Thank you for the thoughtful insight! It's always astounded me how expertly some multilinguals on the internet speak English, sometimes as fluently as myself, despite it being not being their "first language", like my Israeli friend on Telegram who's never been to an Anglophone place yet I talk to like we've been neighbors for a decade. It's interesting, and good news, to hear one such wizard endorse Anki and the study of linguistics and grammar as part of their optimal path, and place value on artificial immersion, as I'm still doing the phone language-switchy thing.

For four months last year I did over half of Russian Babbel, joined two Discord servers, played some translated games, and started thinking what I could in Russian. Forming sentences on the spot is still nigh-impossible, but reading and listening is easier. Indeed, the German I learned six years ago comes a whole lot more naturally for input and output still. It must be is those long words in a new script, like представляющий, and their manifold of conjugations.

A very interesting post that came just in time for my resolution in 2024, which will be my first year in college. My main worry has been how much I'll have to read, going into the "Great Books" cirriculum; but knowing this post, as well as what a pomodoro timer is, gives me reason to be confident I may well remember years from now. Thank you much for writing this, and Dark Lady watch over you! 😁

Either it'll be recieved well, or you get free criticism on your ideas, or a blend of the two.

A tough pill for super-sensitives like me to swallow, but I can see it as an exceptionally powerful one. I surely sympathize with OP on the fear of being downvoted—it's what kept me away from this site for months and from Reddit entirely—but valid criticism on many occasions has influenced me for the better, even if I'm scornful of the moments. Maybe my hurt with being wrong will lessen someday or maybe not, but knowing why can serve me well in the end, I can admit that.

I'm glad I found this. It's incredibly moving, so thoughtfully, artfully composed, and as a new member to the forum I feel I'm in the right place here, reading about the foundations of why empathy and kindness are worth it, not just how it's applied on a grand scale. It presents alone the fearsome reality of suffering, with an implied silver lining that whatever means we have to mitigate it is of immense value, even if all we can do is think to ourselves "I don't want that." It conveys better than any other what Effective Altruism means to me, why I've delved deep into it these past eight months, and why I let this school of thought direct my future plans, hopefully for decades to come.