Shadowing Practice: financial freedom starter pack 2026 - Learn English Speaking with Video
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192 sentences
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casio f91w used toyota that's fully paid off fidelity brokerage account roth ira
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that's fully maxed out costco membership amex food cash preferred
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if you have any of these things
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or combination maybe even have all of them
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that's basically the full financial freedom starter pack of 2026 this tells me
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that you know you are very serious about investing
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and having a good future providing for your family
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and your kids one day while still being able to enjoy your youth enjoy your time
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and have fun it shows me that you have a balance you're not
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so overly hyperly fixated on money
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and locked in to the point where you're not enjoying your life where you're just a slave to money
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and not doing anything else
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but you also are having a good outlook on life having
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a good balance being able to still enjoy your time you know go
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and seek new opportunities travel explore create good memories with your friends
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and enjoy the life you have found the middle ground
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which is right where you want to be at
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and the younger you get here the longer time you have for your you know money to compound
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and grow in the market and just accelerate your financial freedom
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and these are the kind of markers
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that just show me value in a human being
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when i see someone young who has these kind of things
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they have a used kind of beat up car
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they have a fidelity account they have a roth ira
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you know they wear a casio watch they might not wear the nicest clothes
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they don't drive a bmw they don't have a house
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that they can't afford they have a credit card that they're capitalizing their points off,
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this just shows me that this is someone that I want to spend more time around.
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This is someone that knows what they're doing, who has a good head on their shoulders, and just does the right thing,
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even when other people aren't watching.
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That's exactly what this tells me about other people.
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Maybe I'm overanalyzing it, but I think more people need to start having this approach, especially the younger generation, right?
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I'm 23 years old.
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I was born in 2003.
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A lot of people in my generation are so hyper fixated, obsessed with Instagram, social media, Snapchat, flexing their APs, Rolexes,
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BMWs, Mercedes, buying a house at 23, you know, investment properties, real estate,
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all this mumbo jumbo, like they're so obsessed with this stuff that they lose focus of what actually matters.
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Take inspiration from people like Adam Sandler, people like Bill Gates, who they might have a lot of money,
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but they live, they clearly do live so far below their means.
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And they've mastered the craft of finding a balance between enjoying your money
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and taking you know investing and saving seriously but not letting it control
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and dictate your whole entire life and when you're at a young age
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when you're starting off in your journey to financial freedom it's really hard to find that balance
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and me myself i'm even struggling with it right i have all these things i was talking about
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and i've done pretty well for myself up to this point
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so much so like i've focused on investing and saving
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so much the past couple years
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that I do have this weird strong desire to just reward myself
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and spend a large lump sum amount of money on like a new car
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or like an investment property or like just something right I just
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or a tattoo like I have this desire to do it
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but I know in the back of my mind
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that this desire giving into this desire is what sets people off right
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they're on a good track you've already built the foundation in my opinion I've already built a very good foundation
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and now that I have this foundation it's so easy and
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so tempting to just just to stray off just a little bit
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but straying off just a little bit can just lead to
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a path of just making the wrong decisions buying the wrong
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things putting money in places where it really shouldn't be going especially at my age especially
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while i'm living at home and it's so challenging with social media
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and seeing all these people all these kids flexing these nice stuff
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and even though you know realistically a lot of them probably
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aren't in the best financial situation even though they have these things
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that doesn't make you want it any less right like let's say
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i see someone with a kid
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you know like 25 years old with a bmw m3 with a rolex living in brickle miami
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you know he has a modded out you know uh valvetronic exhaust
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and you know he's living at the beach eating all these
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nice meals going to steak dinners every night obviously like in my mind i know
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that even though this kid has of stuff he's probably not necessarily financially free i know
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that but that doesn't make me want any of these things any less just
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because i know that if
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that makes sense right it's some it's like this weird psychological thing where even though you know
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that that there's some lies behind that image that persona that
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that person is giving off it still is attractive right it's there's still something attractive
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and desirable about that lifestyle that we can't necessarily get rid of
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but understanding what is behind that just makes it a lot easier to stay on track
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and that is kind of the battle
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that i'm facing right now i you know
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i have a really good uh foundation for investments
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i'm closing up on hitting 100k net worth at the age of 23
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i have a fully paid off car you know
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i don't dress super nice i don't spend a ridiculous amount of money the thing
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that i spend the most amount of money on is literally groceries and food
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and um i feel like i live a relatively frugal lifestyle given my financial circumstance
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i live at home i save and invest two thousand dollars every single month
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and i try to um only spend my money on things
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that matters like i'm willing to spend a decent amount of money on food traveling new experiences
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and creating memories with friends all right to me those things have always been worth the money
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that doesn't mean i'm going to overspend
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and you know put all my money towards that but it means
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that when opportunities
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that satisfy those criteria come up i am going to jump on them
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i'm going to take advantage of them even if
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that means spending a little bit extra money to achieve those things
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and get those memories
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because i know based on past experiences those things will always be worth
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it to me whereas you know having a nice car having nice shoes having nice clothes
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and buying a house those things aren't going to matter in the long run
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i have experienced it myself i went from driving a 2005 honda civic
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that literally broke down on the highway to getting a brand new 2023 toyota camry off the lot zero miles
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and guess what it was fine it was cool for the first two weeks you know no one really cared
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because it was a camry obviously
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but like it was cool having a new nice reliable car
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for the first two weeks for the first month for the first two months
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and then it just becomes normal it becomes your everyday thing
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and you start to appreciate it less and less and less
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and even though you know
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that's not the right way to go about it your brain psychologically cannot deter you from that path
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when you have an old beat up used toyota that's fully paid off you don't have a car payment
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and you're young automatically tells me
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you don't care what other people think about you you care more about doing the right thing
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and creating the steps in order to work towards financial freedom
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and work towards your dreams rather than the image that you give off to other people.
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When you have a Casio F91W or any Casio in general, it tells me that you don't care about having this Rolex.
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You could probably go in debt to buy this Rolex, to buy this
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Omega Speedmaster or whatever, show off to other people.
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You care more about practicality, usability, while you still have some level of class and fashion to yourself.
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When you have a Fidelity traditional brokerage account
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that you're putting money towards every single month it tells me
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that you're locked in and that you understand the value of sacrificing now
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so that you can have more later
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when you have a Roth IRA that's fully maxed out
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or you're working on fully maxing out every single year tells me
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that you have the ability to critically think
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and to save now even you know you're saving
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and putting in money now for something
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that you can't touch until like you're 65 until years and years 50 years plus down the future.
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That tells me that you have financial discipline.
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You understand the value of a dollar and you understand
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that sacrificing something now can give you 10 times that return in the future when it's more valuable as well.
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And it just shows me so much about the type of person you are.
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When you have a Costco membership, it tells me that, I don't know, to be honest, I don't buy that much stuff from Costco,
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but I have it under my mom because I get gas from Costco.
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So that one doesn't really tell me much, but it shows me that you also understand the value of money, that you understand
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that buying things in bulk keeping it in the freezer using it over a period of time
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if you do the math is actually cheaper yeah like you can go buy a ribeye for twenty dollars
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or you can buy you know the whole entire free uh ribeye
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that isn't cut yet from costco for 120 get like 13
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to 12 steaks from it for ten dollars a steak same quality
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but you save money and
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that just says a lot about the type of person you are especially
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if you have these things at a young age the next thing is amex blue cash preferred
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now it doesn't necessarily matter what credit card you have but
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if you have something that's you know a little bit more niche like not i'm not like an amex gold
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or amex platinum those are all kind of like flexor cards in my opinion they're not actually
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that good but
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if you have something like amex blue cash preferred uh chase sapphire preferred chase freedom flex discover
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it secured all of those cards tell me a lot about the type of person you are honestly
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if you want to know the type of person you are just tell them to pull out their wallet
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and see what credit cards they have because
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if they have all these flexor cards a lot of people have amex platinums
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but they don't own a business a lot of people have amex golds
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but they eat out all the time like a lot of these things just aren't adding up
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they're getting the card for the wrong reason
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and recently i actually switched credit cards um to the amex blue cash preferred
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because i looked at my finances
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i was like what am i spending the most amount of money on every single month
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i realized it was food and gas mainly food and
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when i say food i don't mean eating out i mean groceries i spent a lot of money in groceries
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so i found that the amex blue cash prefer gives me six percent back on all groceries
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which is insane very low annual fee
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and you know i just decided it was the best card for me it's the way
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that i'm going to be able to maximize on the stuff
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that i already buy a lot of people buy these credit cards travel credit cards
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and then they start traveling a lot of people buy these
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credit cards that are good on gas
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and then they start going on you know using more gas get a card
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that already supports what you already spend the most amount of
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money on without having to pay extremely high annual fees
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or having to go out of your way to get all these incentives like
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if you have to spend five thousand dollars in the first month
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but you normally only spend two thousand dollars in the first month is it really worth
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it to spend you know 50 more just to get
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that bonus probably not
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and that's why this card works perfectly for me you know
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i honestly haven't heard a lot of people talk about this card either amex blue cash preferred um
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if you're someone like me who spends a lot of money on groceries on eating shows me
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that you're probably locked in on your diet locked in on your fitness
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and you should probably consider getting a card that maximizes the groceries
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that you buy or you know the food that you eat out
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or the gas that you get so yeah i mean i've loved this card
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so far and
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if you guys want to get a card i think
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i'm pretty sure i have a um not an affiliate link
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but like because i got the card
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if i share a link it gives me some money it gives you guys some extra money i believe
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so i'll put that link if in the description
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if you guys uh do want to get the amx blue
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cash preferred just like a shared uh friends referred link but yeah
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if you have any of these things you guys are already doing good just keep it up stay locked in
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and just do the right thing
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Vocabulary and speaking notes for this lesson
This speaking lesson is built on the video “financial freedom starter pack 2026”. The speaker keeps coming back to these words: card, spend, amex. This video has 192 sentences and 2373 words to shadow. The speech runs for 11:22. The speaker talks fast, about 209 words per minute, so expect linked and reduced sounds. 85% 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
15 words from the video worth learning, with pronunciation and meaning:
| Word | Pronunciation | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| groceries noun | /ˈɡɹoʊ.s(ə.)ɹiz/ | Retail foodstuffs and other household supplies; the commodities sold by a grocer or in a grocery store. |
| invest verb | /ɪnˈvɛst/ | To spend money, time, or energy on something, especially for some benefit or purpose; used with in. |
| necessarily adverb | /ˌnɛs.əˈsɛɹ.ə.li/ | Inevitably; of necessity. |
| steak noun | /steɪk/ | Beefsteak: a slice of beef, broiled or cut for broiling. |
| flex verb | /flɛks/ | To bend something. |
| fidelity noun | /fᵻˈdɛlədi/ | Faithfulness to one's moral or civic duties. |
| membership noun | The state of being a member of a group or organization. | |
| chase verb | /t͡ʃeɪs/ | To follow at speed. |
| lifestyle noun | /ˈlaɪfˌstaɪl/ | A style of living that reflects the attitudes and values of a person or group. |
| sacrifice noun | /ˈsæk.ɹɪ.faɪs/ | Originally, the killing (and often burning) of a human being or an animal as an offering to a deity; later, also the offering of an object to a deity. |
| cloth noun | /klɒθ/ | A fabric, usually made of woven, knitted, or felted fibres or filaments, such as used in dressing, decorating, cleaning or other practical use. Sometimes… |
| platinum noun | /ˈplæt.ɪn.əm/ | The chemical element with atomic number 78 and symbol Pt; a dense, malleable, ductile, highly unreactive, silverish-white transition metal of great value. |
| stray verb | /stɹeɪ/ | To wander, as from a direct course; to deviate, or go out of the way. |
| maximize verb | /ˈmæksəmaɪz/ | To make as large as possible. |
| meal noun | /ˈmiːl/ | Food that is prepared and eaten, usually at a specific time, and usually in a comparatively large quantity. |
Phrasal verbs you will hear
| Word | Pronunciation | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| pay off verb | To bribe, especially to deter oversight. | |
| beat up verb | To give a severe beating to; to assault violently with repeated blows. | |
| add up verb | To take the sum of; to total. | |
| come up verb | To emerge or become known, especially unexpectedly. | |
| give off verb | /ɡɪv ɒf/ | To emit; to produce and send forth; to come across in some manner. |
| lie behind verb | To be the ultimate cause of. | |
| pull out verb | To withdraw; especially of military forces; to retreat. |
Grammar in this video
The structures the speaker uses most, with the exact words from the video:
| Structure | In the video |
|---|---|
| Present perfect have/has + past participle — a past action that still matters now | have found · they've mastered · i've done |
| Passive voice be + past participle — the focus is on what happens, not who does it | was born · isn't cut |
Pronunciation to watch
The speaker uses 64 contractions and reduced forms, such as you're, I'm, don't. Say them the short way, as you hear them.
- The “th” sounds: cloth /klɒθ/, math /mæθ/
- The “sh” and “zh” sounds: inspiration /ˌɪn.spɪˈɹeɪ.ʃən/, shoe /ˈʃu/
- Long words — get the stress right: necessarily /ˌnɛs.əˈsɛɹ.ə.li/, ridiculous /ɹɪˈdɪk.jə.ləs/, inspiration /ˌɪn.spɪˈɹeɪ.ʃən/, psychological /ˌsaɪ.kəˈlɑː.d͡ʒɪ.kl̩/, affiliate /əˈfɪl.i.eɪt/
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 groceries, invest, necessarily.
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.