I went to Valencia, Spain, to study abroad. I lived on a college campus and roomed with friends I met on the trip. My Spanish was hard work. I had taken Spanish one twice.
That is an important part of the story. I had to pay attention to what I heard, try to translate it and find a way to speak. I was putting a lot into using the language.
The change I noticed was on calls home
When I called friends back home, I noticed how different my speech was. Those were conversations in English. I described the speech as flawless compared with what I was used to.
It caught my attention because I knew the opposite experience so well. Normally, I could be thinking obsessively about stuttering, replaying old memories and planning what I would say next. In Spain, I was occupied with trying to use another language.
I interpreted the experience through what was happening in my mind and with my attention. I didn't know exactly how it had happened. I wanted to figure it out.
What happened when I came home?
I've said that I returned at twenty-one asking myself what the hell had happened. The fluency I had there didn't translate into a lasting change by itself. It had been a good breakthrough temporarily.
That distinction is part of my account. I had seen what better speech could feel like. I still needed to understand how to bring it into my ordinary life after the trip.
A glimpse gave me something to work toward
I became absorbed in reading older self-help material and trying the ideas. I took them into dates, job applications, work calls and speaking in front of colleagues.
Sometimes an idea did not work the way I hoped. I failed many times. I kept studying, applying, trying and refining. I've described about ten years of working things out after that glimpse.
The trip mattered because it made me think there was something I could understand. It was an experience I had actually had, not just somebody promising me that better speech was possible.
What this story does and does not tell you about my journey
The observation was specific: I was working hard to use Spanish, and my English conversations with people back home were much smoother. My interpretation concerned the attention I was giving the new language and the way that changed my usual mental pattern.
I can tell you that experience and what I thought it meant. I cannot turn it into a complete explanation of why another person's speech differs between languages.
In my longer journey, Spain was a glimpse and a question that kept me working. I wanted to have that freedom in more of the places where I lived.