Understanding and using Japanese as an altered state

I have just finished the Kyoto International Community Center's second level Japanese class.  It is called Easy Japanese, but was, in fact, difficult at times.  It was particularly well taught and participatory.  As I indicated,  each of us did in fact improve our Japanese.  I will probably re-take it when it starts again in the fall.

When I look at a page of homework written entirely in Japanese, I am immediately convinced that I cannot possibly understand any of it.  But there is another place, an altered state, that I can enter and slowly decipher the written Japanese, and even provide written answers.  And I no longer plan everything I want to say during an encounter -- for example ordering my cell phone or guiding a taxi.  Instead, I enter that other place in my mind, and muddle through with limited Japanese.  


I even took a phone call from my gym in Japanese.  I am not saying I understood much of it, but we communicated what we needed.  And the next day, we did our business in person in Japanese.