Shadowing Practice: If you're under 30, please watch this video… - Learn English Speaking with Video
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Did you know that most people regret their 20s?
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And isn't it so stressful that we know that we should make the most of this time, but we don't know how?
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That all changed when I read The Defining Decade.
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Our 20s are the defining decade of adulthood.
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80% of life's most defining moments take place by about age 35.
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Two thirds of lifetime wage growth happens during the first 10 years of a career.
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Female fertility peaks at 28.
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The brain caps off its last major growth spurt.
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When it comes to adult development, 30 is not the new 20.
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The Defining Decade is a New York Times bestseller written by Meg Jay, a clinical psychologist who specializes in 20-somethings.
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She has been working with young adults for over 25 years.
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So yes, longer than many of us have been living.
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When I first read this book in 2020 at age 21, one thing stuck with me most, and that is the female fertility stat.
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I knew that biologically speaking, women truly have a deadline.
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And not gonna lie, but the stress of my own clock constantly ticking away
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sometimes even makes me wish that I wasn't born a female.
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Now at age 26 with my 30s looming even closer, I need a refresher of Meg J's advice.
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Thus today I'm going to share with you a summary of the defining decade going over these topics.
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I will include some tidbits on ones I've been applying so far and obviously my point of view is from a female, but her advice is truly helpful to anyone.
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Your 20s are something to take seriously, just like this video, so make sure to lock in, turn on full screen, and let's go.
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Number one, stop comparing your life to social media.
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When we're in school, there's a formula to succeed.
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You get A's, decent college, whatever.
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After graduating and in our first job, there's no longer a clear light at the end of the tunnel.
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So without this blueprint, we turn to social media.
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Of course, strangers highlight reels that they curate and put on the internet.
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I should totally let that dictate how good or bad I feel about myself.
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But inevitably, you do and I do.
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That's just human nature, I guess.
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Meg J reassures readers that very few people actually reach their potential in their 20s, maybe not even in their 30s or 40s.
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So yes, you and I should stop comparing ourselves to the mega rich business owners or Instagram models.
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Now, this tip is an essential foundation for everything else in this video.
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Remember that comparing your life path to others is like trying to fit into a one size fits all shoe.
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It doesn't make sense because we're all unique.
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So stop focusing on impressing other people.
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Have conviction in what you are good at
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and what you want in life and most of all what you define as success.
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Two, build identity capital.
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You might think when it comes to career, it's most important to maximize your salary and prestige.
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While financial capital is essential, of course, the most important thing to consider when it comes to your work is building your identity capital.
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Identity capital is your collection of skills, relationships, and professional resources you build up over your life.
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Now that is why it's important to not take dead-end jobs.
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While you have the freedom and youth in your 20s, you should be pushing yourself to learn as much as possible.
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So make yourself uncomfortable.
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Put yourself out there.
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Go to that network event on Friday night instead of just watching Netflix.
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Especially if you're a new grad, it's important to have the good first job as a launching pad for your future opportunities.
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And that is partly the reason why I chose business management consulting.
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Number three, remember your unthought knowns.
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After just a few months of consulting though, I felt stuck.
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I wondered, is this really what the rest of my life will look like?
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Is grinding at a job I don't like what it means to make the most of my 20s?
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I was scared that doing the right thing was a thing that would make me miserable.
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I reflected and discovered what Jay calls unthought-knowns.
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This refers to truths and desires we know about ourselves, but suppressed due to fear or uncertainty.
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Think about your innermost deep dreams about who you want to be, but that are stifled by the stress of practicality.
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To prevent the regret of reaching your 30s and realizing
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that you were working in the most valuable years of your life for someone else's dream, take a step back and ask yourself what are your unthought-knowns.
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Take action in the direction of the future that you would want.
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So for me, consuming different content was really valuable because after I read Millionaire Fastlane, I discovered that creating and entrepreneurship just called to me.
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And thus I committed to YouTube.
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I did have a lot of internal conflict due to the sunk cost fallacy.
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And I did study engineering at Caltech after all.
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But I now realize that it's totally okay to change industries.
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It's always best to live for yourself.
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As long as you're still accumulating that identity capital, you'll be fine.
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But how do you even pursue your dreams if you work a busy corporate job and have to pay the bills?
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Well, the cool thing is that you can use your job to pay for your dream.
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One of the best decisions I made when I was only at 1,000 YouTube subscribers was to outsource my editing.
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I saved 10 to 20 hours per week.
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And now with AI, I can't imagine how much easier my life would have been.
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Number four, take marriage seriously earlier.
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You could say that it's luck that I met my now husband in 2020.
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And yes, that is part of it.
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But I recently realized an important factor that did help us significantly.
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And that was
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that we both aren't heavy social media consumers in 2025 i
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see youtube videos popping up all the time criticizing men
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or men criticizing women and talking about how the other side is toxic
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and then there are youtube videos analyzing tiktoks that show up
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and i watched a few because i was curious
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and holy crap the dating scene is already hard
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but you guys are making a lot worse okay not you guys like the audience
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but like the the the people preaching out there.
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And in my humble opinion, and seeing the long-term relationships of my friends, and of course my parents and Sean's parents,
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there is truly a lot of misleading information on social media about relationships.
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And at the same time, the loneliness epidemic is real, so young people are even more vulnerable to anyone who just yells loudly enough.
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Kind of like how I just did.
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Statistically, the age of marriage is being pushed later and later, and this is especially hard for women who do want children.
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Meg Jay explains in her book, and there are a lot of stories online about women who didn't think marriage was a priority to consider
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and then they're going about their careers, time is flying by, and then suddenly they're racing to find a partner.
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That could make them at risk for settling for someone.
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Biological clock's ticking, right?
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She wants to find a husband.
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Everything is optimized to like find Mr. Right.
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And as a result, she's kind of killed her own personality.
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Plus, many completely miss the window to get pregnant in their lifetime.
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And that is so sad.
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Meg Jay's philosophy is to think ahead and remember that your time is not unlimited.
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She says that as a therapist, she talks to many different people in their 30s
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and a common theme that these clients express to Jay is that they wish they thought about serious relationships and marriage sooner.
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Plus after age 25, the age of your marriage doesn't determine divorce.
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Whew, 26.
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So overall, don't be afraid of dating to marry sooner.
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And if someone hates how you wanna be committed already, then they're probably not the right person anyway.
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Surprisingly, however, couples who live together before getting married tend to have higher divorce rates.
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This is called the cohabitation effect.
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Boy, was that hard to say.
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Sometimes people stay with each other for convenience or to save rent.
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I live in New York.
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I get it.
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But the issue is that people feel more and more locked in
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and they may neglect to think about whether this person is really right for them.
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I moved in with my now husband, Sean, actually very early on, so I'm not really one to say.
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But I will mention that very early on in our relationship, like in the first few months, we knew that we would get married.
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Jay says it's important to get clear on how committed you are to someone before moving in together.
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You can even test the relationship in other ways, like international travel.
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Six, ask yourself why.
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Time is of the essence.
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So in anything you're spending your time on, ask yourself why.
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Watching TV, why?
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Is this really so I can relax or am I just trying to escape?
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Why am I scrolling so much?
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Am I just trying to avoid the discomfort of learning in the real world?
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Why did I get so upset that my manager gave me negative feedback?
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Why did my partner and I get into a conflict?
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And importantly, what can I control to make things better?
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Number seven, do the math.
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There are three things that you can apply this to.
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So that's finances, health, and your relationships.
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Work backwards from 30 to calculate how much you should be reasonably saving in order to meet your financial goals.
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I'm a big supporter of enjoying your 20s, but do so responsibly.
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About health, time travel in your head to look at yourself in five years.
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How mobile will you really be?
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Will you feel good about your body?
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What kind of body will your current actions create?
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Relationships, if you want kids for sure, then calculate backwards about how many years you need to nurture relationships and so on for marriage and all that stuff.
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Of course, don't map out everything because that is impossible.
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Things will always, always change, but it's important to have an idea instead of absolutely no plan because no plan means you're gonna probably regret it.
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If you fail to prepare, you prepare to fail.
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The other thing you want to calculate to not regret is the proportion of time spent on each area of your life.
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So if you imagine yourself at age 30, would you really want 8% of your life to have been spent doom scrolling?
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Probably not, so adjust your daily time wisely.
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If you would like to learn from examples of people in their 20s living for themselves
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and how they did it despite the struggles, you can listen to my podcast, CEO of Life is on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and YouTube.
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For example, my friend Megan got laid off twice, but she was amazing and turned her situation into her becoming a full-time content creator.
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And now she lives her best life with freedom.
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I'll leave you with this awesome quote from Meg Jay.
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The future isn't written in the stars.
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There are no guarantees.
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So claim your adulthood. Be intentional.
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Get to work.
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Pick your family.
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Do the math.
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Make your own certainty.
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Don't be defined by what you didn't know or didn't do.
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You are deciding your life right now.
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Vocabulary and speaking notes for this lesson
This B2 speaking lesson is built on the video “If you're under 30, please watch this video…”. This video has 157 sentences and 1947 words to shadow. The speech runs for 9:29. The speaker talks fast, about 205 words per minute, so expect linked and reduced sounds. 84% 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 |
|---|---|---|
| unthought noun | That which has not been (yet) thought; that which has yet to enter into the mind; a non-existent thought. | |
| calculate verb | /ˈkælkjʊleɪt/ | To determine the value of something or the solution to something by a mathematical process. |
| adulthood noun | The state or condition, for humans and other animals, of physical and psychological maturity: being an adult. | |
| criticize verb | /ˈkɹɪtɪsaɪz/ | To find fault (with something). |
| backward adjective | /ˈbækwɚd/ | Situated toward or at the rear of something. |
| fertility noun | /fɝˈtɪləti/ | The condition, or the degree, of being fertile. |
| tick noun | /tɪk/ | A tiny woodland arachnid of the suborder Ixodida. |
| scroll noun | /skɹoʊl/ | A roll of paper or parchment; a writing formed into a roll. |
| consult verb | /ˈkɑnsʌlt/ | To seek the opinion or advice of another; to take counsel; to deliberate together; to confer; to advise. |
| mathematics noun | /mæθ(.ə)ˈmæt.ɪks/ | An abstract representational system studying numbers, shapes, structures, quantitative change and relationships between them. |
| accumulate verb | /əˈkjuːmjʊˌleɪt/ | To heap up in a mass; to pile up; to collect or bring together (either literally or figuratively), often gradually and without active intent. |
| bestseller noun | A book or other product that has sold in large numbers. | |
| biologically adverb | In a biological manner. | |
| blueprint noun | /ˈbluːˌpɹɪnt/ | A type of paper-based reproduction process producing white-on-blue images by means of a photosensitive ferric compound, used primarily for technical and… |
| cohabitation noun | /koʊhæbɪˈteɪʃən/ | An emotional and physical intimate relationship which includes a common living place and which exists without legal or religious sanction. |
Phrasal verbs you will hear
| Word | Pronunciation | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| going over noun | An inspection, examination, review, or investigation. | |
| lay off verb | (of an employer) To dismiss (workers) from employment, e.g. at a time of low business volume or through no fault of the worker, often with a severance package. | |
| pop up verb | To come up with a "pop" sound. | |
| show up verb | To appear, arrive, or attend, especially suddenly or erratically. | |
| step back verb | /stɛp ˈbæk/ | To stop what one is doing and evaluate the current situation. |
Sentences worth repeating
Short, complete lines from the video that you can reuse in everyday conversation:
- When we're in school, there's a formula to succeed.
- Why am I scrolling so much?
- How mobile will you really be?
- Will you feel good about your body?
- What kind of body will your current actions create?
Grammar in this video
The structures the speaker uses most, with the exact words from the video:
| Structure | In the video |
|---|---|
| Present perfect continuous have/has been + -ing — an action that started earlier and is still going on | has been working · have been living · I've been applying |
| Passive voice be + past participle — the focus is on what happens, not who does it | wasn't born · are stifled · being pushed |
| Relative clauses who / which + clause — extra information about a person or thing | anyone who just · women who do · women who didn |
Pronunciation to watch
The speaker uses 33 contractions and reduced forms, such as don't, you're, didn't. Say them the short way, as you hear them.
- The “th” sounds: mathematics /mæθ(.ə)ˈmæt.ɪks/, therapist /ˈθɛɹəpɪst/
- The “sh” and “zh” sounds: cohabitation /koʊhæbɪˈteɪʃən/, reassure /ˌɹi.əˈʃʊɹ/, refresher /ɹɪˈfɹɛʃɚ/, specialize /ˈspɛʃəˌlaɪz/, entrepreneurship /ˌɑn.tɹə.pɹəˈnɝ.ʃɪp/
- Long words — get the stress right: fertility /fɝˈtɪləti/, mathematics /mæθ(.ə)ˈmæt.ɪks/, accumulate /əˈkjuːmjʊˌleɪt/, cohabitation /koʊhæbɪˈteɪʃən/, entrepreneurship /ˌɑn.tɹə.pɹəˈnɝ.ʃɪp/
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 unthought, calculate, adulthood.
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.