This is something I've been thinking about posting for a while, as I approach a year of using Dreaming Spanish and the 600h mark. Due to a number of significant life events, Spanish has taken a backseat at times during these 12 months; so that's really more like 600h in 7 months. Overall, I am happy with my progress in listening skills, though there is a long way to go.

As someone who looked into methodologies to learn Spanish for a while and continues to research around the topic, and with no previous background in Spanish, I have said from the outset that while I think DS' content and what Pablo has created in DS is fantastic, I'm not sold on the methodology itself. Particularly, the ALG approach to "silent periods" and letting the brain figure everything out itself.

I can understand why people fully commit to the method. If the only experience of language learning is school and a very antiquated grammar-translation system, it's a breath of fresh air. But for anyone that's self-studied a language - and I'm perhaps in a privileged position of working with many people who have self-studied languages to the point they can work professionally in those languages - most people are recommending extensive amounts of listening practice and exposure to native material as soon as practicable. The only real difference is that these more "traditional" methodologies suggest doing that after you've built a base of understanding of the language - e.g. grammar, vocabulary. Even other CI methodologies like Refold suggest grammar and vocab study.

I think for me personally, it's always unclear what goes on in the successful language learner's head. Or specifically, whether they're actually unconsciously doing something which means they're much better at picking up patterns in language. I'd suggest Pablo, as an engineering graduate who's also learned programming languages, certainly has a more analytical mind than me at least. I try to concentrate on the message of what's being said in videos, rather than losing focus or trying to analyse the language. But I find a lot of words and constructions people here seem to pick up just don't come to me without some light grammar study and look ups. I watched one of Pablo's recent videos on grammar (TL;DR - don't study it; you can work it out; you're likely to over-analyse and not focus on the message) and got his point; but a lot of that is based on what's worked for him, admittedly as a very successful language learner. I don't really see anything wrong with a light, Refold-style 15 minutes a day of flicking through a grammar explanation and then even trying a more "study" oriented watching of DS content. If focusing on the grammar in a video, or even pausing and using subtitles to help this helps to then understand a fundamental bit of grammar, to then be solidified by repetitions in normal watching - that seems like a win.

Maybe I'm just at the stage of life - with a partner, family, busy job and other commitments - where efficiency is important to me. That's not "speed running" a language to try and optimise everything, but ways to expedite what I'm learning and more quickly get to the most interesting content seem like a massive win. I'm not in a rush, as the necessity of learning Spanish is visiting extended (non-Spanish speaking) family once or twice a year, but I'm not keen - as I've started seeing here - to just keep upwardly adjusting expectations (i.e. 3000h of input) whilst endlessly following the same methodology, with an assurance at some point it might fall into place.

Partly, this is shaped by the experience of other users here in outputting. It is something that requires some work, albeit the amount might be reduced when you can accurately hear Spanish phonemes, and know how they should be pronounced. But basically - while everyone is doing well, I'm really not seeing evidence of the supposed superiority of an input-only methodology for the quality of output vs those who have studied the language including more traditional methodologies (read: some conscious study, grammar reference etc).

For those that follow a purist approach, is this a genuine belief that an extensive silent period will reap rewards, and/or a real aversion to using other methods of study? Are as many following a genuinely purist approach as sometimes seems to be the case? (doing some light Anki / grammar reference, which then is not the purist method)

It's certainly not a criticism of Pablo or Dreaming Spanish, but I think being able to critically examine things is key; as is doing what's best for individual circumstances.