Background
This is a really exciting article series for me to write, because it is going to be the first of more than 100 articles we are carefully creating to help purposeful men learn how to date in Colombia.
Note: Every article you read on this website is from direct human perspective and will never be AI generated. This is because the perspectives we have to share do not already exist on the internet, are not commonly expressed by travelers on threads or even Redditors, and most who figure out the information we are sharing are living happy, undistributed, quiet, successful lives and they don’t really share this information with others. Why? Because they’re generally happy 🙂
Introduction
Did you identify your Dream State? Did you make a list of goals? If you want some feedback, send me your list of goals at hello@datingincolombia.com and I’ll be happy to lean in.
If you’ve got your goals in front of you, you might be thinking now, great! — but how am I going to do all of this?
If you’ve asked that question, you’ve already protected yourself against the illusions that could entrap you, the dark paths that could sweep you up and get you lost, and the overall inefficiencies that could drive up the cost of your vacation or your life transformation. By merely having goals, you’re beginning to ask the right questions about how to do what you really want to do.
Mental Preparedness: Language Barrier
Let’s talk about Spanish.
You are more than welcome to come to Colombia without knowing any Spanish, and you will also be treated a specific way and pay the cost for it.
If you don’t know Spanish, you’ll likely stay around the tourist areas. In Colombia, the tourist areas are modernized and comfortable, complex, risky, and completely designed for tourists of all types.
You can try to venture out of those areas, but if you’re anything less than experienced, you’re going to become exhausted, confused, or self-diminished by your lack of ability to communicate or understand what’s going on in groups or day-to-day interactions of neighborhoods. This is a very humbling thing to experience. I recommend everyone who travels to Colombia tries it and goes through it. But I don’t recommend you live in type of stress or reduced experience for you.
If you’re pursuing any type of transformation, it’s time to get started with Spanish.
Learning a second language is extremely powerful for your mind. It enhances your skills. It even helps you look back and consider English, communication, and what you’ve known your entire life.
Personal Note: If you’re like me, you may also experience some redevelopment around your identity through the Spanish language. You’ll see what you mean about 3-6 months into it, but there’s an other worldly magic that you can unlock when you can speak Spanish, where you sort of go back in time inside of who you are and you can actually rebuild yourself through communication, starting at the age of 0 to age 4, and then age 4 to age 7, and then age 7 to age 10. That is, while you’re terrible at the language, you’ll notice how you truly depend on others like a toddler would. You find that you enjoy pets more than humans a lot more often. And then you graduate into feeling like a kid again. When we realize that 90% of the world around us is rooted in communication, relearning to communicate in a different culture and a different world really stretches your own identity, leads to growth, but also re visiting your prior growth as a human — the way you perceive and appreciate your native language is going to rise as you experience mental progress and increase the value of your travel and future journeys in Colombia.
Get Started with Learning Spanish
1. Plan your learning through DatingInColombia.com
Our team will match you with the best Spanish instructor we personally know, who will align your learning plan to your dream state, goals, and timeline of your travel and the potential experiences you will having while traveling and dating. She will be a beautiful instructor who will meet with you in one-on-one video calls, develop your learning plan, schedule consistent calls or more flexibly with you. She will teach you directly, hold you accountable, and coach your progress — and if you have learning issues, I’m happy to consult you directly on some corner cutting that keeps you relevant, tweak your planing, and help you realign progress.
2. DuoLingo. The cheapest option, download the DuoLingo app.
This is an amazing app, with new AI features, that helps a lot with basic phrases and vocabulary. Downside is, the free version has ads, the learning pace can be 10X slower, and there’s no one beautiful from DatingInColombia.com that’s motivating you or holding you accountable. Time is money. You won’t progress quickly with DuoLingo unless you take it extremely seriously. That is, you’l need 2-3 hours daily to reach a point of conversational Spanish in a few months. If you put in the work, you can get a lot out of DuoLingo, but becoming conversational in Spanish, before you travel, is going to require your discipline.
If you’re going this route, add me as a friend. I try to put in 20 minutes/day:
3. Meetup.com + DuoLingo. To try and speed up your learning process, you can unite the paid version of DuoLingo and Spanish learning groups from MeetUp.com into your own learning plan. Considering time, paid subscription, and logistics, eating out, potential fees for the group learning sessions, this is beginning to become an investment of about $200/month. That’s near what we would ask from your for DatingInColombia.com but maybe the self-learning and physical interaction is important to you. Keep in mind, talking Spanish with a bunch of language learners over tacos isn’t what you’re going to experience in Colombia. Especially when dating, there are situations and new accents you’ll encounter where you are going to want to have confidence built, prior. Developing that confidence now, with a native female instructor in front you, will be valuable. But it’s all based on your goals, the depth of your pursuit, and the quality of experiences (or retirement) you want to have in Colombia.
4. Preply.com. Hire a community of Spanish teachers.
I’ve personally paid instructors for their time and instruction, and I had fun with it. In terms of real Spanish learning, it was like going to the gym a few times each week and doing a couple hundred sit-ups with friends. Did I have fun with it? Yes. Did I develop a real learning plan? I thought so. Did I practice meeting new people and learn culturally from it? Yes. Did I lose connection with my Preply instructors when I stopped paying for the lessons? Yes. Did I improve my Spanish, overall? Not really.
I could have taken it a lot more seriously, but the best learning from me has come through self-learning, formal education, and direct immersion. Preply set me back about $250/month.
5. Self-Learning. One of the best thing you can do is go to a college bookstore and buy a Spanish language learning book. Write in the exercises and complete the assignments. If you have the will power to complete a beginning, intermediate, or advanced Spanish learning book, you’re basically putting yourself through a Spanish college course. This is highly valuable and it does help. But some people struggle to have the disciple to do this. Overall cost? $20 for the book.
6. An online college certificate program for the A2 or B1 level. You can take Spanish at a community college, if you have the time and money, and you want to take the tuition approach. Money is time. The cost of a college program might run you $2,000. Also, time is money. The quality of learning through formal education can be great for general purposes — but it can also entrench you in topics and ideas, words and tests that may not be relevant to your surroundings in Colombia.
Note: Beginning with any of these options is a step forward in your mental preparedness for Dating in Colombia. Have questions? Reach out at hello@DatingInColombia.com
Coaching
If you don’t know which path is best for you, schedule a call with us or apply for membership and we’ll start to work with you to get you into a routine for mental preparation prior to your travel.
Members get access to detailed discussion, endless courses, one-on-one coaching, concierge travel services, and become the beta testers for the new app and additional features and services we roll out. Member information is kept private as we provide direct support for the purposeful travelers we serve.
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