What Are The Causes Of Language Learning Burn Out?

Reaching burn out when you are studying a language is something you really want to avoid. It can be extremely unpleasant and can actually cause you to give up all together.

While it is important to know the signs and symptoms, it is also important to know what the causes are. Burn out is basically caused by studying, but this alone will not cause it …you have to be pushing yourself too hard, for too long and you inevitably cannot sustain this level of effort and get burnt out.

This means that you need to manage how you study and not push too hard. If you can balance this properly, you will not have problems.

Repeated Fatigue Is The Main Cause Of Burn Out

The biggest cause of language learning burn out is repeated fatigue. Fatigue and burn out are often seen as the same thing, but they are not.

Fatigue is when you sit down and study and basically push yourself to exhaustion during that session. This is easy to do, studying will make you tired and that is totally normal.

The problem is when you are constantly getting into this state day after day and you not allowing yourself some time to replenish in between sessions. You are constantly worn down until you basically totally run out of energy altogether …this is burn out.

Just imagine I asked you to sprint 100m. Most of us would find this okay, but maybe we would be a little out of breath. If I asked you to this tomorrow again …that shouldn’t be a problem. You could probably do this every day with no problems. You run the 100m, then get to go home and eat dinner and sleep. It may be slightly fatiguing but there are no real long term issues as you have plenty of time to recover.

Now let’s say I ask you to sprint that 100m again …and then I ask you to do it again in an hour, and then an hour after that.  As the day goes on you are going to get more and more fatigued after each sprint.

Let’s take things to the next level. Now I ask you to sprint the 100m and then I give you 1 minute to rest before making you do it over again. How long do you think you could last doing this? Only after a couple of sprints you will already be fatigued and you will quickly reach the point where you are basically drained. You are probably going to crash and have to stop running, or at least go at a very slow pace.

This is exactly what is happening in your language learning, if you are pushing too hard and getting fatigued and not resting, then and you allow that exhaustion to build up and you will burn out.    

(You can read more about – What Is The Difference Between Language Learning Burn Out And Fatigue?)

You Are Doing Too Much

A very common cause of language learning fatigue is trying to do too much.

Languages are huge and for some reason we think we can conquer them very quickly, which always leads to us doing too much. It is easy to make a plan on paper and it sounds easy and realistic …but we usually totally misjudge this.

I know I have planned some crazy amounts of work and while my heart is in the right place, it is just stupid and a recipe for disaster. Doing too much is fine for a day, maybe even a few days, but working at this level all the time can quickly compound and really drain you fast.

A classic example is trying to learn vocabulary and using apps like Anki to help you. You might set yourself some high goal like leaning 50 words a day. After a month you will know 1500, that means you can understand a lot and we all want that kind of progress, but of course this isn’t as easy as it sounds.

After a few days your brain is going to be so overwhelmed with new information that it will take you twice as long to learn your daily words and are also going to have your reviews to do …this is going to drain you and you will be fatigued. Your memory is going to struggle and your general focus and concentration will start to fade. 

If you keep trying to do this, it’s just going to get worse and worse and you will reach breaking point, you will have done too much and you will get burnt out from it.          

The Way You Do Things Can Cause Burn Out

Another way that you can get burnt out is by the way you study; this would be from how you actually go about things, rather than the volume.

Usually this would happen if you were doing things that you didn’t find fun. Maybe you just focus intensely on grammar or learning words and you do it in a way that you do not really enjoy.

You might sort of force yourself to study, thinking it is good to just make yourself know this certain topic. If you keep doing this, you will burn out, the learning is more a chore than a pleasure and you will really need to use a lot of energy to make it happen.

A Lack Of Fun Can Make Cause Burn Out

You really can not underestimate how important having fun is while learning.

You will find the total opposite of burn out happens when you are actually enjoying yourself. The studying doesn’t feel like study and you can end up just spending hours immersed in the language and not be tired from it.

This really can make a difference and if you are finding your method too intense and not very enjoyable, you need to make changes before you burn out.  

Taking No Breaks Can Cause Burnt Out

Taking breaks throughout your study sessions will help reduce fatigue and help you study for longer on that particular day, but you should also consider actual breaks, where you don’t study for the whole day, or maybe even a few days.

You could set aside one day a week where you don’t study, or you could just take random days off here and there as you feel like it. You may even take a longer break, as if you where on holiday from your language studies.

I am not really a fan of taking breaks. I do like to study every day, but even though I am always doing something there are days where I drastically reduce the amount of studying I do and basically do the bare minimum.  This for me is enough to keep things balanced for me. However, there is nothing wrong with taking a total break.

It doesn’t really matter what you do, but so long as you are having some sort of rest period it can really help you stay away from burn out. Trying to constantly work at high intensity is never going to work long term, so make sure you are having some sort of break to help keep you feeling fresh. 

(You can read more about – Should I Take A Break If I Experience Language Learning Burn Out?)

Other Areas Of Your Life Can Affect Language Learning Burn Out

While the biggest cause of language learning burn out is …language learning, it doesn’t mean it is the only cause.

The rest of your life can also affect your studies and you really need to look after yourself in all areas. I have found that other areas of my life can really stress me out, or just drain me and this can really take away from language studies.

You need to make sure you work life balance is good and free from stress. You also want to make sure your diet, exercise and sleep are all good, as this should allow you to come into your studies at an optimum level.

If any of these things are off balance, you will notice it as it just makes studying so much harder.  

Making No Progress Can Lead to Burn Out

We all want to continually make progress in our language studies, but this doesn’t always happen. You will find that you plateau at times and this is totally normal.

When you notice this is happening you just need to keep doing what you are doing and it will eventually pass. It is too easy to try and respond to this by doing more, which can end up in burn out.

You will enter a sort of downward spiral very easily, where you work harder, but don’t really see the results, so you work harder and harder until you basically grind yourself down. At this point your performance is going to be weakened from the constant fatigue …so again, you won’t make any progress.

All this will lead to burn out, when it could have been easily avoided.    

(You can read more about – How Common Is Language Learning Burnout?)

If You Are Bored With Your Language Learning, You Can Burn Out

Another cause of burn out can be when you are just bored with language learning. Usually this is in conjunction with making no progress.

You end up doing the same things day after day and when you end up seeing no results and you kind of get bored of the whole process. For a lot of people they will just quit when this happens, but a few may power on.

However, if you do this for long enough it will wear you down to the point where you burn out, and then quit.

The way around this is to just have fun with your studies. While progress is great, it might not always happen, where as you can insure that you have fun and that will keep you going for long enough to actually see the progress you want.  

Losing A Sense Of Purpose Or Motivation Can Lead To Burn Out

A lot of the time when we start wearing ourselves down through constant fatigue, we actually wear down our passion and motivation at the same time.

This can be pretty dangerous as we can end up forgetting what drove us to this new language in the first place.

If you lose this, you will easily quit when you do start to feel burnt out. It will just not be worth the discomfort and you will not want to fight for it anymore.

If you notice this passion is faded it could be a sign that you are slipping into burn out, or you are certainly at a higher risk.   

However, if you do find yourself burnt out, this is something you should really think about and try and remind yourself as to why exactly you started, as relighting this passion can help you recover and make you want to study again.

(You can read more about – Frequently Asked Questions About – Language Learning Burn Out)

Conclusion

As you can see there are quite a few different causes to language learning burn out, but basically it boils down to just grinding yourself down through pushing too hard and being constantly fatigued.

Hopefully now you can recognise the early signs of burn out a little sooner and you can deal with it before it becomes a larger problem and interrupts your studies.   

(You can read more about – How Do You Overcome Language Learning Burn Out?)