Shadowing Practice: Ex-Buddhist: You Don't Understand Buddhism - Learn English Speaking with Video

So I think I was like hardcore Buddhist from 13 to I think it's 18 or 19.

So my question is, if I had met you when you were 15 and I had said, what is Buddhism?

Can you teach me?

What would you have said to me?

What do you believe?

Oh, I would be so into it. Do it.

Let's pretend.

I was like, oh, so it's been such a long time.

But I would have said, yeah, we are all called to be enlightened.

We have someone who's Buddha.

His name's Siddhartha.

A long time ago, he was a prince, and he lived a very lavish life.

But as he left his palace, and he had a family, he had a wife and everything, he saw different stages of life.

He saw someone being born.

He saw someone getting old.

He saw someone getting sick, and he saw someone die.

and then that's when he started questioning the meaning of life

and the cycle of life and he wanted to escape

that suffering so he believed he needed to go seek refuge alone in solitude

so he left everything he had money he had prestige he had a family

and he left it all to go figure that out

and he was sitting in a forest and this is

when he started meditating he started um closing himself off to

all of the worldly desires like hunger comfort it was kind of like mind over matter

right and eventually all these temptations as he was really weak came to him and he was able to

conquer it through deep meditation and deep prayer

and he understood he doesn't need any of these things

and that's something

that we can have too we can have inner peace through meditation through the teachings of buddha

and i think that's how i would approach someone i thought

that sounded pretty sane at the time great to me if i had said to you does god exist

what would you have said?

I would have said no. I don't know who you're talking about.

Oh really?

Yeah.

Interesting.

Um, if I had have said, I like to party, I like, you know, hooking up with my girlfriend.

Is that okay?

What would you have said?

I would have said no. Okay.

Yeah.

I'd be like, that's, that's not part of the teaching. So yeah.

So what, what is the sexual morality in your version of Buddhism?

It's the same where you, um, you would have to be committed to your husband and your wife.

You know, I didn't really learn anything about divorce.

I know affairs were looked down upon.

There's no such thing as cheating.

What about sex before marriage?

Yeah, that wasn't allowed either.

It's very traditional, I think, and conservative.

See, I think what a lot of Westerners get is like a California hippie interpretation of Buddhism

that they want to be true.

I don't know.

And so I just think the kind of Buddhism I was introduced to when I was 15, I was like looking for something spiritual, but didn't want anything demanded of me was

that kind of California Buddhism where all of the don't do that was kind of.

So it's cool to know that Buddhists aren't raging hedonists, but it's a joke, but it's also true.

So are there, did you meet different Buddhists who had different views of Buddhism?

No, I was surrounded by the same mindset, I think.

And it was mostly just Vietnamese people.

So we pretty much practiced similar things.

But it never went deeper than what I learned and what I practiced.

If anything, they were learning a lot from me every time I came across another Buddhist.

Did you read the works of Buddha, his writings?

No, I didn't.

It's just my mom, she taught me about Siddhartha, which is the most popular Buddha.

Is he the first Buddha?

That's what people believe.

See, there's no like understanding of the origin of it all.

And for Vietnamese Buddhists, we have a lady Buddha that we really look up to.

Her name is Phat Guanam, or I think for, I guess, English speakers, they say Guanyin.

She looks a lot like Our Lady.

I'm glad she doesn't look like the Buddha I imagine.

Yeah, no, she has a veil.

She just looks serene, except there's different depictions of her.

So we actually go to Siddhartha and Gwanyin a lot.

And what's the story of the lady?

Is there one?

So apparently, so yeah, everything I had learned, it wasn't through books.

My mom would tell me all these things.

And back then I didn't really use YouTube or anything.

And I'm a terrible reader.

I'll be honest.

Like I love reading comic books.

I just couldn't read books.

I had such a short attention span.

But I asked her and she said, yes, Buddhas are people and eventually they had reached that enlightenment

so she was a regular woman and she went through many lifetimes many merits,

many karma eventually she reached enlightenment and now what she does is she helps people in need, there are a lot of stories where she'll appear on the

ocean where someone is abandoned in the middle of the ocean and she'll help them or people who are hungry.

She's always depicted with kind of holding like a kind of like a little olive leaf or something.

And she has a vase in one hand with water pouring out and she's on top of a lotus.

Or sometimes she's depicted with several arms and it's supposed to symbolize that she can do everything and be everywhere at once.

Yeah.

Is she Vietnamese?

She looks pretty Vietnamese from what I grew up with.

Yeah.

All right.

Cool.

Okay.

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When you were meditating and saying these mantras, what was the point?

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You know, because I think if you would ask a Christian, like, why are you praying?

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They might say any number of things.

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They might say, I'm giving adoration to God, or I'm repenting of my sins, or I'm requesting that he grant me certain things.

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What was the point of your meditation?

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Yeah, so I was asking that when I was really young, and the Buddhist nuns at the time were telling me,

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it's just these prayers that we say to Buddha, and they never really expanded more on that so i didn't understand

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but they said it's more to be in a meditative state i was like hey what's the purpose of

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that as well they didn't explain that further either to find peace

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or something they couldn't even explain that it was just

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because this was a cultural practice this is something

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that had been happening i think since buddhism was introduced in vietnam

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so they didn't even question it either and when i had asked questions

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they were like don't worry about it you just have to do it

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so I went along with it they never explained all right fair enough

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but then what was the benefit of it

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because I could imagine you saying to somebody why do we do this

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and they go we just do but if you would say to someone

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but you're you know you're choosing to do it

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so I would imagine someone might say like I'm afraid of punishment

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or I'm afraid of becoming a snail in the next life

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but they almost also might say like this is how I

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find peace like did you have any physiological response to how you were praying that put you in a calm state or?

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Yeah, I think it was for that discipline to not be

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so distracted from everything and to just focus on one thing

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so it is supposed to grant peace

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but actually the opposite had happened to me i had absolutely no peace from doing

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that stuff yeah so why why were you doing it well

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that that's all i knew right

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so i was like okay i'm going to follow these rules

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i'm going to do what they're all doing like eventually i'll

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get it yeah eventually i was like maybe i'll understand it

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because my mom

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and the buddhist nuns like the more you do it the

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more you will heal the more you will find peace

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because they were trying to help me with my afflictions with like my mental issues

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and my emotional state i'll say okay

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so i'm gonna keep doing it they're like when you're scared pray

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when you're having a nightmare pray just do it

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so it became like second nature to me even in my dreams if i had a nightmare I would just start praying.

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But the more I did it, the more anxious actually became.

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And I remember throughout all this process, I don't know if I could just suddenly add this in, I was very afraid of the Virgin Mary.

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My cousin, out of my entire family, they're the only Catholics.

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And my mom has like 11 or 10 siblings.

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She has a bunch and only one section is like Catholic.

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And so when I would visit them, they had Our Lady statues of her everywhere.

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and I was so scared to go anywhere near her

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and I would have sleepovers I was like can you cover

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her I don't I don't want to look at her yeah

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they said why I just said she's just scary to me

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I don't know who this lady is she's freaking me out

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yeah what kind of statues of her were they were they like Fatima

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or our Lady of Guadalupe I don't remember

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but I think it was our Lady of Fatima yeah did you ask who is this no I just knew

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that they called her the Virgin Mary And I don't remember even seeing Jesus in their home They have him, but he just never popped out to me Only she did

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Yeah So I'm not going to ask you to reenact repeating a mantra That's not what I'm going to do

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But I am interested So when you would wake up at night

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and you would start praying Would you just repeat over and over the name of this Buddha?

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Yes And would you use your breath to do that?

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Or would you just say it, say it, say it, say it?

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I would say it out loud, audibly Thank you very much for watching If you enjoyed that clip, you are going to love the full interview.

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Please click it and watch it or else I will tell on you.

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Vocabulary and speaking notes for this lesson

This B2 speaking lesson is built on the video “Ex-Buddhist: You Don't Understand Buddhism”. The speaker keeps coming back to these words: buddha, buddhism, buddhist, lady. This video has 161 sentences and 1777 words to shadow. The speech runs for 9:21. The speaker talks fast, about 190 words per minute, so expect linked and reduced sounds. 83% of the words are among the 3,000 most common in English; the rest is worth studying before you start.

Key vocabulary in this video

The 15 most advanced words in the video, with pronunciation and meaning:

Word	Pronunciation	Meaning
meditation noun	/mɛdɪˈteɪʃn̩/	A devotional exercise of, or leading to, contemplation.
depict verb	/dɪˈpɪkt/	To render a representation of something, using words, sounds, images, or other means.
meditate verb	/ˈmɛ.dɪˌteɪt/	To contemplate; to keep the mind fixed upon something; to study.
mantra noun	/ˈmɑn.tɹə/	The hymn portions of the Vedas; any passage of these used as a prayer.
nun noun	/nʌn/	A member of a Christian religious community of women who live by certain vows and usually wear a habit, (Roman Catholicism, specifically) those living together…
enlightenment noun	/ɪnˈlaɪtənmənt/	An act of enlightening, or the state of being enlightened or instructed.
scare verb	/skɛɚ/	To frighten, terrify, startle, especially in a minor way.
statue noun	/ˈstæt͡ʃu/	A three-dimensional work of art, usually representing a person or animal, usually created by sculpting, carving, molding, or casting.
nightmare noun	/ˈnaɪt.mɛɚ/	A very unpleasant or frightening dream.
adoration noun	/ˌæ.dəˈɹeɪ.ʃən/	An act of religious worship.
affliction noun	/əˈflɪk.ʃən/	A state of pain, suffering, distress or agony.
audibly adverb		In context of possibility of being heard; in an audible manner.
depiction noun	/dɪˈpɪkʃən/	A lifelike image of something, either verbal or visual.
enlighten verb	/ɪnˈlaɪtən/	To supply with light.
hedonist noun	/ˈhiːdənɪst/	Someone devoted to hedonism.

Phrasal verbs you will hear

Word	Meaning
come across verb	To change sides; to cross over to work for the opposition.
go along with verb	To acquiesce to or comply with a proposal, despite lacking a desire or value for it.
go through verb	To travel from one end of something to the other.
look up to verb	To show respect or admiration for (someone); to see (someone) as a role model.

Sentences worth repeating

Short, complete lines from the video that you can reuse in everyday conversation:

Can you teach me?
What would you have said to me?
What do you believe?
What would you have said?
What was the point of your meditation?

Grammar in this video

The structures the speaker uses most, with the exact words from the video:

Structure	In the video
Passive voice be + past participle — the focus is on what happens, not who does it	be enlightened · being born · were looked
Present perfect have/has + past participle — a past action that still matters now	have said · it's been
Relative clauses who / which + clause — extra information about a person or thing	Siddhartha, which is · people who are

Pronunciation to watch

The speaker uses 52 contractions and reduced forms, such as I'm, don't, didn't. Say them the short way, as you hear them.

The “sh” and “zh” sounds: meditation /mɛdɪˈteɪʃn̩/, adoration /ˌæ.dəˈɹeɪ.ʃən/, affliction /əˈflɪk.ʃən/, depiction /dɪˈpɪkʃən/, lavish /ˈlævɪʃ/
Long words — get the stress right: enlightenment /ɪnˈlaɪtənmənt/, adoration /ˌæ.dəˈɹeɪ.ʃən/, meditative /ˈmɛdɪˌteɪtɪv/, physiological /ˌfɪz.i.əˈlɑ.d͡ʒɪ.kəl/, morality /məˈɹælɪti/

How to practise with this video

Listen to the whole video once without speaking and note the words you do not know.
Start at 0.75× speed, shadow it sentence by sentence, then go back to normal speed once it feels easy.
Record yourself and compare with the original, paying attention to words like meditation, depict, meditate.

What is the Shadowing Technique?

Shadowing is a science-backed language learning technique originally developed for professional interpreter training and popularized by polyglot Dr. Alexander Arguelles. The method is simple but powerful: you listen to native English audio and immediately repeat it out loud — like a shadow following the speaker with just a 1–2 second delay. Unlike passive listening or grammar drills, shadowing forces your brain and mouth muscles to simultaneously process and reproduce real speech patterns. Research shows it significantly improves pronunciation accuracy, intonation, rhythm, connected speech, listening comprehension, and speaking fluency — making it one of the most effective methods for IELTS Speaking preparation and real-world English communication.

Shadowing technique: read the full step-by-step guide →

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Vocabulary and speaking notes for this lesson

Key vocabulary in this video

Phrasal verbs you will hear

Sentences worth repeating

Grammar in this video

Pronunciation to watch

How to practise with this video

What is the Shadowing Technique?