After two years studying Mandarin quite intensely I've stopped thinking of the language as "hard" and recognize that it just takes a long time to get where I wa

After two years studying Mandarin quite intensely I've stopped thinking of the language as "hard" and recognize that it just takes a long time to get where I want to go. Driving to the next big city is not hard but it does take longer than driving to the corner store. Learning any language involves rewiring the brain and, for a westerner, learning Chinese involves a lot more of that rewiring because almost nothing from English is transferable. When I say 'rewiring' I mean coaxing my neurons to grow into a useful framework that someday will support that magical skill I posess in English of knowing exactly what people are saying and exactly what I want to say. No amount of "hard work" is going to make that happen ... I can't force my neurons to develop no matter how hard I grit my teeth and study. It just takes repetition repetition repetition, immersion and lots and lots of time for those neural pathways to develop.