Shadowing Practice: Life is Short, Travel Now | Jared Kamrowski | TEDxFargo - Learn English Speaking with YouTube
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Leonardo Silva Reviewer Reviewer Edecijio K.P.
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Leonardo Silva Reviewer Reviewer Edecijio K.P.
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We all think that we're invincible,
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and we assume that we're going to live forever.
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But far too often, life reminds us that that's not the case.
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Recently, a family member of mine who had worked hard his entire life found out that he had cancer,
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and he didn't have much time left.
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And one of the biggest regrets that he had when he looked back on his life was that he worked too hard,
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and he hadn't spent enough time with his family.
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So he impressed on his kids,
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worked just a little less,
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spent more time together, and most of all, have fun.
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Because spending time together as a family is one of the most important things we have.
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You know, we all have plans and goals in life,
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but sometimes life takes us down a different road,
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and we need to adapt. So, life is short.
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Take vacations.
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You know, while that's going to the Maldives on a beautiful beach,
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or just going to a lake cabin a couple hours away,
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we need to take off time from school and work to recharge our batteries and just kind of kick back and relax.
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Sadly, as Americans, we choose to spend too much time at work,
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and we don't take the vacation that we earned off to recharge our batteries and enjoy life.
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And this is a serious problem.
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So according to the research done by Project Time Off,
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52% of Americans aren't using all their vacation.
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This totals an astounding 212 million days that are forfeited.
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Basically, all these days, 212 million days that you've earned have been just given back to your employer,
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and that's just in the US alone.
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Another stat, 24% of us who are taking a vacation,
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you're not actually even leaving home.
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You're just, you know, obviously there's nothing wrong with being a homebody,
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but getting out there into the world is shown as a lot healthier for your overall well-being.
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And those of us that are taking vacations,
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66% of you are still working while you're on vacation, myself included.
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And not being able to disconnect is a huge problem.
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Simply put, many of us are missing out on the experiences,
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memories, and moments that define us.
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So digging a little bit more into the research that Project Time Out did,
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there's a strong correlation between travel and happiness.
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Those of us who use more of our vacation time to travel are happier.
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And actually when you return back to work,
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you're more productive than another person who's just been toiling away in their cubicle,
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never taking any of your leave.
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And surprisingly, you're more likely to be promoted at work if you're the person who's on vacation all the time.
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Which is like mind-boggling but I think it goes back to the idea that if you're happier and you're more productive,
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you're more likely to get promoted.
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And I think it takes a lot of us a
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while to come to that conclusion but once you realize that you're like,
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yeah this is pretty awesome.
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I think one of the big things is you know building these stronger relationships,
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traveling with friends and family, it's so important.
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Like I said, you know at the end of the day what do we really have at the end?
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It's friends and family and trying to enjoy life.
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And the last benefit of traveling,
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the one that I think really embodies the spirit of TEDxFargo,
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is seeing the world and diversity in a new light.
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In the polarized world that we live in,
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I think travel is essential for breaking down the walls and preconceived notions that we have about other countries and other cultures. So prioritize travel now.
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Why wait?
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Why procrastinate?
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Why wait until you're old and gray?
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Do it now.
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There's no reason not to.
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I know some of you are thinking,
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I can't afford it, I can't do it.
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But I'm sure that there's plenty of ways that you could cut costs,
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and if you applied those savings,
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you put it towards travel, you could afford it.
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So saving and living a frugal lifestyle,
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it's the key to unlocking a world of travel.
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Alright, so, first myth.
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Travel is expensive.
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Can it be expensive?
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Absolutely, travel can be disgustingly expensive.
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And this stops many people from doing it.
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They just are like, it isn't for me,
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can't afford it, too much credit card debt.
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I mean, you hear this all the time.
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So what we need to do is we need to develop strategies
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and we need to use tools in order to reduce those costs.
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So let's dig into it.
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Let's bust up this myth.
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All right, first off, there's some beautiful things that have happened in the last 10 to 20 years,
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and one of them is airline competition.
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There's been so many new airlines that have popped up,
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some ultra-low-cost carriers like Spirit and Frontier,
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and also these transatlantic carriers like Wauer,
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Norwegian, Icelandair that have helped to drive down prices.
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And while I wouldn't necessarily advocate for flying Spirit all the time,
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in fact, I have a saying,
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friends don't let friends fly Spirit.
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You know, these low-cost carriers have been able to drive down prices and make it cheaper for all of us to fly.
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Also cheap oil, cheap fuel.
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Up until recently, oil's been at some of the lowest points in a long time.
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And while it still has uptick,
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airline prices are as cheap now as they have ever been in the history of aviation.
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Think about that.
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It's a crazy concept.
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Flights used to cost $5,000 in the 70s to fly from New York to London,
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and you can now go there for under $500.
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And now this sharing economy,
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this is one of my favorite things.
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And we're talking about Airbnb,
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VRBO, Lyft, Uber, you name it.
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There's so many new ones popping up all the time.
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There's these entrepreneurs in different parts of the world
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that are offering their homes for rent or driving people around instead of using a traditional taxi.
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And it offers an opportunity for us as travelers to save
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and maybe do things instead of staying in a stuffy hotel or sitting in that boring taxi.
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And it's created this beautiful new economy that's helped build out so many new relationships.
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Airline flash sales.
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And I can see the blank look on a lot of your faces.
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You're like, what is an airline flash sale?
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So this is what I do for a living.
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The airlines have these unadvertised sales that they don't want any of you guys to know about.
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And for example, most people don't know that at least one or two times a month,
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you can fly from any city in the US to Europe for about $400 to $500.
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They have these sales that last maybe like five,
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six, seven hours, and then they're gone, even from Fargo.
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So this is what I do for a living,
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and this is what I get super excited about.
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People who think that flying to Europe is something that's going to be incredibly expensive,
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and that doesn't necessarily need to be the case.
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Bank competition.
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And when I'm talking about bank competition,
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I'm talking about credit card travel rewards.
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So we have a huge problem in this country with credit card debt.
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It is crushing.
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But if you're the kind of frugal person who's able to pay off your cards every single month,
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taking advantage of those $50,000 and $60,000 sign-up bonuses,
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That's the key to reducing your travel costs.
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Alright, so let's dig into my favorite cheap travel tips.
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First off, we need to reduce the cost of the two most expensive components of your travel,
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reducing the cost of flights and lodging.
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So the first one, search with Google Flights.
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If you're using Kayak, Priceline, Expedia, whatever, stop.
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Use Google Flights.
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All I do is search for flights for a living,
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and Google Flights is without question the number one tool.
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Follow Flight Deal websites like ThriftyTraveler or TheFlightDeal.com.
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You guys don't have time to be looking for these fares, but we do.
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So follow us and figure it out.
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Use Airbnb and VRBO.
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I was talking about stuffy hotels.
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Airbnb is incredible that you can stay in a house on the coast in the Caribbean
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for pennies on the dollar in comparison to an expensive four or five star hotel.
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Also, traveling with friends and family abroad,
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maybe getting a house that you can fit 10 or 15 people,
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friends and family, it's incredibly important to reduce costs.
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If you have a $500 house and you get 10 people to stay in it,
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that's 50 bucks a night,
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and it's much cheaper than a hotel.
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And maximizing that world of points and miles that I talked about.
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This is the thing that I created Thrifty Traveler about just
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because I get so excited that you don't even need to pay money for flights or hotels.
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You can use all these travel rewards,
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and you don't even need to travel to get them,
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and that's where the credit card travel rewards comes about.
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All right, so don't limit yourself.
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The one thing that I absolutely despise is the words once-in-a-lifetime trip.
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There should be no such thing as a once-in-a-lifetime trip.
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You should travel early, and you should travel often.
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The world is a beautiful and massive place,
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and it would be tragic for you not to go out and explore as much of it as possible.
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When I quit my job,
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my wife gave me a card in the morning,
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right before I was going to tell my corporate employer that I was done,
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and I was going to do thrifty traveler full-time and on the front of this card it said,
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do one thing every day that scares you.
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And I'm not a huge quote person,
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but this really resonated with me.
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And I think it can apply to travel as well as everyday life,
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whether eating street food in Bangkok,
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solo traveling in New York,
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or even giving a TED talk in front of a sold out crowd in Fargo.
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You need to push yourself to take that vacation,
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try new things, and visit new places.
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but most importantly, have fun and live without regrets.
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Thank you.
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About This Lesson
In this lesson, you will practice your English listening and speaking skills through a TEDx talk by Jared Kamrowski. This talk emphasizes the importance of taking breaks and traveling to enhance our quality of life. By engaging with this material, you will not only improve your English pronunciation but also gain insights into the significance of work-life balance and exploring the world. The talk provides an excellent context for learning conversational English, especially when discussing topics related to happiness, family, and the need to recharge. You will also practice using the shadowing technique, where you’ll listen to sections of the video and repeat them aloud, mirroring the speaker’s intonation and pace.
Key Vocabulary & Phrases
- Invincible: Feeling as if one cannot be harmed or defeated.
- Recharge: To rest or take a break in order to regain energy.
- Forfeited: To lose or give up something, usually as a penalty or by choice.
- Correlation: A mutual relationship or connection between two things.
- Productive: Being effective in producing a desired result or outcome.
- Homebody: A person who prefers to stay at home rather than go out.
- Adapt: To change behavior or ideas in response to new conditions or environments.
- Experience: Knowledge or skill gained over time through involvement in an activity.
Practice Tips
To effectively use the shadowing technique with this TEDx talk, start by watching a short segment of the video. Pause after a sentence or an idea, then repeat what you just heard, focusing on emulating the speaker’s tone and rhythm. Since Jared Kamrowski speaks at a moderate pace, this will be beneficial for both beginners and intermediate learners in IELTS speaking practice.
As you engage with the content, try to incorporate the new vocabulary into your shadow speak. This not only strengthens your understanding of the words but also enhances your ability to use them in conversation. By practicing with authentic material like this TEDx talk, you can significantly improve your English pronunciation while gaining valuable insights into life and travel.
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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