The Paradox of Choice

Oh, life. The ultimate paradox, right?

But we’re not here today to do philosophy and question life, but to discuss a peculiar (language) learning paradox —the paradox of choice.

This is a conversation I’ve had many, many times with different students over time, and it’s one of the reasons why I created the Foundations Books series.

What is the paradox of choice?

You can watch the full video I’m embedding below by polyglot Robin McPherson for a full tour around the idea, but it stems from the assumption that in order to increase our welfare and happines, we need more freedom. And the way to create more freedom is to maximize the amount of choices we have.

How we experience it as language learners?

As language learners, this translates as endlessly exploring resources and never making actual progress due to the fact you’re constantly expecting the next BIG, ULTIMATE, ULTRA-EFFECTIVE resource that will get your Spanish up to level.

Especifically, there are two strong and revealing points to this paradox for language learners:

#1

The more options we’re presented with, the more difficult it becomes to choose. If you’ve ever tried to find the right book to learn Spanish, you know there’re so many options out there. Many of them available for free, some paid, some unreasonably expensive. Is free effective or if I want to really learn I need to pay?

#2

Knowing there are other choice we’ve left unexplored sparks the question: “Have I really made a wise choice?”

I always say that the third conditional (in English, [If I had…, I would have…] and the same structure replicated in Spanish [Si hubiera… , habría…]) is made for neurotic minds that like (or can’t help) playing the game of “What if…?”

This leads to nowhere.

How can we avoid falling into this black hole?

Hopefully, you can see how this applies to life in general and having a framework to navigate choice is bliss and efficiency “only” a side effect. But let’s stay within the language learning context.

From my own experience, I can tell you the best way to avoid feeling overwhelmed by the amount of unexplored options is taking enough time to consider the resources available and then choosing the one that seems best suited and commiting to it.

As simple as that.

Here’s the video:

Thanks for visiting, and until next time.

Happy learning,

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