Do you think in your new language?

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lovepeacefakepiano@reddit

German in English speaking countries, but kinda on steroids since my husband is American and also it’s been well over a decade. I think in English, but I count and dream in German.

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I’m Dutch / German in the uk and my husband is Indian so we always speak English and at work of course we well so yes I think mostly in English, I dream in English most of the time but I exclusively swear in German

20 years for me

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Level-Brain-4786@reddit

Been living in an English-speaking country for 35 years. I think in my native language 100% of the time.

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akiber@reddit

Combo including in Dreams, but took some years for that to start (but don’t remember when. Probably when I learned stuff in the second language exclusively, that subject I would then exclusively think about in the second language)

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JohnInBrazil@reddit

Born and bred in the UK and didn't leave until late my 20s, but I had my children in Brazil and built houses in Brazil for the first time, so when thinking about children or building houses I think in Portuguese because that's where I learned the technical language of those experiences. For most other things I think in English, with some Portuguese, but despite spending only 2 years in Switzerland I mostly swear in German, I think that's a reflection of the work crowd I was with then.

Example: once while back in the UK I went into Mothercare to buy a pushchair (aka buggy / pram) and I thought what I wanted in Portuguese, where the word is basically the same as for a shopping cart, then translating into English to speak I asked the shop assistant for a "trolley for babies".

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Go-Go-Gou@reddit

I’m Italian and when I lived in France my thinking and dreaming usually quickly switched to French.
I learned French as a kid though, this might explain it.
For you native English speakers, I am told I once woke up screaming THE WHALE in the middle of the night so some English must be part of me by now

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Early_Switch1222@reddit

greek native, lived in netherlands a few years now. english stays the default for thinking but dutch creeps in for specific contexts, mostly anything around bureaucracy and transport. when i call the gemeente or buy a treinkaartje my brain just defaults to dutch. greek shows up for cooking and family stuff. its weirdly context-dependent more than language-dominant

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FinestTreesInDa7Seas@reddit

I speak C1 level French, and I've been speaking French as a second language for over 20 years.

I go back and forth between thinking in English or French depending on my environment, and the subject of my thoughts.

Living in France, I mostly think in French because I'm totally immersed in the language.

When I call my family, have practice conversations in my head with English people, or play back English conversations, my mind will usually switch back to English for a period of time after that, depending on how long those thoughts linger. But it's not long before my mind switches back to French, because I'll naturally think of something that pertains to life here.

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owzleee@reddit

I’ve been in Argentina for 8 years. I worked for an English speaking company and became a manager when I moved here and honestly didn’t have the time to learn a new language (plus husband speaks Spanish natively). I’ve now retired here and I’m taking Spanish lessons but boy is it hard. I still have to work out which ‘I was’ (out of 4 options) to use. Some of it has become innate and I don’t translate in my head but Spanish is like a gzip file compared to English so I’m constantly unzipping a sentence in my head to understand it. In English we just chuck a load of words in front - ‘I used to’, ‘I would like to’ etc. in Spanish these are all single word tenses and I really struggle sometimes. Estuve, eataba, era, fui. In English it’s just ‘ I was’ with some descriptors. I feel like my gunzip binary is faulty.

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dogwoodcat@reddit

Probably always will, I can think and process in multiple languages now, but my base language will always be English.

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Jazzlike-Bird-3192@reddit

Very common. My grandfather lived in an English speaking country. For more than 70 years, he still thought and dreamed in Italian.

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Caveat2026@reddit

I think in various languages depending on which I used most and most recently. Though I admit I'd hate to think in French!

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Flyboy_BCN@reddit

Dutch in Spain for 15+ years. My thinking is a mix of English, Spanish and Dutch in confusing combinations. Same goes when I talk to myself haha

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astridares@reddit

Same (English-speaker living in France for nearly 7 years). It depends on the subject, which language has the best word that captures the concept, what language I am hearing around me, what language I was reading something in, etc. I work in a mixture of French and English (tech) so it's not too surprising in the end.

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Wranorel@reddit

After 15 years in English speaking countries yes, I think and dream in English.

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RoundAd4247@reddit

You need to think in the language you use to communicate, not try to translate your native language inner monologue.

This is also what every decent language teacher tells their students.

For example, I’m Finnish, but I didn’t “translate “ your post nor my reply in my head, all this happens in English, for me a foreign language. When I have a dialogue with a French speaker, I do it similarly in French. Ditto with Swedish and German, the other two languages I understand enough to read a novel in and live everyday life with. I find it much more frustrating to first formulate a perfect sentence in my own language and then try to communicate that with a language that has a completely different structure and whose vocabulary I’m much less confident in.

Maybe it helps being a native speaker of a small language,we don’t have the luxury to assume everyone will understand us anyway.

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Rough-Foundation9208@reddit (OP)

Yeah I should probably push myself to do it more