Many people say they want to learn a new language at a serious pace. Few, however, put in the serious time to see those kinds of results.
The word “serious” can mean many different things to many different people. For our purposes, though, we’ll take serious strides in language learning to be fluency without having to put in the years. Let’s say, you’ll be conversant enough to interact freely in the streets within 6 to 12 months — that’s a significant enough turnaround without being unrealistic.
If you want that kind of progress, you’ll have to put in the time. That means, increasing the length of your daily lessons, practice and overall exposure to the target language. If you’ve been getting by on an hour of language training a day (30 minute lessons, 30 minute practice), then blow it up to two or four times.
With a language that carries close proximity to English (e.g. Spanish, French), you’ll need an estimated 600 hours of lesson time to be fluent. On a Monday to Friday schedule over 6 months, that means you’ll need to clock in at least 5 hours of pure classroom or language software training. That’s not including active independent study, such as practicing by yourself or listening to monologues online.
Consider that if you’ve been hoping to learn in a fairly short time, while slacking in the amount of time you’re investing. Language learning isn’t a walk in the park — you need to put in some serious work and serious time.