Language learning is an emotionally and psychologically dynamic process that is influenced by a myriad of ever‐changing variables and emotional “vibes” that produce moment‐by‐moment fluctuations in learners' adaptation. This individual‐level study triangulates physiological, idiodynamic, interview, and self‐report survey data of three high and three low anxiety language learners to examine their language anxiety, its triggers, and the interpretations of rapidly changing affective reactions over a short period of time. Participants were videorecorded giving a presentation, while wearing heart monitors, in their Spanish as a Foreign Language class. Using the idiodynamic method, participants self‐rated their moment‐by‐moment anxiety 42 times over three and a half minutes and later explained their reactions in an interview. The strong relationship observed among the various converging data sources demonstrates the strength of considering language learners on an individual level using triangulated quantitative and qualitative approaches. The study generated pedagogical implications for dealing with both positive and negative emotions, facilitating the reinterpretation of physiological cues, planning “escape routes” that allow participants to remain active in communication exchanges, and invoking the positive power of preparation, planning, and rehearsal.

Language learning is an emotionally and psychologically dynamic process that is influenced by a myriad of ever-changing variables and emotional "vibes" that produce moment-by-moment fluctuations in learners' adaptation. This individual-level study triangulates physiological, idiodynamic, interview, and self-report survey data of three high and three low anxiety language learners to examine their language anxiety, its triggers, and the interpretations of rapidly changing affective reactions over a short period of time. Participants were videorecorded giving a presentation, while wearing heart monitors, in their Spanish as a Foreign Language class. Using the idiodynamic method, participants self-rated their moment-by-moment anxiety 42 times over three and a half minutes and later explained their reactions in an interview. The strong relationship observed among the various converging data sources demonstrates the strength of considering language learners on an individual level using triangulated quantitative and qualitative approaches. The study generated pedagogical implications for dealing with both positive and negative emotions, facilitating the reinterpretation of physiological cues, planning "escape routes" that allow participants to remain active in communication exchanges, and invoking the positive power of preparation, planning, and rehearsal.Keywords: affect; anxiety; learner variables; idiodynamic; emotion THE ANCIENT PALIMPSEST, A PARCHMENT or manuscript originally used during the Middle Ages, offers a present-day metaphor for visualizing the dynamics of rapidly changing emotional states of language learners. Palimpsests contained an original text upon which later writing was superimposed and which over time reappeared, thus creating a multilayered record of competing and infiltrating content. The resultant document was composed of the unintended existence of texts from the past and the possibility of future inscriptions. The metaphor suggests that the palimpsest projects an endless succession of brief intervals where the past is recalled and refracted by the momentary lens of the now.The language learning process produces its own palimpsests, as a new language is layered over an older one, as new identities find their form,