I grew up as a bilingual since early age. One of my languages was an ancient language only spoken by about a million people who all spoke other, more popular, l

I grew up as a bilingual since early age. One of my languages was an ancient language only spoken by about a million people who all spoke other, more popular, languages rendering their own language pretty useless in economic terms. Yet there are few things I think this gave me. I believe growing up as a bilingual with two completely different languages gave me an edge in learning other languages when compared to my monolingual peers. When we started learning a foreign language in school, my monolingual peers didn't seem to grasp just how different the languages can be. All through school they tried to apply the grammar and phonology of their native language to the language they were learning. For me it was always a given that even similar sounds like consonants are often vastly different, that words can be in whatever position they have to, not just where I'd like them to be. Though, truth be told, I had no preferences in that matter to begin with since I was constantly switching in my mind from one language to another with a different word order. I am quadrilingual today, and I am not even a big fan of learning languages per se. This might be far fetched, but I think it also made me more organized and disciplined, or at least it helped to do so early on. This mental context switching forces you to pay attention to the details for one thing. For another, it also gives a sense of "protocol" early on. You understand that you should speak one language to some people and another to the rest. In process you see that this thing is even more subtle because you have to choose styles withing the same language to match the social situation. Last but not least, knowing the languages gave an early access to two different and often clashing cultures. This, I believe, made me less judgmental and more accepting of other people, at least when it comes to cultures. Not because it was the moral thing to do, but because noticing all the commonalities and differences between people became an exploration on itself for me as a kid. I am genuinely curious about people that are different from me, either by origins or mindsets. Being a typical white nerd and health-junky, I am easily bored by other nerds and health-junkies, but give me an alcoholic and I can talk to him for hours straight despite never being drunk myself.