Sometimes it's so hard to believe that you сan improve your speaking skills dealing with your target language. I don't have any doubts regarding any other skill such as reading, listening or writing. Speaking, however, is so stressful and requires so much practice, confidence and resourcefulness that you often think "Okay, there's no chance"

I'm a firm believer that one thing can really help on this way. One has to know well why learn a language (not sure that the phrase is correct, but anyway). Why is this so important? The answer is: when you know why you learn it and why you NEED it, it's easier for you to go through those moments of frustration. I think it's very important as lots of people give up learning exactly when they feel tired, busy and disappointed. Not to mention that having strong motivation makes you focused and dedicated.

I had a student from Italy whose Russian was pretty good. I mean he learned it for quite a while and he knew a lot. He knew a lot PASSIVELY! However, once he started speaking he became unconfident, he lacked vocabulary and he confused even those constructions and conjugations that were familiar to him. Why? Well, that's clear, he didn't speak often and he didn't know why he learned Russian. 

So, my main takeaway from my work with him was that there's no great prospect in learning when you do it just for fun, for maintaining what you've already learned and stuff like that. There's no alternative to development and to develop language skills you should have a goal.