I'm fluent in 20+ languages and I've never learned a language in my life

Hey everyone,<br><br>I wanted to create this thread because I see a lot of posts like "I want to learn a language in 1 year" and similar questions like "How long did it take you to learn language X?" or "What's the most effective way to learn a language?"<br><br>I'm not a professional polyglot, but I get asked about how I learned my languages all the time. I fluently speak over 20 languages, and I've never spent time learning a language in my entire life. I didn't grow up in a bilingual family, I've never had any interest in languages (at least not until recently) nor have I had a talent for them. I've never used Anki, Duolingo, or any other language learning software for more than 5 minutes, and have never cracked open a textbook or dictionary. I've watched TV shows in multiple languages, which indirectly caused me to learn a new language every few months. It's not like I sat down and said "Okay, let me watch 50 hours of TV in Polish so I can learn it", but I'd just happen to find shows that I found really interesting and happened to be in that language. I don't care what language a show is in - it's about the quality of the content. I've watched many shows in English, some in German, some in Polish, some in Russian, some in Swedish, some in French, some in Dutch, etc.<br><br>I've never had any interest in learning a language, it just happens. I'll watch 3 seasons of a show, and then I'll be able to speak better than a native speaker. It's that easy.<br><br>To those wondering, I'm German-born but live in the UK. My IndexError is German and English.<br><br>Let me know what you think.<br><br>&#x200B;<br><br>Edit: I get ~200 PMs an hour so I'm not able to reply to everyone, I'm trying my best to get back to as many as I can. I've never used AMAs, so let me know if there's a better way to do this.<br><br>Edit #2: I've been getting a lot of requests asking me to record myself speaking these languages. I'm not comfortable doing that. I'm just a random guy who likes watching TV in different languages. I don't have any interest in creating content based on my skills.<br><br>Furthermore, I don't want to create the impression that I'm making this all up just for the sake of getting internet points. My entire goal is to provide an alternative perspective to the "It takes 10,000 hours to become fluent" mindset. A lot of people spend years of their lives learning a language and very often don't end up fluent. I've never spent a single minute learning a language in my life and I'm fluent in 20+ of them. That's it.<br><br>Edit #3 (since I get so many questions about it): I have absolutely no problem with anyone learning a language. If you enjoy it, go for it. I'm not trying to discourage anyone from pursuing their hobbies. What I have a problem with is the constant glorification of it. There's nothing special or impressive about it. If you want to learn a language because you enjoy it, that's completely fine, but people *shouldn't* be applauded for it just because they decided to learn a language. I'm bringing this up here because I get a lot of comments like "You're so disrespectful towards people who spent years learning a language", when in reality I couldn't care less whether people learn languages or not.