That's a very impressive achievement, but I think this is one of those classic examples of the post hoc fallacy, "I succeeded by doing this, therefore those who do this will succeed." That logic is unsound.
Yes, that logic would have been unsound. It was not my reasoning, just a data point, and not a very impressive one :)
Deep enough conversations, periodically, prevent language attrition. How can I convince you? It's really just like anything else: practice helps. Is that a controversial claim?