you feel better. Everyone has days when they feel like quitting, that just shows how strong you are to persevere thus far. :clap:

I sincerely hope you plan to continue I_| san :crossed_fingers:and whatever decision you take, we will be here to support you :fist:

Good luck :four_leaf_clover:

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Haha, me too. I keep trying to use it, and I keep almost throwing my laptop out the window at the same time. Interesting how coincidences happen.

Update: I completed my first fast level last night without incident. I got to see the image for 100+ lessons available for the first time. I’m sure I’ll be seeing a lot more of it in the future. 9.5 weeks to go!

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Congrats I_I san :metal:

Great going :clap:

Best of luck, I’m on level 43 and keep increasing my time by making 1 mistake :triumph: Level starts with exactly the amount of kanji needed to pass, so I don’t get any leeway. The answer override button is a big temptation

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Yeah, you have to be really careful with the kanji reviews on the fast levels, especially the initial ones. Even if I’m confident in the answer, I usually pause for a second when doing the level reviews, just to reduce the risk of stupid mistakes. So far I’ve made it to level 45 at full speed despite not using an override script.

Starting around level 40, I’ve been using a modified version of Bish Bash Bosh to do extra practice of new apprentice kanji to help reinforce them. I don’t think there’s any way I could make it through the fast levels if I was literally just looking at the kanji once during the lesson and then hoping to remember them perfectly four hours later. I’ve found that it usually takes two or three reviews to remember them reliably.

Another tip is to be careful with when you do and don’t do reviews in order to minimize the number of non-level related reviews that come up at the same time your new level kanji reviews do. For example, if you plan to do your level reviews on Wednesday at 8pm, avoid doing reviews at 9pm on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Wednesdays in order to minimize the amount of extra reviews that will come up at that time.

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Generally I’m pretty much an idiot so I’m kind of bound to make a bunch of mistakes anyway. WK mnemonics never seem to stick for me so I have to come up with my own for all the Kanji, which I may or may not be able to do… I try not to review kanji between the SRS reviews on WK since Tofugu advises against it, since I think it’s bad for the SRS and will negatively impact retention.

And on my computer I don’t have any kind of reorder script to get apprentice reviews first or get related reviews back to back, again apparently bad for SRS, but on my phone I have that switched on. I usually do my reviews on the computer but when there are are Kanji reviews for this level I’ll do them first on the phone, then go to the computer to do the rest.

I’m hoping to decrease my level time next level by not being quite so unintelligent lol

I don’t reorder reviews at all either. Also, I disagree about the doing extra reviews outside SRS thing. If you think about it, you’re doing that all the time anyway. WK gives you a lot of similar words, and I’ve often had an old word I’d forgotten come up for review where I was able to get it right due to the review for a similar word or the kanji or whatever coming up just before (that I missed, but learned the right answer from) or vice versa.

Anyway, Bish Bash Once is only for reviewing apprentice and guru leeches, so it doesn’t impact the higher SRS levels at all anyway. It’s mostly just to help reinforce newly unlocked lessons.

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Reviews are definitely starting to pile up, but I’ll manage. Nine weeks to go!

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Well, for the fast level, to be under 100 in Apprentice just means pacing the lessons…
If you do them all in one pass then, yeah, you will end up having more than 100 in Apprentice :upside_down_face:

You seem to be very focused on speed and that’s great if that works for you.

The no more than 100 Apprentice pile IMO works well for those who want to avoid burn out and the dread and gloom of a giant pile of reviews :wink:

Doing the fast levels at full speed means that by definition you’ll have on average at least a level’s worth of items in Apprentice at any given time. The only way you could possibly have less than that is if you reorder the lessons to skip all the vocab, which is obviously not recommended.

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Last night, I had 400 reviews projected in a day for the first time. Things are definitely picking up. 6.5 weeks to go.

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Glad to hear that @I_I san :slightly_smiling_face:

Ike!!

Trying to get lessons slotted into every hour of the day, I take it?

Not really, that just happens naturally over time.

I started a new thread to track my progress since hitting level 50 in case anyone is curious and wants to follow along: Diary of a mad level 50'er

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