Older learners who started late, what made you decide to learn a language and how is it working out for you?

I'm a native English speaker in my 40s. I dont speak other languages. I thought i was too old to learn. I took a trip to Spain a few years ago and had a great time. The only downside was not being able to speak Spanish (tl). I wanted a project and also to see if I really was too old to learn a new language because I thought that was only for kids and young people.

I started off with Duolingo and then moved on to more sensible course material. I have an Preply tutor to practice speaking with.

Three years later, Ive made Spanish a part of my life. I listen into the local news for hour each way to work. Then I watch 2-3 hours of Spanish movies/TV series in the evening. I still space repeat my study notes on weekends to keep expressions and grammar rules fresh.

I'm an effective and fluid speaker. My Preply lessons are essentially philosophical debating sessions with my tutor. Ive had around 200 hours of speaking and probably around 3,000 hours of study/comprehensive input so Im very comfortable with Spanish and I was able to do it from home not in my target language.

I just wondered what motivated other late learners and how their journey is going.

Started learning my second language at 34 years old because of a YouTube video I wanted to understand, thought it would never happen for me lol 🇸🇪

This is really encouraging! I'm a 38 year old native English speaker trying to learn Spanish and sometimes I question why I'm doing it but it's very rewarding. I'm in the early stages yet and haven't had any conversations with a native speaker but I'm motivating myself to book one soon, once I feel I have enough vocab and grammar to have a simple conversation.

Hello! 41M from Spain here, started learning Serbian/BCMS when I turned 38, not really old, but definitely older than most beginners in language learning.

What made me decide to learn it was a long time wish to know more about the language. It had always fascinated me how it sounds in music, plus I was interested in the culture of the Western Balkans. However, I hadn't started before because I thought Slavic languages were just too difficult. Turns out it just requires some time and effort but it is not unachievable.

It's been almost 4 years, and I'm still learning. I got my B2 certificate a year and a half ago, and I'm now trying to get more fluent and to minimize my mistakes. I've learnt a lot about the culture, I made some good friends from Serbia and even visited Belgrade twice, so it's going quite good. It's actually part of my everyday life now.

I'm a weeaboo. Tried to learn japanese in my twenties but gave up thinking it would be too much work and take too much time and felt I was progressing too slowly.

Now, older, I see language learning as a Marathon, not as a sprint. I'm enjoying the proccess more. Even if it takes a whole decade to learn at my own pace, I still have few more decades to use the knowledge, so it is worth it IMO.

Had I had this line of thinking when young, I would already be near fluent but hey, the best time to start is always right now.

Didn't start until 50. We lost a couple interpreters at work and I got tired of depending on others to translate so I decided to learn Spanish.

I learned to move to Italy, and started learning Italian at 50. It’s been an extremely tough process, but hopefully I’ll pass C1 in December.

I started learning French at 38 mostly because my ex’s family only spoke it and I felt like a idiot just sitting there at dinner. three years later I’m still not great at speaking but I can follow movies without subtitles now so I’ll take it

I'm 45 and I frequently travel to foreign countries for work and vacation. I HATE feeling helpless when the person isn't able to speak English. I'm basically confined to only a few places that can accommodate me. Either touristy areas when I'm on vacation or the same areas that I was introduced to when I'm on my business trips. I'm currently working on Spanish and Japanese. My Spanish is functional but not fluent. I was able to get around Buenos Aires comfortably even though Rioplatense is one of the tougher Spanish dialects. My Japanese isn't as far along (\~600 hrs) as my Spanish (\~1200 hrs) and I have a Japan trip coming up. I don't expect to speak a whole lot but I'm hoping my comprehension is far enough for me to venture out a little more and handle a little more back and forth transactional conversations.

I had studied Spanish in college and took a few immersion courses and traveled in Latin America over the years. But I could only get by in Spanish. At 60 I decided to memorize the 5000 most common words with Anki, studying every day. That grew into a balanced program of Anki, reading the Harry Potter series, listening to podcasts, and using ChatGPT for a comprehensive grammar review.

I started Spanish at 37 (4 years ago) during my second trip to Spain. However, I had learned 3 foreign languages at school already.

Started learning Korean at 41 and Spanish at almost 42. I was tired of dabbling in languages (had been doing it for five years or so) and wanted to decide on one (two) languages to learn for real.

I'm a piano teacher. So far I've had three students who didn't know English when they start lessons, only Chinese. So around the third one I decided I'd better start learning a little. I'm not very strong yet. I don't think this is ever going to be hugely impactful, but it keeps my mind sharp, and there are always times here and there where it makes things a little more convenient. For example, when my students give me mooncakes, I can read well enough to avoid the ones labeled "Sichuan pepper." :) I also happen to meet a lot of Chinese friends in the spaces I frequent, and I don't think I'm butchering their names too badly.