I see. So you DO have other interests. So I guess among your interests, learning Korean doesn't make the cut (of regular study). It's not as much of a priority, which is fine, we can't do everything. I have many other things I would like to do (guitar and piano, tennis, drawing, etc.), but learning Spanish was more important to me. There is never enough time to do everything we want to do.

Well I guess it is just a matter of saying, ok these are my goals and I am going to set aside an "x" time a day to achieve them. Something else has to give, work-time, wife-time, or whatever else.

If you plan on having kids, better to do it now. You will have less time with kids biting at your ankles all day.

aybee77 : Thanks for the reply.. I forgot to say I appreciated the comment you added earlier about your situation. Yes I do have other hobbies.. The weird thing is one of my hobbies is my job at the sametime HAH! I draw/paint all day sooo 12 hour work actually takes care of 1 of my hobbies and i feel very satisfied in that regards. My photo/filming hobby is also somewhat fulfilled by my day job as I have to go out and take reference pictures. So in a way I have time for all my hobbies except language learning. Learning korean is at the top of lists of things to do outside of work But time doesnt always permit it unfortunately which is why i say my study schedule is very sporadic. And it isnt a problem with my wife at all. Its more a problem with me... I just need to figure out a schedule that permits me to reach my goal a bit faster than now!

dooo : YEah no kidding about the kids ( no pun intended 0_o). We've no plans for kids at the moment. Maybe when when around 30 years old. Yep, I know if i want more time studying i need to cut something out but right now there isnt anything to cut out I've a full schedule of important things I need to do.. If i was watching too much tv or wasting time doing meaningless things I would cut them out ( maybe i could cut out how much time i spend on these boards today =p )

Again I just find it interested to read about other peoples situations and where they find the time to study languages. Im crazy busy but I do find the odd time to enjoy some korean studying. I just wish days were longer =p

Keroro, I think your routine is better than mine, actually.

Vi7 . How so? I only actively study korean a few hours a week maybe. Is that more time than you spend on your studying? I hope not =p.
My daily routine works pretty well but everything BUT studying.. I just havent been able to figure it out a routine that includes daily active studying. Hopefully it works out =p.

I think you have work that you enjoy and it's creative. I think a lot of people would like to have a job like that.

I don't know how many hours you mean. The way I "study" is kind of the way, dooo finds time for languages. For me, it's not the amount of time, it's the quality of time and that's kind of how I think about family time as well.

I didn't read all the posts, but in my opinion the best way would be to convince your wife/husband to learn a language. In this way, whithout any doubt there wouldn't be any problem about listening with your headphones all the time because he/she would be doing the same.

This must be love...

You're very fortunate with your job. I'm envious.

Good luck to you.

Aybee , Awwww no need to envy .. Seriously. Theres alot of negatives when your work is your hobby Trust me =p. I love my job and im happy i get paid to do what i do but sometimes I wish it was just a hobby =p.
I envy alot of other people here who seemed to know what their doing when it comes to studying languages =p.

For most of much of my married life I have been involved in learning languages and my wife has not. There is always time, sometimes there is more and sometimes there is less. Listening and reading and vocabulary review have always been my learning methods, even before LingQ. Here are my real tips for success.

Do not spend your time listening and reading in a way that appears to your spouse to invade your time with her. That still leaves time for your own activities. There are spouses who read books, who enjoy different music, and different hobbies. Language learning should fit into that pattern.

Since I started with LingQ I have devoted more time to language learning. I find that with an mp3 player, I have more flexibility. I can listen anywhere, waiting in line at a store, exercizing or whatever. I find that I now volunteer for household chores, like the dishes and clean up, and garden work, more than before , because this is my learning time.

"For much of my married life" I meant to say.

People know what they're doing when it comes to studying languages? (I was just joking about Basque, btw.) That's a whole 'nuther topic and a good one.

That was a good answer, Steve.

Still, I think that if an octopus fights Steve, the octopus will win. ’Cos octopuses rule.
(Love the word *manswer*, by the way.)

Steve fighting an octopus? I think I saw that on YouTube once.

I have long hair and, when listening to Russian on my mp3 player, keep the volume down low enough that I can hear people when they talk to me. That way I get in 1 - 2 hours a day of listening, despite constantly being around other people who want me to listen to everything they say. Saying "yes dear" every 2 minutes works best with the under 10s.

My husband was bemused when I started learning Russian, seeing no practical purpose for it whatsoever. I kept telling him it's not illegal,expensive or fattening so he should count his blessings, and after 4 years, he's stopped grumbling about it.

Does this count as a wo-manswer?

Well, here is from a Japanese wife who has a Japanese husband. As a definition of Japanese husband(s), they rarely come back home before 11 pm. Therefore, the wives have to do most of the things around the house. Wait, it's too early to judge that our lives are so miserable, because then we can have a lot of free-time after sending the kids to bed. In this way, I can have enough time to do my own staff. Hey ladies, why don't you have a Japanese husband, it would be much nicer than you probably imagined :p I also totally agree with the method introduced by Helen: "Saying "yes dear" every 2 minutes works best with the under 10s".

Vi7, I meant they seem to have things figured out in terms of learning schedule and what works for them on a daily basis.... didnt mean it in the sense that they had language learning 100% figured out . Thats a whole topic all together =p.

For long we were lacking that kind of advice! I have been always arguing for a better appeasing your spouse functionality at LingQ. This is as valuable as listening and reading. IMO, we urgently need to fix bugs in the new peaseSpauseMarklet :-)

Hi Keroro,

my situation is similar to yours somehow: I'm not married, but I live with my girlfriend (which pretty much is like being married), I am all day long at home, I study french and she is french. She doesn't teach me because she's a french teacher, and ends up pretty tired after classes, so I can't ask her to teach me french. Besides, she loves to speak spanish, and my french level is still too low to have a natural conversation in french with her.

We are both quite busy. However I can spend 30 min a day with LingQ (the truth I'm not that systematic, so perhaps one day I would spend 2 hours learning french, and then 3 days on a row without doing any practice; which is something I wouldnt recommend).

That said, here is a tip, I know you didnt ask for advice, but this might be helpful for a lot of us who spend a long time at home: you can write down some of the vocabulary that you learn, and post it in several places around the house. For example, you post the word "mirror" (if English is the language you are learning) on the mirror; the word "table" on the table, and so on... This does not only apply to vocabulary related with objects of the house, you can post the phrase "to have a nap" next to the bed, or "do you want a beer?" somewhre in the kitchen. Moreover, if your wife doesn't get mad about having all these tags around the house, or if you don't care much about keeping a beautiful decoration; you can also post pictures or drawings with their correspondent name-tag. This way, you get input all day long from the language you are learning, and most importantly you make the most out of working at home. Your house will look like a scrapbook, but then, you can study some vocabulary while cooking, or while sitting on the toilet bowl.

LingQing while sitting on the toilet bowl? Imaging watching it on Yo-Tube. Isn't it the best advertising ever made for lingQ?

May I ask, say, a thousand LingQ points for my great ad idea? I have not yet thought if it has s-th to do with spouses -:)

I'm married with 2 tweens.

Whenever my wife watches TV or plays computer games, I study. When I go to bed, I read a little or I watch a Japanese drama. She reads a lot and I study at the same time. Sometimes, I study in the morning by getting up earlier than everyone else. On the weekends, everyone sleeps in but me, so it's my study time. Apart from that, I spend a lot of time thinking about Japanese and I can do that anywhere.

Studying Japanese is my main hobby. As much as I love my wife, I need to be able to have some time for my hobby and it's only fair that she understand this.

I listen to audio books in the bath, on the school run, on errands, in bed while falling asleep, while cuddling sick children, and while pretending to be asleep so they go to sleep too. Using my netbook I do LingQing while "supervising their play", ie just being around so they play more carefully. I get far more LingQ time than TV time these days.

I don't know if married people have less free time to learn a foreign language than unmarried people. Besides, some married people might have more free time than other married people. But we are supposed to do what we want to do at our own risk. Nothing can be attained without any sacrifice. :-)

You inevitably have less free time when you are married and when you have a family. That's what happens when you have responsibilities!

That may be the case by not always. Marriage can have the effect of settling your life down and leaving more time for more constructive pursuits.