I wish I did this when I started learning Russian (my biggest regret)

There’s one thing I only started doing after 3 – 3.5 years AFTER I started learning Russian. And I wish I would’ve done it right from the start. My Russian would’ve improved much quicker, and it would’ve saved me lots of frustration.

Curious what it is?

In this article you’ll learn:

• What I regret the most (regarding my Russian learning)
• Whether this can help you learn Russian quickly too
• What will happen to your motivation after you start doing this

What do I regret the most (regarding my Russian learning)

You may know that I have a second YouTube channel that’s fully in Russian:

Ари говорит по-русски (Ari speaks Russian)

I uploaded the first video there about 3 – 3.5 years after starting to learn Russian.

See where I’m going? 🙂

I got positive feedback and kept uploading a video once a week.

But after about 6 months I got an interesting comment:

“Wow, your Russian has improved so much compared to your first video”

I hadn’t noticed, so I quickly compared my Russian in the first and last video I’d made.

And to my surprise it had actually improved a lot.

I could better articulate what I wanted to say.

I spoke using a wider variety of words.

I used correct grammar most of the time.

And it made me very happy to see how my Russian had improved.

But I also got a bit sad…

How cool would it have been if I had regular video audio recording right from the start?

Now I only have a couple of fragments here and there (and most of them are on old laptops and phones…)

So I wish I had started recording myself regularly right from the start of my Russian journey.

And if you’re also learning, it can be valuable to start doing this too.

Once a week would be cool. Maybe even once a day if you’re serious. But even just once a month would’ve been great.

You can talk about anything:

• Family
• Hobbies
• Work
• Something random that happened to you recently
• Something you see in the room where you’re at

You could even try talking about politics. No one ever needs to hear this anyway.

These are your personal recordings.

If you later decide to share them with someone (or the internet), that’s an option.

But for now, just keep them private. They’re for you to improve your Russian.

By the way, why exactly does this help you improve your Russian?

Can this help you learn Russian quickly too?

What’s your main goal with learning Russian?

If you’re anything like me, you want to communicate with native Russian speakers.

And to get good at speaking, you need to practice… well, speaking.

But how is this going for you?

Before you can have good conversations that improve your conversational skill…

… you need a reasonable level of Russian.

Because imagine having a Russian speaking friend in your sports team.

You usually hang out after the match and just speak your native language.

• Now what happens if you tell him “hey, I know you’re Russian and I’m learning the language. Could we try speaking some Russian?”
• Your friend probably says “Да конечно!” (Yeah, sure!)
• Then he adds “тебе нравится спорт?” (do you like sport?)
• You understand this and say “да, мне нравится футбол” (yes, I like football)
• Then your friend asks “круто, мне тоже. За какую команду ты болеешь?” (Cool, me too. Which team are you rooting for?)
• And you’re like “ееее, не понял…” (eee, I didn’t get it)

And before you know it, you’re back to speaking about sports in your native language.

Now, most people don’t even have someone to practice speaking Russian with.

But you still need to practice speaking. Otherwise how are you going to improve it?

And that’s where this “self recording” practice comes in:

You can practice speaking even if you don’t have any native Russian speakers around.

And you can do it without the pressure of having a real conversation.

You can take your time and slowly talk about something that’s on the top of your mind.

You can look up some words on a translation service, but it’s not necessary.

You can also try speaking as fast as possible to test yourself.

But there are no rules. Just record yourself and say something.

The only exception is to create your own sentences.

Reading something out loud isn’t very helpful.

It’s not about saying perfect sentences. It’s about teaching yourself to build sentences, regardless of whether they’re wrong or right.

You can always later listen back with a translation app and check whether what you said was wrong or right.

Or show it to a native speaker and have them help you.

Alright, so recording yourself can be useful to improve your Russian. 

But there’s something else that it works great for:

What will happen to your motivation after you start doing this?

I’ve had my ups and down throughout my Russian language journey.

Often I felt that I wasn’t making progress for months at a time, even though I was practicing consistently.

It’s difficult to keep studying if you don’t notice progress.

Our memories are fickle.

Have you tried remembering how you spoke Russian a couple of months, weeks, or days ago?

We just have an idea in our minds how it was. And we compare that to how we speak now.

And often those ideas don’t match reality.

But how easy would it be to compare progress…

… if you have an audio recording of yourself speaking 3 months ago?

You can just compare the recording to how you speak now. And if you’ve been consistently practicing, there’s a 95% chance your Russian has improved.

So recording yourself gives you the facts.

No more guesswork. 

Whenever you feel like you’re hitting a plateau with your Russian and getting demotivated, just look back how far you’ve come.

You might surprise yourself.

You’ll see that you are making progress. And that all you need to do is just continue putting in the hours every week.