Shadowing Practice: I Asked 100 Married Couples for Dating Advice and Learned... - Learn English Speaking with YouTube

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Over the last three years, I have asked more than 100 married couples one huge question.
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303 sentences
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Over the last three years, I have asked more than 100 married couples one huge question.
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What would you say is the key to 60 years, 20 years, 54 years, 58 years together and successful, long lasting marriage?
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And their answers have taught me more about love and dating than any book, course, video or school ever could.
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And in this video, we will be sharing some of their most insightful, emotional, and knowledgeable pieces of advice we have heard to date.
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How long have you been married for?
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40.
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Huh?
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No.
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1987.
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Can we do that math really quick?
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37 years.
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Well, this will be 37.
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37, yeah.
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There's a times 10 factor.
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You lose track.
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You guys are married?
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Yes, we've been married many years.
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How many?
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Good.
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The year.
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It's always like that.
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See if you know.
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54 years.
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Yes, 54 years.
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We met in 71.
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We've been together 53 years.
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Yeah, almost 53.
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I kind of feel like a lot of my friends, like after 20 years of marriage, you want out.
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40 years of marriage, you're like, oh my God, what have I done?
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They never make it to the good part.
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A lot of flowers that don't bloom for decades.
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Interesting flowers.
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She's very interesting.
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And she's really intelligent.
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And to me, very beautiful.
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Sweet.
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and we've been married 58 years, but still great.
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What would you say is the secret to 58 years together, and you said still great?
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The biggest thing is we both married our best friend.
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True.
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Well, to me, it's having your best friend next to you all the time.
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When Ann goes out of the way for a few days, I'm sort of out of sorts.
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We're together 32 years.
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We've known each other for 50 years.
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But somehow we never got, and we were single.
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Right.
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And so he got involved with other people and went separate ways for 18 years.
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And sort of had a child together.
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You know, that would have been awfully nice.
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I was younger.
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I worried a lot about finding love in my life, enduring love.
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You know, whether it was living with someone or married to someone, it didn't work out.
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Then we're together 30 years, so we came together fairly late, you know, in midlife.
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And yes, it was that important.
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And as you get older, it gets even much more important.
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The most important decision you make in your life is your marriage and who you marry.
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I can make or break it, as we all know.
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It can be a success.
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They can encourage you in whatever you're doing, discourage you.
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The best thing that I ever did was I met Joan, and it was the best decision I ever made.
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I was 23 and she was 20.
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So that was our 20s.
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You got to have your mate with you as long as possible when you get older.
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Yeah.
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Be single when you get older is not good at all.
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How long have you guys been married for?
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It's going to be 60 years in October.
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What has gone you 60 years?
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Still happy?
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You know, I'm assuming, right?
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Still happy?
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Still enjoying?
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There's a couple of days here and there that are pretty good.
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What's the secret to a long-lasting relationship?
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You got to be flexible.
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You can't be dogmatic.
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you're not always right.
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She's not always right.
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No.
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I know what she's going to say.
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You told me I'm a lot of talk, not you.
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So I'm talking.
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You can't let things fester.
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You got something on your head, you talk about it, you resolve it, finish it.
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Yeah.
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Can you define the word love for me?
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I don't know what the hell that is.
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I can't define it.
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If you can smile regularly, you're okay.
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A lot of it is caring.
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It's respect.
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don't pick fights respect and um i mean love what's love he's crazy you know
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so you got married at 87 with that lady there married for three years wow you've been married three years you got married at 90 to a younger man.
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You're a cougar.
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Congratulations.
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How does that feel?
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Thank you.
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There you go.
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Robbing the cradle.
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What I have felt in this relationship is that I hadn't felt any red flags.
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So, okay, so love is no red flags.
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I had a friend who once said, I love it in life when all of a sudden the lights go green.
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That's what's happened.
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I like that you were looking at him too when you said all this.
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Life worked very well after I met.
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My first husband died.
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After I married John, life was just very, very good.
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We've been fortunate enough to always travel, so we've been almost everywhere.
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We've just had a wonderful life.
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We're very lucky.
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Love is not looking in each other's eyes, but it's looking together in the same direction.
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What would you say is the key to a successful, long-lasting marriage?
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Patience, patience, good principles, you know?
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That's important.
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Cover your ears.
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Oh yes, okay.
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That is my opinion.
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How do you appreciate each other for so long?
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My wife is really a wonderful wife because she's every time very, very correct with me.
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And correct with everybody anyway, all human beings.
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So you're always right.
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I'm a little bit of a nun.
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What are the sacrifices that you guys had to make or have to make in order for this to work?
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Quite frankly, I don't think I made any sacrifices.
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I guess that marriage is not for everyone.
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None at all.
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God, I mean.
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Some people are thinking, oh, I have to sacrifice my freedom and this and that.
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No, I think you have more freedom when you have a committed relationship.
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Most relationships are not just a compromise, but a complementary existence.
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One person is the good cook, me.
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One person takes care of the finances, him, and that gets worked out in a relationship.
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But I think it's also an attitude toward life in general.
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I mean, I guess you could ask somebody, what kind of sacrifices do you make for your job?
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Well, if you really like your job, you know, look at it like a sacrifice.
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Good marriage gives one a sense of safety and comfort.
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It allows you to grow, just like a child who feels secure in their relationship with their parents is then willing to go out in the world independently, knowing that there's a good attachment.
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That's what marriage is.
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It's an attachment.
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Marriage is, you know, 60%, 40%, 60%, 40%.
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Isn't that 50-50?
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I'm usually the 60.
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I would hope so, yeah.
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I've heard from my dad that's the standard.
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That's the best way to go.
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60's pretty good for, I'm glad he's getting 40 at least, you know.
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We're 67 years married.
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No matter if we do get in arguments, which happens at all times with all people, we try not to let it hang over till the next day.
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We have it set in our lives that we embrace each other every morning, no matter what happens.
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And it erases any problems that we might've had.
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It brings us back to a decent level relationship.
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I think that's important.
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I love that.
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So you guys are both on your second marriage.
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Can you define the word love?
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I'd say love is care.
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It's a big word, but I think love means caring for someone.
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It just lasts.
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I think there is a feeling that applies better to us rather than one of us.
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what do I love about you is less than what I love about the both of us together as a couple.
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That's what I love.
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You're like, uh-uh.
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That was a good answer.
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That was better than what I was going to say, so I don't want to say what I had.
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The most important thing is honesty.
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Not doing anything.
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That's a good foundation to build trust and loyalty.
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It's an agreement that the trust is above everything.
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Yeah, we don't break the trust.
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Love is the ability to sacrifice oneself for the when you can put things aside that are from your ego or preference or personality and just say, yeah, I'll go with that.
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That's love.
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When I was a girl, I made a list of what I wanted in a guy, and then I met him.
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He had some of the valuable qualities that I wanted, like kindness, spirituality, intelligence, like really intelligent.
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Now, I had other things on my list that he completely doesn't meet at all, but he had the right character.
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So all through the years, again and again, I chose to love him whenever we'd get upset, whenever we completely didn't agree, whenever he wanted to live somewhere and I didn't want to live somewhere.
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That was a real crisis.
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Girls now, they're taught that what they want is the most important thing, rather than what is the we, what is like the best thing for us together instead of what's the best thing for me.
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When you give up that me to a we, that's love.
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I think that the key word is respect.
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You're not always going to agree with what he or she is doing.
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Ultimately respect their choices.
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I think you have to learn how to say you sorry.
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That is a really big thing.
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I thought that love is never having to say you sorry.
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Oh, but it is.
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And that's a ridiculous statement.
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That was just for you, yeah.
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What's the value of being with someone for the rest of your life, hopefully, versus jumping around and like, oh, if I have all of these options available to me, why would I stick with one?
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It's the good, the bad, and the ugly.
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You know the good, you know the bad, you know the ugly, and you still love the person.
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I mean, you can't ask for more than that.
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It's just, there's something really great about that and special.
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And even when you're angry at the person, and you still flick on that coffee machine that they need for the morning because you know they need that, that's commitment.
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What's the value of it?
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I think you get to a point, every relationship that's enduring, where you need to refresh it.
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For the relationship to keep growing, a way to get closer.
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You don't need to rush into marriage.
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We were together for five years before we got married.
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And then it was sort of the right time.
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It added something ineffable, right?
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But real.
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I think finding a life partner is the biggest gamble in your life.
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But if you do find it, it can be the magical part of your life.
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Well, we were kids when we met and there was a lot of luck and just communication.
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If I could give younger people advice is finding the right partner is important and therefore not having kids until you are more sure that it is the right partner because there's so many divorces in life.
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And obviously waiting a bit to have kids doesn't negate divorce, but it minimizes the chance that if you're not together as a couple, don't introduce someone else until you're sure.
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How is dating difference when you guys first started dating than it is today?
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I think the pressure on kids now is pretty hard from social media to go out, what to do, who to be with, where you are.
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I think they're smarter about protection.
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They Uber instead of drunk driving.
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We did not do that.
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Anything that you're going to do, get video consent for it first.
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Right.
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There was no permanent record of how incredibly inane you act.
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It was easier back then and it's tougher now.
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We were doing crazy stuff and no one was filming it.
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I mean, now they are.
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Every movement that you make is on film and you have so many distractions like, you know, social media.
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Commitment is harder because of that.
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What are some things you think we could do to have like more opportunities or better chance of finding real love.
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I think you should take this and flush it down the toilet.
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Personal connection.
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You can't replace that.
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I think it's very difficult now for dating.
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One, because it's all done kind of remotely.
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A lot of this texting back and forth, which seems like the worst way to communicate.
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We were very immature when we got married.
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We were both 22.
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Speak for yourself.
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I think it's harder than it ever was.
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But I also think that people's expectations are higher than maybe they should be.
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I think that you have to kind of take a chance on people and get to know them better.
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Having unrealistic expectations of this person is going to be lined up right up with all your ideals and all your priorities.
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It's not going to ever happen.
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Like you're going to have to make compromises.
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And so there's going to be surprises.
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What's one thing that when you were younger, you put a lot of importance on?
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And as you got older, you realized wasn't actually that important.
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You want the truth?
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Chasing girls.
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And then I met my wife and we've been married for 45 years.
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I saw the futility of that.
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It's a lot nicer to be in a very loving couple than to be chasing women all the time.
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Don't be afraid to fall in love.
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Yeah.
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No, it's true.
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Some people are.
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Some people are very sort of, you know, they're afraid of becoming dependent or getting hurt or whatever, but you shouldn't.
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You got to risk it.
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Feels like people aren't putting themselves out there as much or taking that risk.
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Yeah.
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Yeah.
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I think maybe they think that there's always somebody else to try.
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So I get too bogged down with one relationship and just keep moving around.
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And after a while, you find years have gone by and you've just been moving around and not like challenging a relationship to continue like day to day.
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Yeah.
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You know, not looking so far ahead all the time.
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It is really, it's about day to day.
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Yeah.
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Even a long-term relationship has to do with today is today and it's the next day.
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Let's get better.
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How do you recommend someone finds love in this day and age then?
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Be open to find it.
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And if you get hurt, that's how you know you're alive, right?
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Don't make it a shopping list.
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I like to see who I'm with.
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So when I met her, I looked at her and I just saw flashing lights.
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So does she.
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Let yourself be changed by the person that you need.
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I've changed him a lot.
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I like musicals.
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He goes to musicals with me.
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I love you.
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That's shocking.
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It wasn't my habit.
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Yeah.
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Literally follow your heart.
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Like no one knows what you want except for yourself.
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Sometimes you won't listen to yourself because maybe what you want is not what others would want for you.
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I married a man 20 years older than me and everyone around me said that it was a wrong decision.
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Three years later, I can say that I'm so happy that I followed my heart.
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Yeah.
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And it comes with sacrifices, but it was the right choice.
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Amazing.
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Let's bring him in.
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Because you've been speaking about him the whole time, so this is the husband.
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Okay.
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Having a partner in life is the best thing because you always have that person that is going to be there for you.
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It's work, but it pays off.
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Thank you so much for watching this video.
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If you have enjoyed it, guess what?
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This is part of a huge year for us where we're going around the world and interviewing people from all these different countries of all these different ages and giving you perspectives like this channel has never offered before.
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So if you haven't already subscribed, please make sure to do that and we will see you in the next video.
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About This Lesson

In this lesson, you will focus on improving your English speaking skills by practicing with real-life conversations. The source material comes from a video where over 100 married couples share their insights on lasting relationships. By listening to the discussions, you will engage in shadow speech, which will enhance your pronunciation, intonation, and overall fluency. This practice will not only teach you key vocabulary and phrases related to relationships but also help you understand conversational dynamics in English.

Key Vocabulary & Phrases

  • Key to a successful marriage: Insights into maintaining a long-lasting relationship.
  • Best friend: A term used to describe a deep and supportive friendship; crucial in a marriage.
  • Out of sorts: Feeling unsettled or not balanced, often due to a change in routine.
  • Bloom for decades: A metaphor for relationships that may take time to flourish.
  • Emotional advice: Insights that resonate on a personal and heartfelt level.
  • Interesting flowers: A quirky expression referring to unique traits in relationships.
  • Years together: A reflection of time spent in a relationship, often celebrated.

Practice Tips

To effectively engage in shadowspeak with this video transcript, follow these tips:

  • Listen and Imitate: Play the video at a comfortable speed, and pause after each couple’s response. Mimic their intonation and emotion.
  • Use a Shadowing App: Try using a shadowing app to record your practice. This allows you to compare your speech with the original audio, enhancing your learning.
  • Focus on Pacing: The speakers in this video have varying speeds. Start by practicing at a slower pace, then gradually increase to match their natural flow.
  • Repeat Key Phrases: Identify key phrases or vocabulary related to relationships and repeat them several times. This will help cement your understanding and improve recall.
  • Engage Emotionally: Pay attention to the feelings conveyed in their speech. Try to infuse your practice with similar emotions, as this will enhance your speaking style and realism.

By applying these practice tips while shadowing the couples, you will not only learn valuable vocabulary but also develop a better understanding of natural conversations in English. Happy practicing!

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.

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