Learning to Pause - The Benefits of Breaks
I recently took a sos - break from Substack for a few weeks. And in large part, I took a break from learning teangacha - languages as well. As much as I was struggling with the aftermath of grief and grappling with what my life looked like without them, I also struggled with my cinneadh -decision to take a break in the first place. It’s éasca - easy to feel like no reason is enough or that others will be disappointed with our decision, even in cases where it only effects us directly, like language learning. When I was learning Irish, the closest I came to taking a break was allowing myself to learn less. I never would have dared taking any true time away from learning. I was in a race to prove to myself that go raibh mé in ann - I was capable of learning a language and that outweighed any discomfort or struggles my dedication brought with it.
Thar na blianta - over the years, I learned a lot more than just how to speak Gaeilge - Irish. I learned how important breaks can be. Not just to give us a chance to cope with what life throws at us, but also to actually help us learn even better down the line.
By taking breaks we are:
Reducing the risk of burnout and mental fatigue.
Taking time to process what we’ve already learned - even if we’re not conscious of it!
Showing ourselves that our worth is more than our ability to learn quickly, which in turn, will help our muinín - confidence.
The other thing about taking breaks is that it’s up to us what that means. Although I took a break from Substack and Polish, I had to lean ar aghaidh - carry on with many other aspects of my life. I wasn’t giving up those two things because I didn’t enjoy them, but rather, I needed the flexibility to be able to grieve, struggle and dul i dtaithí - adapt to my new life without the brú - pressure of expecting myself to do homework, write articles and show up to classes on zoom.
At times, I wrote for Substack. And at times I did things in Polish. However, I did these things simply because I wanted to.
Taking a break doesn’t have to mean all or nothing. Uaireanta - sometimes it’s as simple as allowing ourselves to do what we want to do instead of what we feel we need to do.
When we’re réidh - ready to come back after a break, we should continue to be gentle with ourselves and ease into it. For example, my sprioc - goal this week is to attend one Polish lesson. Not study every day. Not spend hours immersed in Polish. Just show up. Just once.
And maybe an tseachtain seo chugainn - next week, I will do a little more. And the week after that, maybe a little more still until eventually I’m operating at the level I was previously. Maybe I’ll decide I want to do less than I was doing before, or maybe I’ll do more. That’s okay.
It’s easy to think that when we take on goals like ag foghlaim teanga - learning a language that we have to accomplish exactly what we set out in the beginning. Taking breaks gives us a good opportunity to pause and reflect on what we want now, as opposed to doing what we thought we wanted to do at the start.
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I find that students' Irish is often more fluid after returning from a break. We're definitely processing what we've learned without realising it :)
Tá "passive processing" cabhrach! Bí cineálta leat féin 💖