Hallo @Ron. Ich antworte jetzt in deiner / Ihrer Muttersprache. Ich arbeite als Technische Redakteurin, und ich muss meistens auf meiner Muttersprache Englisch arbeiten. Jetzt überarbeite ich mein Finnisch, um meinen Wortschatz zu erweitern. Ich möchte auf einem C1-Niveau meine Sprachen zu sprechen. Wenn ich zu schnell lerne, vergesse ich es. Fünf Sprache ist ganz genug, wenn jemand wenige Zeit hat. Meine Arbeit ist kognitiv anspruchsvoll, und ich habe oft niedrige Energie davon, weil ich täglich tief recerchieren muss. Schritt für Schrittt.
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Ich habe auch Englisch als Muttersprache, und benutze vier andere Fremdsprachen in meiner Arbeit (Deutsch, Niederländisch, Russisch und Polnisch), also sind wir beide bei fünf 
Es ist doch schwierig, Zeit für Sprache Nr. 6 zu finden… ich würde sehr gern Tschechisch oder Französisch besser sprechen, aber mir fehlt die Zeit und Energie um mich zu bemühen, den Niveau von beruflicher Kompetenz zu erreichen… wenn ich dienstlich eine Email auf Tschechisch fassen würde, bräuchte ich 3 mal so viel Zeit. Wenn ich meine Zusammenarbeit mit Tschechen intensiviere, bin ich vielleicht bereit, mir die zusätzliche Mühe zu machen
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How do you find language partners?
Ich habe mich bisher selbst nicht wirklich bemüht, einen Sprachpartner zu finden, aber mich kontaktieren manchmal Leute über Sprachlernseiten (vor allem Russen und Chinesischsprachige), um mit mir Japanisch zu lernen, und mit denen muss ich dann einfach ihre Sprachen sprechen, weil sie noch nicht so gut Japanisch können (wenn sie schon gut Japanisch können, dann spreche ich in der Regel nur Japanisch). Das ist kein gleichmäßiger Sprachaustausch, aber bei mir hat es immer so funktioniert. Also, Freunde finden, mit denen ich meine Zielsprache notwendigerweise sprechen muss, war meine bisherige Methode sozusagen. Ein richtiges Sprachtandem wie “30 Min. Japanisch, 30 Min. Chinesisch” ist schwierig für mich 
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Awesome!!! I would like to participate in a polyglot group. I feel all alone studying languages only by myself.
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i’ve had a huge issue finding a language partner. i feel if i pay for a tutor i can worry less about frustrating them since they are being paid to listen to me. i have feared that a exchange partner would be less inclined to be patient. (even though the community gives me no reason to believe that they would be nothing but patient)
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Ich denke, diese Konferenz ist die beste Gelegenheit dafür. Beginn einfach ein Thema, z.B. Wer lernt noch Sprache X und möchte gern in einer Gruppe lernen?
Oder die andere Möglichkeit, such dir hier jemanden, der Spanisch lernen möchte und eine deiner Zielsprachen spricht. Und dann frag einfach, ob der- oder diejenige interessiert ist.
I speak, read and write on a C1-C2 level: German, Italian, French and English. My Dutch is B2-C1 level – depending on the topics I have a C1-C2 level in speaking and writing.
In order to keep up with all 5 languages: I speak them every day – I have clients from a very diverse linguistic and cultural background: that helps! – also with friends and my family. We live in the Netherlands in a very international community where it is easy to switch between 3-5 languages per day, if you want. Also, I read a lot and try to balance between the languages. At the moment it’s more German books, but also Dutch ones. English is a must every day anyways, and French and Italian it’s on Mondays and Fridays – quindi, se fossi molto coerente, dovrei scrivere questo messaggio in italiano, oubien en français. 
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Oui! Ce forum est génial. J’ai déjà rencontré des gens très intéressants et je peux apprendre des langues avec eux. Merci
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Je crois que si on parle de atteindre un niveau avancé pour la première fois, ça demande beaucoup de temps et effort.
Au contraire, pour maintenir une langue active pour qu’on puisse la parler couramment, ce qu’il faut n’est pas exactement un grand quantité de travail focalisé, mais surtout des opportunités très fréquents de l’utiliser, même qu’ils soient assez brefs.
Si on se contente de maintenir les langues étudiées auparavant pour qu’on puisse les comprendre sans problème, mais on accepte qu’il faudrait un petit peu de “réactivation” pour bien les parler à la vitesse normale, alors je crois qu’il n’y a pas vraiment de limite!
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I’m the same as you, Heidi. I learned Dutch to about B1-2 25 years ago, and I don’t need much time to revive it. I wish I had more opportunity, but I don’t. Auslan (C1) I can leave for years and pick up easily. Even French, which for me is A1, I don’t seem to lose comprehension of, but have to work at active expression now after 2 years of little to no speaking. The longer I learn, the longer I can leave it.
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I am brazilian and have C2 English, C1 French, Spanish and German (going onto C2), C1 Dutch and A2 Russian (going on to 1) end Italian. Wishing to go further.
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@Weltbummler78 What do you teach/research? That sounds like the path I’m trying to head in (just submitted my first Ph.D. application recently and working on another now).
I work on biomaterials for biomedical applications, which is a topic of research in many countries, including those where people speak the languages which I am interested in
Hey @Ron,
While my Languages aren’t all C level, I find that I can keep 3-5 active at a time with less effort, on top of my job and family. There are some studies suggesting 6 really is the cap in a multilingual environment before a person must consciously put more energy into keeping more languages active. I would recommend reading “Babel No More”, which does look at this question some.
Personally, I only have about 3 languages integrated into my life on a regular basis, so keeping 5 active takes work, and one of those is usually a lower level language that I am focusing on. Having said that, when a language is at a higher level, it takes less effort to keep it active or to reactivate it. But the truth is you only hace so much time in the day.
The idea is that ~6 makes sense when you look at those who grow up in multilingual environments but aren’t language enthusiasts. There success comes from the environment itself, and you have to really start shifting your active life, just like you are already doing, to keep bringing those languages into your life. This is a common theme with some of the hyperpolyglots where you find they are focused in the languages spoken around them in their community (@polyglotconference is a good example in Skopje). When the language you want to learn just isn’t spoken around you, you need to be realistic that maybe that ~6 langs might just be ~4-5 to compensate for all the extra effort you have to put into it. (Unless you have the time to really focus on more at a time, but with other demands on life that becomes hard)
At least, that’s been my experience.
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Just since you’re bringing up iTalki… I have had no issues at all with Japanese tutors being reliable and I figured it was the fact that was paying that helped this along. But I’m at a B2 level and I can carry on a good conversation. My Korean iTalki tutor seems to show up for lessons only 50% of the time though. I think its because my beginner Korean means more work for her? I’ve had this issue with Spanish in the past too which also was beginner level. Maybe I need to flatter my tutors so they will show up for lessons 
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I think it depends on your target language. If you’re learning Chinese finding language partners is easy. When I was learning Japanese I felt the same way as you about doing a language exchange. But really if your skills are weak they’ll just end up speaking more English and being happy about it probably. But maybe another reason to get a good tutor.
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What I try to do, even though it is sometimes difficult to be consistent with it, is to focus on 2 languages per day, one stronger and one weaker one. Ideally, I spend half an hour to an hour studying the weaker language in the morning, and then carry some flash cards in that language around with me during the day that I revise whenever I have a moment. A vocab app like Memrise or Anki fulfil the same purpose, but always in the language of the day. And I talk to myself or my cat in that language. And in the evening I read something or watch a film in the stronger language of the day where it is not so much about learning loads of new words but about maintaining what I know. I also try to have regular language exchanges, chat groups and/or lessons in as many languages as I can fit in. And when I learn a new language, I try to spend half an hour with it every day, either in the morning or at lunchtime.
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@PaulW i’ve never thought about them just being able to get more English time. 
that’s a win win. Thanks that helps a lot
Short and somewhat vague answer, from my experience, is half a dozen. Depends on definition of a high level of course.
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Yeah. Chances are quite good they’ll be happy for the extra English practice. If their English isn’t up to it you’ll probably be able to tell and they’ll end it after 10 minutes or so. One problem is that a lot of people learning English get a little selfish or maybe speak to a lot of beginners and end up expecting exchanges to be mostly English. But that’s another problem for later.