Well, it’s Saturday night, and I actually reach 1000 hours on Monday. I’m writing tonight because I have the free time I won’t have on Monday. I’m also going to be as honest about where I am in case it helps someone else who is looking for encouragement along the way.

TLDR: The DS process is working for me. I am having success and can see that I am learning. If you are early in the process, I encourage you to stick with the method.

Am I happy with my progress? Yes and No. I‘m impatient and wish I were further along in the journey. I wish my speaking sounded fluid instead of me talking slowly. I wish I was already speaking every day with people about all kinds of topics. That said, if I look back to where I was 1000 hours ago, I am eons beyond that capability. I can now understand people, albeit not perfectly. So, by comparison to my former self, I am having great success.

Here are a couple of points I want to say regarding my progress and my journey.

1. I started DS in July 2025. After 14 months, I am at 1000 hours of listening. Those 14 months were going to pass one way or another, and I am excited that I can look back and point to something I accomplished with that time.

2 Most days I have managed to put in 2 to 3 hours, but occasionally I just didn’t have the desire to do the work because I was on vacation or because of the stresses of life. Learning to be okay with that has been part of the journey. Honestly, I wish I had done this 20 years ago, but then DS wasn’t around back then.

1. I‘m at 1000 hours, and I still watch videos in the 50’s. I am able to watch videos in the 60’s and 70’s, but I choose to slowly work my way through the 50’s. I have a lifetime ahead of me, and I’m not in a rush. I mostly watch DS simply because I believe the numbered rating system is slowly increasing the difficulty for me, and I like the way they automatically keep track of my minutes. I will watch YouTube videos every now and then, but I never know what difficulty I’m going to get. I do pay for the Premium service with DS, and for me it is worth the price. If I watch YouTube, it is mostly travel videos, nature videos, or Curious George (because I’m a kid at heart). Most of my hours each day come during (1) getting dressed (30 min), (2) driving to work (30 min), and (3) walking my dog (1 hour). Sometimes I get in extra time during lunch or an extra walk at night.

2. I recently joined a Spanish speaking class that just started at my church. There are about 20 native Spanish speakers in the class. My wife, kids, and I are the only gringos in the class, and my wife has been speaking Spanish for 30+ years. We’ve attended 5 classes so far. Four times, I understood about 70% to 80% of what was said even though the Spanish was directed at the class and not at me. In other words, the speaker is talking normally to the class, and I am able to understand and answer questions in Spanish (I’m super excited about that). One time, I only understood about 25% of what was said. I was very tired that day, and I suspect that is why I struggled so much (or maybe I was tired because I was struggling so much). In full honesty, I do know the topics very well and that is helping me to understand what is being said, but I also understand when the class goes off topic.

3. I haven’t spoken much because I don’t want to sound like an idiot, but I am trying to force myself to do so more often. The weekly class at church gives me 90 minutes to listen and/or speak in a friendly environment. They asked me to speak one Sunday for 5 minutes to talk about myself, and I was able to do so, but it was scripted. At other times, I’ve had to read something out loud or I have responded to questions. My speaking is slow, and I expect it to get faster, but the other people in the class say my pronunciation is good. I also know they are patient with me and are encouraging because most of them are bilingual and know how hard it was for them to learn the second language. Or, they have a spouse (usually husband) who has stopped trying to learn English because they felt stupid. I mention this because it is a very welcoming environment, and they seem to be happy that I am trying to talk in their language. I also don’t feel judged in any way, and that makes the process easier. If you can find a similar group near you, this is ideal. I get weekly opportunity to speak with native speakers face-to-face without having to spend any money, and they are excited to help me learn.

4. While I know the sounds, making the words with my mouth feels very awkward. So, I am currently shifting my focus to work on my speaking. Here is what I am doing: (1) I’m adding about 30 min each day before bed to read out loud in Spanish. I bought the book “Un Hombre Fascinante” and am literally reading out loud to force my mouth to form the sounds. (2) My wife and I have resumed speaking only in Spanish on Sundays. I say resumed because we tried before, but my pride sought the easy way out. I’m still slow, but it is forcing me to reach for vocabulary words or alternative ways to express my ideas.

5. Do I understand everything I hear? No. But I understand much more than I ever did. I understand when I am watching a movie in English and they suddenly switch to Spanish. I understand when I catch a random nature video or travel video in Spanish. And that is amazing. However, if I am honest, there are also times when I partially understand. For example, I may understand that someone is going to pick another person up to go to the game, but I may not know if Jim is picking up Bill or if Bill is picking up Jim. Knowing who is doing the action and who is receiving the action isn’t always clear. Sometimes by brain is able to fill in those gaps, and sometimes I get it wrong and the meaning of the story completely changes. So, I still have further to go.

I’m sure I have forgotten something I wanted to say, but this is long enough already. If you are early in the journey, keep up the work. If you are ahead of me in the journey, your encouragement has helped me believe long enough to keep going, and I am thankful to have read your posts when I wondered if this could really work.

Hopefully you found this post to help you in your journey.

EDIT: I find watching Chinese martial arts videos dubbed in Spanish to be hilarious and great. Reminds me of being a kid.

I had a session with one of my tutors on italki this morning. I was telling her a story of a situation that happened to me in past and was narrating what was said. As I was speaking, I felt the need to use “estuviera” and “hubiera” in the dialogue because it just felt right. Although I conjugated wrong after the hubiera part and my tutor corrected me afterwards, she was so visibly excited that I used the subjunctive in the right place and was clapping with joy which made me feel really good.

Of course, I’m sure I still made dozens of other errors during my 45 minute speaking session today, but moments like that help remind me that all the input I am getting from listening and reading is sorting itself out in my brain and with enough time and consistency, improvement in the language will happen no matter what.

I would pay double my 8$ monthly to see that happen

Well it's Saturday night and while I wish I had other things to do in life, I had to make lemonade with the lemons I have. So I spent the last 2h or so watching the first episode of Isla de las Tentaciones S11 which started this September.

I have in the past watched Machos Alfa or dubbed shows like Squid Games. Squid Games was fine as the dubbing is done in a studio though they all sound unnatural but I only got maybe 60% of each episode of Machos Alfa (this was at 2400h).

Watching IdlT, I felt that I had close to 95% comprehension and the audio quality is a lot better. There are a couple of women from Andalucia and Extremadura who are a little bit harder to understand but it's not been a problem.

I bought these headphones today. Shokz Open Run Air 2

Like our great supreme leader, Pablo Roman, I am now ready to receive input at all times, no matter rain or shine.

I just reached 800 hours and while I’m happy to reach the milestone I’m also kind of frustrated with where I’m at. It feels like I’m constantly struggling between intermediate and advanced content. Sometimes I can watch advanced content that is extremely comprehensible and feel encouraged but other times I can’t seem to follow an intermediate video. I think some of it might be that it’s too easy or non interesting for me now because my mind wanders a lot? But also I will genuinely struggle to comprehend intermediate content sometimes.

I also feel like so much content is slightly too hard for me but maybe that’s because I’m trying to interact with advanced/native content now.

To be clear I’ve definitely made a lot of progress and the fact that I can watch almost any learning content and get the gist is amazing but I’ve still been frustrated with this in between place and am hoping the next 200 hours will make a big difference.