El Jefe's Guide to Acquiring Spanish
El Jefe's Guide to Acquiring Spanish
Three Point Essay | Principles of language learning + practical methods
“Speak a new language so that the world will be a new world.”
—Rumi
I felt compelled to create this article because language learning—and in particular how to learn Spanish—is a topic plagued with misconceptions and false limiting beliefs.
As someone from a city that’s ~20% Hispanic, took AP Spanish in high school, double majored in Spanish in college, and lived in Spain last summer, I can provide some clarity.
This piece is split into three parts:
5 essential principles for learning a language
5 Specific methods I used to master Español
Understanding fluency + 50 common Spanish phrases & translations
If you study and apply the lessons in this article, you might just find yourself being effortlessly charismatic with hispanohablantes while experiencing a positive change in how you view both yourself and the world.
I. The 5 Essential Principles For Learning a Language
1. It Takes Time, Relax
Don’t put absurd expectations on yourself. It’s counterproductive and unnecessary. You have to be willing to give yourself credit for small language achievements.
Say you had an exchange with a Spanish speaker where the only thing you said was “Hola, cómo estás?” (“hello how are you”) and they said “estoy bien y tú?” (“I’m good and you") and you said “todo bien” (“all good”)—and that was it. Ok. You spoke another language. You did the thing. It’s said the journey of a thousand miles starts with a single step. You took one.
Don't beat yourself up if you're struggling or if it feels like your progress is slow. Instead, have faith in the process and compounding your skill for the long-term.
The only way to "fail" at learning another language is if you stop.
2. Embrace Being a Fool
When practicing another language, you’ll probably feel
awkward
self-conscious
nervous
Maybe you won’t experience these neurotic feelings because you’re a sociopath, and that's cool too.
Either way, getting past these feelings will be worth it when you're chilling under palm trees on a beach in Costa Brava speaking flawless Spanish straight to the hearts of the natives.
In the beginning, you’ll have a funny accent, make mistakes, and have to ask ‘cómo se dice’ (how do you say?) a billion times.
The key to overcoming these socially-painful emotions is being able to laugh at yourself; to not take yourself or the process too seriously. It's not even fun if you're dead serious about it.
Instead, view every mistake, every butchered pronunciation, every moment someone laughs at you or someone corrects your phrasing, as practice. “If you want to improve”, Epictetus once said, “be content to be thought foolish and stupid.”
3. Changing Your Tongue Movements
There’s a reason languages are sometimes referred to as tongues.
To improve your spoken accent and sound more natural, you have to practice moving your tongue in different ways when speaking Spanish.
You sound like a tourist because you’re saying Spanish words with English tongue movements. There are many good YouTube videos of linguists showing you how to improve pronunciation of Spanish sounds (perhaps most importantly rolling your R’s)
The foundation of improved tongue movements is memorizing the sounds of the Spanish alphabet, especially vowels. The good news is, it's similar to the English alphabet and there are many YouTube videos showing you how to master the sounds of letters en Español.
4. Immersion
Exposure, exposure, exposure.
Assault your brain with the sounds of the language. We live in an era when immersion in a language has never been easier or more accessible—we have AI and the internet.
If you're ever lacking the drive to immerse yourself in Spanish, remember your why: Whenever I was making excuses, I would recall how I felt watching Shakira and J-Lo’s 2019 Super Bowl halftime performance. Or how much I wanted to be like multilingual basketball legends Kobe Bryant and Luka Dončić.
5. Cultural Curiosity
Spain, countries in central America, South America, and the Caribbean—cultivate a genuine curiosity about these Spanish-speaking areas.
If you know nothing about the cultures you won’t connect with hispanohablantes. You don’t have to be an expert. Learning a bit about the history, music, food, and cities of a country will suffice. If you’re not willing to put in effort to learn about these places, why do you even want to speak Spanish?
Whether it’s asking an Argentinian about the parades in Buenos Aires after the World Cup, or speculating who the best baseball player from the Caribbean is with someone from the Dominican Republic, it helps to know some cultural tidbits.
Cultural curiosity and language learning reinforce each other. It’s an obvious necessity yet somehow “language learners” neglect it, opting to keep their face buried in a Spanish III textbook during the day and glued to the DuoLingo bird at night.
II. Specific Methods I used to Master Spanish
1. HelloTalk App: Online Language Partners
This app helped me become fluent in Spanish. HelloTalk is a social media site designed for language exchanges.
A few summers ago I created a profile. I put English as my native language. I put Spanish as my desired language. Moments later I was conversing with Hispanohablantes.1
You can text, (and translate messages with a tap) send voice messages, and do calls or Facetimes. The voice messages were perfect at the start because it eliminates the nerves. You don't have to suffer through a phone call or in-person conversation where neither person understands each other.
You’ll find people who will talk to you in Spanish every day. There’s no shortage of Spanish speakers eager to talk to Americans on this app2 (or anyone who knows English).
2. Listening and Singing Along to Spanish Music
La música—listening and singing along to Spanish music. Yes, singing along. Don’t act like you don’t do it already when you’re in your car by yourself.
Find Spanish songs you enjoy, translate the lyrics so you know what it’s about, and practice singing the lyrics in Spanish as you read and listen along. I do this all the time. It’s fun and it improves my Spanish.3
Eventually you’ll be able to do it without the lyrics. Repeating this process will make you sound more native. You’ll feel more natural with the language.
Sure, it might be embarrassing if someone witnesses you singing along to music in Spanish. So what. You’re going to die. Who cares?
*I’ve been building a playlist of 500+ FIRE Spanish songs over the past two years. If you share this publication with 3 of your friends and they become subscribers, I’ll send it to you :)*
3. Reading and Writing in Spanish
You don’t have to read some dense book in Spanish. Look at a Twitter account. Skim a short article. Glance at a text message. See what you can decipher.
As you read more, you’ll stop directly translating things word for word into English. You'll just interpret its meaning, what it signifies. This is called getting the global meaning of a context. (Eventually things will get freaky and you’ll start thinking and dreaming in Spanish).
Then there’s escribiendo. Writing in Spanish (by hand!) is a cheat code. It improves your memory and recall of the language.
Neuroscientist Andrew Huberman points out that, “when we read text or listen to something and then write key aspects and takeaways down by hand and not typing, it engages our motor control centers in ways that deeply embed that information to our memory” he continues, “Taking notes, however cursory, turns out to be the best way to remember and implement information later.”
I often journal in Spanish, and even used to write down fictional (potential) conversations that would essentially get coded into my brain.
4. Obsessively Using SpanishDict
SpanishDict needs to be one of your best friends.
When it comes to learning grammar there are rules you have to memorize. Some of them are logical. Some of them are seemingly random and frustrating. It is what it is. I can promise you it is an easier language to master than English. Just focus on memorizing through practice and repetition over time.
Spanishdict is great for this. For conjugating verbs (most important), memorizing vocabulary, and remembering expressions. The more you use this app the less mistakes you’ll make4.
5. Face-to-Face Conversations with Spanish-Speakers
Just try.
Who cares if it’s weird or awkward. You’ll be pleasantly surprised at how eager others will be to share their language with you.
If the thought of speaking face to face with a Spanish speaker makes you too nervous, here’s a communication tip: Next time you go out in public, gaze into people’s eyes until they look away.
You’ll see how most people are extremely neurotic when it comes to interacting with new people. It’s universal. Humans are like this regardless of their language or verbal ability. You can then recognize this within both yourself and others, relax, and send it on having random conversations.
If that doesn’t help much, recall the fact that you’re going to die. (I’ve yet to find a better motivator for action in life).
III. “How do I become fluent?”
Here’s a harsh reality of language learning, from the Substack Bet On It:
“People who attain fluency practice a lot more than the typical foreign language student. ‘A lot’ doesn’t mean 10% more, 25% more, or even 100% more. People who attain fluency practice about ten times as much as the typical person who is officially ‘learning a foreign language.’ Sure, the quality of practice matters, too; immersion is the best method of foreign language acquisition. But unless you’re willing to give ten times the normal level of effort, fluency is basically a daydream.”
For real fluency, there are no shortcuts. You get out of it exactly what you put into it. Spending four minutes a day with DuoLingo characters is fun but to think that will magically make you fluent at some point is a delusion. Anyone can become fluent in another language. But it takes serious dedication.
That said, the following section is a collection of Spanish phrases. Phrases that, if you memorize and practice pronouncing with SpanishDict, will get you by in a Spanish-speaking country or situation. By mastering these—with the ideas from this article in mind—you’ll be able to get by sometimes.
50 Common Spanish Phrases + Translations
Hola - Hello
Buenos días - Good morning
Buen día - Good afternoon
Buenas - Good evening/good night
Adiós - Goodbye
¿Cómo estás? - How are you?
¿Qué tal? - How’s it going / What’s up?
¿Cómo te va? - How are you doing?
¿Cómo te llamas? - What's your name?
¿De dónde eres? - Where are you from?
Dime - Tell me
¿Cuántos años tienes? - How old are you?
Me llamo - My name is
Mucho gusto - Nice to meet you
Encantado or Encantada /Mucho gusto - Charmed / Nice to meet you
Soy de… - I'm from…
¿Cuánto cuesta? - How much does this cost?
¿Dónde está el baño? - Where is the bathroom?
¿Hablas Inglés? - Do you speak English?
¿Cómo se dice en Español? - How do you say it in Spanish?
Lo siento - I'm sorry
Perdón - Excuse me
Por favor - Please
Quiero... - I want...
Gracias - Thank you
De nada - You're welcome
Hablo un poco de español - I speak a little Spanish
¿Qué dices? - What did you say?
¿Me ayudas? - Can you help me?
No entiendo - I don't understand
¿Puedes repetir? - Can you repeat?
¿Puedo...? - Can I...?
¿Me gustaría...? - I would like...
No hay problema - No problem
De acuerdo - Okay
No pasa nada - It's all good
Estoy perdido/a - I'm lost
Qué linda estás - You look pretty
Qué guapo estás - You look handsome
¿Cuándo? - When?
¡Hasta luego! - See you later!
¿De dónde eres? - Where are you from?
No me importa - I don’t care
Yo no sé - I don’t know
¿Dónde puedo encontrar...? - Where can I find...?
¡Salud! - Cheers!
Está bien - It's okay
Todo bien - Everything's good
Pasa un buen día - Have a good day
Que pases una buena noche - Have a good night
In Conclusion
There’s never been a better time to learn Spanish.
It’s one of the biggest and fastest growing languages in the U.S. and the world. Whether it’s healthcare, education, business, politics, sales, the trades, professional sports—there’s few areas left untouched by the influence of the language at this moment.
But that’s just the practical reasons to learn Spanish.
There’s a deeper reason that’s more personal. The best kind of success is internal satisfaction. And there’s few greater feelings than setting out to master a language, putting in the work, and overcoming the fear to do so. I hope this article can help you do exactly that, in due time5.
I’ve talked to Spanish speakers from every single Spanish speaking country. I marvel at how different the accents are and enjoy detecting the nuances in them. But remember: although, for example, Puerto Rican Spanish and that from Argentina sound dramatically different, they are the same language! There's a false yet common notion that Spanish speakers from various/distinct places can’t converse because of how unique some accents are. Of course there are dialects and slang and expressions distinct to one place that result in misunderstandings. But people from South America can communicate with people from the Caribbean, as people from Central America can communicate with those from Spain, etc. It’s like how people from the United States can communicate with individuals from England, or Canadians with the Irish. It can be difficult. But it’s the same language.
For the best experience on HelloTalk, send as many messages as possible to as many Spanish-speakers as possible without getting discouraged when people don’t answer or when conversations fizzle out. PS—while there’s plenty of normal people who genuinely want to improve in a language on this app, there’s also many bots, catfishes, and people who aren’t on the app to become multilingual, but to be a creep. Just ignore them and find the real and non-creepy serious learners.
Regarding music, keep in mind songwriters and performers adopt artistic license—so translations are rarely if ever direct from one language to another, but the global meanings are there.
SpanishDict also has a useful pronunciation feature—type in a word, and click on the speakerphone symbol next to it. A graphic of a Spanish speaker will pop up and the proper pronunciation will sound. You can also do this for entire sentences/paragraphs, it’s just read by an AI for the longer ones.
Special thanks to Hanna Morris for her feedback and assistance with this article.