The other day, I visited the Casa de Cristóbal Colón museum.

Cristóbal Colón, or Cristoforo Colombo in Italian, was the man who discovered the Americas.

The map of his first journey is super interesting.

If you zoom in, you’ll see a point where he faced mutiny right before discovery.

Imagine after months of travel, you’re so close to the destination (although you can’t see it yet), but everyone turns against you ‘cause they think they’re not getting anywhere!

Thankfully, Colombo didn’t turn back and pressed on until he discovered the New World.

This got me thinking about Italian learning – of course!

Sometimes, despite all your hard work studying Italian, it can feel like you’re not making progress or even going backward.

But if you’re practicing the right way, trust me—you are moving forward!

And actually when your practice get the most uncomfortable is when you are very close to a breakthrough.

I see this all the time with Italian learners when they say things like:

“It took me ages to make a sentence to say something about X… Am I really making progress?”

“I’ve tried to use this tense in my last conversation, but I got it wrong… Am I really making progress?”

“It was uncomfortable to record myself speaking in Italian…is this really helping me making progress?

However being “slow”, “wrong”, “uncomfortable” doesn’t mean you are not making progress.

It’s actually a sign of stepping out of your comfort zone so that you can make progress.

That’s why when you’re facing a challenge in your learning, it’s not time to reverse back or give up.

It’s rather time to rise to the challenge, because it means that, although you may not see it yet, you’re close to reach a whole new level.

Just like Colombo reached a whole new world.

Ermy***

P.S. And if you need help in facing your challenges, I would be honoured to be your guide and we can create a map of your Italian learning journey here.