Language Learning: The highs and lows......
As we learn a new language, we will experience "highs" and "lows". Most of our days fall in between, but I thought it would be nice to compare notes and to gather some inspiration for this life long journey we have all signed up for.
Briefly describe your worst moment in this whole learning process....that moment when you "hit the wall" and decided the idea of learning Spanish was a ridiculous idea. This could even include the worst financial investment made in an attempt to learn the language. Then describe your best "mountain top" experience in learning. This could also include the best idea you have implemented or the wisest purchase you have made in this process.
Who knows what great ideas we might come up with? Hopefully, there will also be a laugh or two! 
14 Answers
My low point was after checking into a hotel in Giayaquil and having the bellboy, who looked like he was 12, blast me with an unparsable torrent of Spanish. It literally sounded like one word that lasted for over a minute.
My high point so far is going a whole month without a seven year old telling me I can't speak Spanish.
My low point still is that I have great difficulty understanding spoken Spanish. Maybe my ears are no good anymore.
My high point was over 40 years ago when I realised very suddenly that I had "got" Danish one evening when walking home from work without a headache after a yet another day of only hearing and speaking Danish. My work mates refused to speak English with me.
I would like to tell about the following incident:
I had a stroke (embolia) a couple of years ago. I was lucky and some friends realised something was wrong and took me to a hospital. I was "out of it" for days and can remember nothing BUT later the friends told me I was trying to talk to the doctors in Spanish. They said it was hilarious. I wish I had "been there". 
My low points have been after having some sort of English/Spanish encounter and not being able to understand anything and being so overwhelmed with the situation that I would go home and crawl into a dark closet, lay down on the floor in a fetal position and cry myself to sleep.
My high points have been when I reached the point where I could carry on a conversation with a Spanish speaker that had absolutely no English reference point to 'help' me, and we understood each other without him pulling his hair out, or talking with three guys at the same time at 'normal' speed, arguing amongst ourselves how to do something and finally coming to an agreement. To be included in the argument was a thrill. Or, going to my favorite Mexican restaurant (well, the owner is Costa Rican, but that's another story) that's packed with americanos and having a loud and lively conversation with the owner over the noise in the restaurant, having every head turn when they hear this gringo talking with the owner in what 'they' think is awesome Spanish, but mainly seeing the twinkle in her eye and the smile on her face with the unspoken words "listen to yourself Jack, you're speaking Spanish, and I'm so proud of you".
My low points have been stuttering out unintelligible sentences in attempt to speak.Wait I do that in English also.My high points are when I remember a word for an object,or 'guess' a cognate from other learned material.
A (math teacher) friend of mine says, "Learning STARTS when you hit the wall." My low: sick in Puerto Rico and having a hard time understanding. One of many high points: the first time I dreamed in Spanish. And once while interpreting for a visiting dignitary at a Chilean university, we were suddenly being filmed for a local TV station. YIKERS! My neighbor saw me on TV and said, "¡Lo hiciste bien!" (Still, I'm glad I never saw that clip.)
Low point: Right now I can't seem to write a single sentence correctly in any of the daily threads 
and even when I'm told the sentences are wrong I just can't figure out how to correct them 
. Marianne reckons I should buy myself a condo in the dunce corner jejeje.
Actually, I don't really have low points any more . I went through quite a few when I started learning and felt I should be learning faster but now I know that if I keep at it I'll have another high point , so I just chill and accept that my brain just needs some time to get its act together .
High point: Joining in an advanced chat and actually understand everything and participating actively 
.
As soon as I saw that "hablo" was "I talk" but "habló" was "he/she/it talked" I became so terrified I gave up all hope for about 3 or 4 months at least and lost a lot of momentum.
The idea that stress could be so important really scared me, but when i got over the fear i learned all the past simple endings really fast and was annoyed at myself for being so afraid of it.
Other low points included overhearing my boss talking about how slowly I was learning and how strange it was since a co-worker had learned fluent Spanish in a few months and another had learned fluent Catalan in just a year.
Highlights include talking to the man in the bakery near where I work, being able to read articles and news sites and stuff and knowing if I work hard at this I'll be able to get to Spanish-speaking Spain next year!
My low points are when I feel like I go days without really learning anything new despite all of my effort with Rosetta Stone, this site, workbooks, etc.
My high points are when I have a conversation in Spanish with somebody at work (even a small one) and all the non-Spanish speakers look at me in awe. I pretend not to notice, but inside... I LOVE IT!
Low point: When I picked up a copy of "Spanish for Dummies" a couple of years ago after a very long time since high school Spanish classes. Some material through present indicative verbs, salutations, etc. was fresh and familiar, but the whole rest of the book seemed like first contact. It may as well have been written in Chinese.
High point: When my wife and I were birdwatching in Panama last August, and I carried a small dictionary in case I needed it. I spoke with the lodge staff and birdwatching tour guides in Spanish (slowly and a bit difficult) but never once opened my dictionary! I asked for any translation help in Spanish.
I hope higher points are ahead.
For me and I think for many of us, the low point is when we "hit the wall". ( I plagiarized that)
It is so unfortunate that so many of us grew up with only one language.
There comes a moment when we suddenly realize just how much we must learn to be at least competent in the language, What many of us do then, is to study so much that we retain little or nothing and become so frustrated that we want to run down the street screaming. Once we pass that point and re evaluate our situation and recover our senses we take a more reserved approach, and go into our studies on a more step by step basis.Knowing that yes we will get there ,but not just at this moment.
The high point is when suddenly the light clicks on and you stop forgetting the verb and the conjugations begin to fall in place,
Suddenly you realize that yes I can have a conversation,yes imperfect, but I can understand and be understood.
Low points?
Recently my lowest point was after a turorial. My tutor had someone shadowing her, I assume assessing her, and seemed less frinedly about her corrections than usual. In addition to that I was really tired. After getting all my verb conjugations wrong, I gave up, logged off and went to bed.
One advnatage of online tutorials is that you can stick your tongue out at the tutor and so long as you don't make rude noises with your microphone on they are none the wiser.
Recent high points have been some of the games on here, and being able to read some of the comments in Spanish without looking everything up. And the tutorial this week which went really well, not only fun but I finished the night feeling I had learnt something.
My low point (which I've mentioned elsewhere on this site) was during the oral part of a final exam when I said, "Voy a ir a la playa con mis tres novios." The teacher looked a bit surprised and said, "¿Tres?" I nodded and then she smiled and said, "¿Nietos?"
My high point was just a couple of weeks ago when I finished reading a short story in Spanish. A first! I felt so proud of myself.
Learning new languages is a good thing for us to have another language to learn. With that we can have an edge among others ad we can be globally competitive. Also with learning new language e can have the good communication skills with a certain language that we know.
I am really enjoying hearing everyone's highs and lows in language learning!
As I was thinking of my "high point", the most profound was when I had the opportunity to share my life story (testimony of God's work in my life) at a Dominican church. After practicing with a friend from Puerto Rico for several months, I was still fearful that no one would be able to understand a thing I said. This was almost ten minutes worth of talking so it would have been a disaster if no one understood me. After reading the first paragraph and noticing that people laughed at the funny parts, looked touched at the appropriate times, etc., I realized that there was understanding. What a relief!!! 
Unfortunately, because no one knew this had been rehearsed for months, they thought I was fluent, which I definitely wasn't!
I can think of several low points dealing with my own failures or mistakes. However, I would have to say that the there is one thing that has made me very sad in this whole learning process. I have encountered several people along the way who have made a point of ridiculing me or telling me that I am wasting my time for learning Spanish. To me this is incomprehensible. Some of it stems from the attitude "Your're in America, now speak English!! No matter what the reason, it is wrong!! That is why I love hearing from the members of this forum. We all share a common goal and that is great. Learning a new language opens up doors of communication and enables us to stop thinking of ourselves The fact that there are people unwilling to communicate with a huge segment of the world's population, no matter what the reason, is definitely my all time "low point"!! 
