Shadowing Practice: How to write like a human being, not a robot - Learn English Speaking with Video
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You need to learn how to write, not so that you can become famous, but so that you know how to use your brain.
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More and more people are becoming dependent on AI, robots, machinery to do their thinking for them.
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And I'm not okay with that.
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It makes me very angry to think about that.
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Look at any comment section on the internet and you can see the intellectual decline of our species.
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Not okay, not all right.
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And if you can feel your own brain starting to get lazy, starting to not think so clearly, it's hard for you to sit down and even fill a single page with your own thoughts.
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It's time to step in and build in a writing process into your life
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so that you can tap into your own inner creativity and not lose yourself to the development of machinery we don't understand.
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Also, you'll create some pretty interesting things.
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I think you're capable of creating amazing art if you so wish.
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But on a basic level, writing, communication, having ideas, and spreading them is part of the human experience.
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And we need you to do that in an age of unprecedented AI.
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Today, I wrote 12 pages by hand.
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I write short stories, personal essays, things like that.
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Writing is a big part of my life.
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I just enjoy it.
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It's something that I really like.
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I need it to feel okay.
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I rely on it to process my own experience and I'm going to teach you how to do the same thing.
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I think most people have a really twisted idea of writing
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or it just feels daunting to them or intimidating and that's because they don't have a process.
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Writing, more than anything, is a process.
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So if you're finding yourself already thinking thoughts like, oh, I'm not a writer, oh, I'm not capable of it.
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It's a skill that you might not have built.
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It's a skill that you might not have dedicated significant time to try to develop.
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And I'm telling you, more than ever before, it is important that you develop it.
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And when you do, it's going to be fun.
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Like, when you can communicate your own ideas, it's fun.
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Okay, let's start at the very beginning.
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What you're going to do, if you're interested, is you're going to get yourself a journal or some collection of paper, physical paper that you can write with and on.
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You're going to get a pen or a pencil, something that feels good in your hand and you're going to start your writing process by hand, the same way you learned how to write when you were in kindergarten, first grade, whatever.
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You started just with this kind of analog, very physical experience.
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And I recommend that you do that as well.
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There is something so freeing about looking at a page compared to staring at a blinking cursor.
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A lot of people's main experience with writing is staring at a blinking cursor, not being able to come up with the first sentence and then feeling like, oh, I can't do it.
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I'm not good.
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I can't think of something, oh, I'm bad, and then giving up.
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If your primary experience around a task is failing and then giving up, of course you're not going to want to do it.
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That's not fun at all.
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We're going to reconnect you to the magic, the sense of fun that comes from this.
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So get yourself something where a blinking cursor isn't going to stare you down.
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Get a pen, sit down.
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Here's how the writing process starts.
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It starts with drafting.
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The important thing with the drafting process is that you don't get in your own way.
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Most people start editing the work immediately, and that's really what's going on when you have writer's block or when you're staring at a blinking cursor, is you're trying to edit it already.
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You're thinking too hard about what the final product has to be.
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And you're not letting the idea flow.
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You got to get everything out on the page.
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The first draft should feel like creating a sandbox.
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Okay, just generating as much raw material as you can.
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You're going to mess with it later.
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You're going to delete stuff.
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There is absolutely zero pressure when you are drafting.
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So I want you to take the idea and just write it in its most basic form.
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This is a speech about blank, or this is a story about blank, or if there's a single image that comes to mind, you're going to write that image down.
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Boom, you've started.
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The process has begun.
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You are no longer looking at a blank page.
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That's huge.
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The main thing is that you don't look at a blank page.
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What you're going to do on this first page is you are going to ruin it.
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You're going to make a mess.
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You're going to do a bad job on purpose.
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You're going to remove any and all psychic pressure that you're putting on yourself to create something good, and you're going to make a messy,
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horrible job that then you can maybe mess with later and clean up later if you want.
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You might not want to.
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Okay, so you're going to fill the page.
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Just fill it.
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The drafting process needs to be fast.
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It needs to be like just ferocious, fast and furious.
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You got to go fast.
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You got to fill the page.
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Your hand and your forearm should be getting sore from the speed at which you're going.
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Pause.
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And you're just going to do this until your idea is either fully fleshed out
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or until you need to take a break.
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And then you just take a break.
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What you're not going to do is you're not going to purposely run yourself into the ground.
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I'm going to write an entire novel right now.
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I'm going to fill this entire page of...
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No. Nope.
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You're going to pay attention to what's going on inside your body
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and brain and notice when you get tired and then you're going to pause.
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I can take a short break.
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What I do is I go make another cup of coffee
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or I take a walk around the block or I say what's up to my roommates or I eat an orange.
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Notice how different this process is compared to using ChatGPT or another AI.
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Everything that comes out of you during the drafting process is coming from you.
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It is your most honest take.
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And what you're going to notice if you've been depending on these tools 100% for all of your writing, you're going to notice that it's hard.
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Like it's hard to think of stuff and you have to kind of like try and that's a good feeling.
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And that it's not actually miserable to have to try.
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You get more interesting material out.
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You find what is actually you.
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Because the more that you use ChatGPT, the less you're going to trust your own voice.
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Because you are letting something speak for you that is not you.
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And it's not even a physical, biological being.
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It's not someone with feelings.
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So that's why you got to draft.
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You got to write by hand.
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You got to figure out what is actually you.
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What ideas are coming from you?
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What is important?
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When you're doing it right, which is when you're doing it honestly, good writing is just honest writing.
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What's going to come out of you onto the page is raw feeling, or it's truth.
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It's true to you.
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And it might not sound great.
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You might doubt it.
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You might hate it, but it's true.
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It's coming from you.
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Just tell the truth.
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This is Hemingway.
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When Hemingway, Ernest Hemingway, one of the great writers of the 20th century, could not think of what to say, he went back to one very basic maxim.
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Write one true sentence.
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Write one true sentence.
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You can always think of one true thing to say.
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Let's say you're doing a journal entry, and you don't know what to write.
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Okay, what are you feeling?
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Like right now?
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You could, I mean, the most honest thing would be like, I don't know what to say right now.
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I don't feel like I have any good ideas.
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You know what?
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This reminds me of when I was in high school
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and I often felt as if my peers were doing better than me at this, this, and boom.
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You've just found yourself, you've connected that feeling of not knowing what to write to a personal memory that then you can unpack.
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You can go into the sensory details of that memory.
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I remember being in math class and feeling really behind
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and what it was like to have all my peers look at me.
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And it doesn't have to be negative, but do you see what I mean of how if you could just take an honest feeling, it ultimately, it leads you down a hallway of interesting ideas that
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if you could just take one true memory one true experience it'll lead you down a long corridor of doors
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that you can open and each door leads you into a potential experience
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or memory that you can unpack through writing this is your human experience
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and this is what we need you to write about in whatever form makes sense for you not
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so that you can publish it and become famous unless you want to and that's a separate conversation
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But just so that you know who you are, so that you are fully engaged with your life.
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This is like a mental health exercise more than anything.
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I mean, people get all confused.
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They think writing is so that they can blow up on social media or whatever.
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Like, that's great.
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But what if it meant mental digestion?
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What if it was a tool for you to process what you're going through?
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Okay, I know we're getting way off topic here, but that's how these things go usually.
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This is what the drafting process is like.
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You go off on a tangent, right?
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And then you find other interesting truths
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that you had no idea you were going to stumble into when you set out to write the initial thing.
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Anyway, so you draft a messy thing by hand.
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And then what I do next, what I recommend you try, is then transcribing it.
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So then I open up my computer and then I transcribe what I wrote down in my notebook.
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I'm holding a mic right now so I can't flip through it
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but this whole thing
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and along with like ten others over there is just full
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every single line is full of blah blah blah blah blah
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blah blah blah blah blah some of it is good some of it is not
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so good but every time when I have a finished draft of something a story
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or an essay whatever I write it I transcribe it
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and I still don't edit anything I'm not trying to make
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it good I'm not overthinking anything I'm delaying I'm saying to
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myself no I'm gonna figure it out later not worrying about it I'm gonna figure it out later.
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So much of it is just coaching yourself to not stress out in the moment.
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Because if you start to edit early on, you'll wig out and you'll hate it.
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So just don't do that.
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Just, nope, I'm going to trust that initial pass.
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I'm going to trust the initial effort.
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There was something in there that is truthful.
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So you transcribe it over.
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And then once you have it all transcribed, you take a break, get a glass of water, you go outside.
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And then when you come back to it, maybe it's the next day.
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For me, oftentimes I separate it.
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I have a drafting day and then an editing day, you got to figure out what works for you.
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You're going to come back to the work and you're going to start editing.
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And editing is a different vibe.
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Editing now is much more like surgery where you are thinking critically.
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You're really using your brain.
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You're looking at what this material is.
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You're reading over it again and you're noticing what feels good
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and exciting and what you want more of and what doesn't really work for you.
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And you delete the stuff that doesn't work and you keep the stuff
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that is good and maybe you expand on it, right?
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Maybe you rewrite some sections.
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Maybe there's some sections that are really messy.
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Editing right now as of April of 2026 is where I feel the most resistance
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or where I feel sometimes the most challenge because I've learned to really enjoy the drafting process.
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I love taking an idea and ripping through it, just getting it from beginning to end, just running with the idea right away.
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That used to be really hard for me
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and I think most people really struggle with starting something because they don't want to mess it up.
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I've gotten through that.
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I can now start things pretty easily but then cleaning them up
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and making them a finished product is the harder part because it's a little bit more tedious, right?
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You have to be more patient.
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You have to spend a lot of time going over the same material over and over again, reading through it, reading through it again, reading through it again.
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And through that repetition, you notice what works and what doesn't, what is exciting and what isn't exciting, what makes your nerve endings go, oh yeah, this is awesome,
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and what isn't like that.
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Over time, your internal compass of what's good
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and what isn't as good or isn't as true becomes more attuned and you get better at editing.
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But that's why in the editing process, what I coach myself on is just get yourself to publishing it.
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Basically, my process is fast the whole time.
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And that is because I want to move on to the next one.
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Because I know that if I take too much time at any stage of the process, the drafting, the editing, or the publishing on the internet, if I take too much time,
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I'm going to get lost in it and I'm going to lose some of that spark, and it's likely that I don't finish it.
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And that's what I found to be true for me.
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I think this is probably applicable to a lot of people.
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I think a lot of people move too slow with their projects, and they really don't sprint towards publishing.
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The problem with that is if you don't publish, you don't move on to the next one, typically.
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Or then you just have a bunch of unfinished drafts.
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You have a closet of unfinished projects, and you have no confidence in yourself to be able to complete something.
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What you need to become a better writer or a better creative in any field is the act of publishing, is the act of finishing something and learning from it and moving on to the next one.
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And so that's why even in the editing process, which right now I find to be the most difficult part writing-wise, I just tell myself, hey, guess what?
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It doesn't have to be perfect.
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And the little reward you get by publishing this is
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that then you're done with it and you can move on to the next one.
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And I've got many of my favorite stories that I've published, some of which have done fairly well on the internet by my standards.
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I didn't think they were that good when I was working on them.
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I had so much self-doubt at every part of the process.
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The drafting, the editing, the publishing.
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My experience, a lot of the writing process is just getting yourself to not freak out
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and not give up on a project and just stay with the process itself.
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Understanding that through each iteration on every single thing that you write and publish, you get a little bit better, right?
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And you find more of your voice, right?
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You figure out, you start noticing the things that you do often.
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Like everyone is going to have little intricacies in their process.
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You know, like for example, this process might not be for you.
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The whole drafting by hand, whatever.
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I think it's worth trying, especially if you're someone who isn't writing right now, go back to analog, find your way.
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But you're going to have your own intricacies.
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You're going to have your own little rituals that work for you.
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And those are great.
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Lean into those.
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Everyone has their own process.
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But the most important thing is that you view it as a process
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and not some character trait that you have or don't have.
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It is a skill, and the skill is learned through a process.
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Draft, furious, fast.
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Why do I keep saying those two words.
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Draft it messily, inclining to make it bad, trying to make it bad, right?
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Then you transcribe, carry it all over.
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It's your first rereading of what you just produced.
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Don't worry about it yet.
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You're going to fix it later.
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Then edit, edit like a surgeon, edit very carefully, but have some fun with it.
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Don't lose the magic, right?
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The goal is to keep the thing alive.
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Okay.
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I know we're all over the place today, but listen, here's the problem with AI writing and why we need to be so careful of it in the coming years.
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AI writing is not alive.
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It was not produced by something that is alive.
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What we need to figure out as the humans who are alive during this time is what is it
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that makes human art good?
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Do we have anything that makes our art better than the machines
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that are going to become infinitely better at creating infinite content?
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The AI, I have no doubt, is going to become better at producing viral content than I ever will be, and I need to accept that.
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But that's never going to stop me from writing because I love the creative process.
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I love it.
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Like I need it.
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It is one of the things I enjoy most in this life.
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And so I'm going to do it forever.
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This is a game I'm going to play forever.
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What I am very compelled by is what is my human edge?
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What are the things I can do that the machine cannot do?
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And if you're curious about that as well, the only way you're ever going to figure that out is by trying, getting into the arena, using your skill,
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using your humanity, training your humanity through creative work.
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And it's going to come out different than what a machine will produce, but it will be alive.
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It might be messy.
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It might be bad.
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It might not perform on social media compared to what Claude or ChatGPT can crank out in a millisecond, but it will be alive.
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It will have a pulse.
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It'll be true, hopefully.
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But we got to get good.
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There is a huge skill building component to this.
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And the only way to build the skill is to show up for it.
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Understand it's going to be fun.
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I know I say this all the time.
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But it is fun.
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If it's not fun, you're not doing it right.
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It should feel cathartic.
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It should feel like you're processing things that need to come out of you.
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And you will get better over time.
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But I want you to stop putting this pressure on yourself that it needs to perform well or whatever.
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No. This is psychological digestion.
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This is you doing the work as a human being to figure out what's going on inside you
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and to put words to it.
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And when you do that really truthfully and honestly, you find that a lot of people resonate.
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Draft.
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Transcribe.
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Edit.
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Publish.
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Repeat.
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Do the whole thing many times.
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Build it into your way of life.
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You don't have to publish also.
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I know I say that because I do that, but like you don't have to.
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Publishing just means finishing.
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Just finish the work.
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This might be as simple as journaling in the morning.
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This might be as complicated as writing short stories, screenplays, novels, whatever it is for you.
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But you need to write.
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We need to train our brains.
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We need to become smarter.
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We need to defend ourselves against the attempts to reduce us to dumb, dopamine-addicted zombies.
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I don't mean to fearmonger here, but I also don't think that I'm speaking entirely out of turn.
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So anyway, no doom and gloom.
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This is what's going to give our lives joy and spirit
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and vitality and it's a process and it's fun
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and let me know how it goes for you and if you have questions, I'm going to get back to it.
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Vocabulario y notas de pronunciación para esta lección
Esta lección de conversación de nivel B2 se basa en el vídeo “How to write like a human being, not a robot”. Las palabras que más se repiten: process, writing, write. Este vídeo tiene 306 frases y 3544 palabras para practicar shadowing. La parte hablada dura 15:37. El hablante habla rápido, unas 227 palabras por minuto, así que espera sonidos enlazados y reducidos. El 87 % de las palabras está entre las 3.000 más comunes del inglés, por lo que el vocabulario es fácil de seguir.
Vocabulario clave de este vídeo
Las 15 palabras más avanzadas del vídeo, con su pronunciación y significado:
| Palabra | Pronunciación | Significado |
|---|---|---|
| publish verbo | /ˈpʌblɪʃ/ | publicar |
| transcribe verbo | /trænˈskɹaɪb/ | transcribir, desgrabar |
| cursor sustantivo | /ˈkɜːsə/ | cursor |
| blink verbo | /ˈblɪŋk/ | parpadear, pestañear |
| messy adjetivo | /ˈmɛsi/ | desordenado, desprolijo |
| stare verbo | /stɛɚ/ | mirar fijamente, quedarse mirando |
| excite verbo | /ɪkˈsaɪt/ | emocionar |
| digestion sustantivo | /daɪˈd͡ʒɛst͡ʃən/ | digestión |
| intricacy sustantivo | /ˈɪn.tɹɪ.kə.si/ | vericuetos, entresijos |
| unpack verbo | /ʌnˈpæk/ | desempacar, deshacer |
| unfinished adjetivo | /ʌnˈfɪnɪʃt/ | inacabado, inconcluso |
| analog adjetivo | /ˈænəlɔɡ/ | analógico |
| furious adjetivo | /ˈfjʊəɹi.əs/ | furioso |
| pause sustantivo | /pɔːz/ | pausa |
| machinery sustantivo | /məˈʃiːnəɹi/ | máquinas, maquinaria |
Phrasal verbs que vas a escuchar
| Palabra | Pronunciación | Significado |
|---|---|---|
| figure out verbo | averiguar, captar | |
| sit down verbo | sentarse | |
| clean up verbo | limpiar | |
| come out verbo | /ˌkʌm ˈaʊt/ | revelarse, salir a la luz |
| come up with verbo | ingeniar, ingeniarse | |
| get back to verbo | responder / contestar (en un rato), volver / tornar a contactar | |
| get through verbo | /ɡɛt ˈθɹu/ | aguantar, salir adelante |
| give up verbo | rendirse, entregar |
Frases que vale la pena repetir
Frases cortas y completas del vídeo que puedes reutilizar en la conversación diaria:
- Also, you'll create some pretty interesting things.
- It's something that I really like.
- It's a skill that you might not have built.
- You're going to mess with it later.
- What ideas are coming from you?
Gramática en este vídeo
Las estructuras que más usa el hablante, con las palabras exactas del vídeo:
| Estructura | En el vídeo |
|---|---|
| Present perfect have/has + participio pasado — una acción pasada que sigue importando ahora | you've started · has begun · You've just found |
| Voz pasiva be + participio pasado — importa lo que ocurre, no quién lo hace | is compared · is learned · was not produced |
| Oraciones de relativo who / which + oración — información extra sobre una persona o cosa | right, which is · someone who isn |
Pronunciación a tener en cuenta
El hablante usa 128 contracciones y formas reducidas, como you're, I'm, don't. Dilas en su forma corta, tal como las oyes.
- Los sonidos de “th”: cathartic /kəˈθɑɹtɪk/, truthful /ˈtɹuːθ.f(ə)l/, truthfully /ˈtɹuːθ.fəl.i/, mathematics /mæθ(.ə)ˈmæt.ɪks/
- Los sonidos de “sh” y “zh”: publish /ˈpʌblɪʃ/, unfinished /ʌnˈfɪnɪʃt/, machinery /məˈʃiːnəɹi/, ferocious /fəˈɹoʊʃəs/, iteration /ˌɪt.əˈɹeɪ.ʃən/
- Palabras largas — cuida el acento: intricacy /ˈɪn.tɹɪ.kə.si/, machinery /məˈʃiːnəɹi/, intimidate /ɪnˈtɪmɪdeɪt/, iteration /ˌɪt.əˈɹeɪ.ʃən/, millisecond /ˈmɪlɪˌsɛkənd/
Sonidos difíciles para hispanohablantes:
- s + consonante al inicio — sin añadir una “e” delante: stare /stɛɚ/, stumble /ˈstʌmbəl/, screenplay /ˈskɹiːnˌpleɪ/, sprint /spɹɪnt/, spark /ˈspɑɹk/
- /v/ — no es /b/: los dientes tocan el labio inferior: vitality /vaɪˈtælɪti/, vibe /vaɪb/, creativity /kri.eɪˈtɪv.ᵻ.ti/, viral /ˈvaɪɹəl/, nerve /nɝv/
- /z/ — sonora, no /s/: pause /pɔːz/, oftentimes /ˈɔf.ənˌtaɪmz/, resonate /ˈɹɛz.əˌneɪt/, zombie /ˈzɑmbi/, miserable /ˈmɪz(ə)ɹəbəl/
Cómo practicar con este vídeo
- Escucha el vídeo entero una vez sin hablar y anota las palabras que no conoces.
- Empieza a velocidad 0,75×, haz shadowing frase por frase y vuelve a la velocidad normal cuando te resulte fácil.
- Grábate y compara con el original, prestando atención a palabras como publish, transcribe, cursor.
¿Qué es la Técnica de Shadowing?
Shadowing es una técnica de aprendizaje de idiomas respaldada por la ciencia, desarrollada originalmente para la formación de intérpretes profesionales y popularizada por el políglota Dr. Alexander Arguelles. El método es simple pero poderoso: escuchas audio en inglés nativo y lo repites en voz alta de inmediato, como una sombra que sigue al hablante con solo 1-2 segundos de retraso. A diferencia de la escucha pasiva o los ejercicios de gramática, el shadowing obliga a tu cerebro y músculos de la boca a procesar y reproducir simultáneamente patrones de habla reales. Las investigaciones muestran que mejora significativamente la precisión de la pronunciación, la entonación, el ritmo, el habla conectada, la comprensión auditiva y la fluidez al hablar, convirtiéndola en una de las metodologías más efectivas para la preparación del IELTS Speaking y la comunicación en inglés en el mundo real.