I read somewhere that as much as 40% of what we do everyday is made up of habits. This means that almost half the time, we conveniently switch on the auto-pilot and conserve brain power: reach for the light switch, put on your shoes, grab your umbrella, feel your pockets for your keys, wallet and phone, pull the door behind you, ‘accidentally’ reach for your phone and check Facebook… What I didn’t realize is how delicate these habits can be. For example…

If only I could speak Finnish (or any other language!), then I could… [fill in the blank] Well guess what? Speaking can start today, and continue for the next 7 days. And at the end of those 7 days, you’ll be better off than you were 7 days ago. Random tangent: Is your favourite number 7? Mine isn’t but I vividly remember it being everyone else’s in elementary school. Odd. Here are 7 quick & easy ways to improve your Finnish in the next 7 days…

When moving abroad, you quickly notice some differences in how people interact from strangers to family. In my case, I noticed that I was the only person smiling at strangers on the street in Tampere, Finland, whereas I’d never even questioned why everyone smiled at each other in Canada. I made a decision in 2010 to change my ways and adapt, but a couple weeks ago, I decided to revisit that decision from a new perspective.

The first time I picked up a Finnish book, I decided I would read the whole first page. It was 2009, I knew about a dozen Finnish words, and the only ones I understood from that page were ‘on’ (is) and ‘yö’ (night). And on it went from there! It’s easy to get boggled down in the glass half empty mind-set…