Shadowing Practice: Talk To Strangers. It Will Change Your Life. - Learn English Speaking with YouTube
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Hey, how's it going?
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Hey, how's it going?
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Where are you going?
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Learning how to talk to strangers is one of the most fundamentally important skills that you can learn in your lifetime, no matter how old or young you are.
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Here's the problem though.
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Talking to strangers fundamentally is a very difficult thing to do because it requires you to put your ego in your pocket and allow yourself to potentially get rejected.
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Social anxiety has prevented me from asking out a lot of girls that I thought were cute, walking up to people who seemed interesting, and honestly putting myself out there more.
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It even took me a long time to start my YouTube channel because I was afraid to put my face onto this camera and potentially find out what my friends really thought of me.
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Now, I know that a lot of us have that same problem.
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So in this video, I'm going to be teaching you how to talk to strangers, how to move past that fear of rejection, and learn how to put yourself out there and open up every single door.
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Before I teach you how to talk to strangers, I think it's best I show you how not to talk to strangers.
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Can I ask you a quick question?
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Can I continue the conversation for you with your friend?
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Just take over the phone?
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You want to listen to the phone?
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Yeah?
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Don't say who it is though.
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Sorry.
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I have a quick question.
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What are you listening to?
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A podcast.
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Oh cool.
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Can I listen?
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Cool.
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Hi.
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I'm just a random stranger but I wanted to say hi.
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She doesn't speak English.
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What language?
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Spanish?
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Spanish.
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No hablas espanol pero te amo.
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Is your name John?
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By chance?
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Oh shit.
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I thought I recognized you from Cizep.
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I can only...
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No?
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No?
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I'm sorry.
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Can I get a hug?
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Can I have a hug?
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A hug?
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Yeah, why not?
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Nice to meet you.
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That's how not to ask, but now let's get into how to talk to strangers.
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So this is a video that I've been wanting to make for a long time because it's a problem that has been impacting me since high school.
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I used to be an extremely introverted person, so much so that in my final year of high school, I won an award.
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And any time that you win an award, you get a trophy, but you also get a book.
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and the book was picked by my English teacher who saw that I was struggling and having a really hard time.
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And the book was called Quiet by Susan Cain.
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It's a book entirely devoted to how introverts can still use their powers to make real life long lasting change in the world.
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What's funny is I had never considered myself an introvert or an extrovert.
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I didn't even understand both of those concepts until she gave me that book.
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And I couldn't believe that that was the book that she gave me because I thought introverts are never going to make big changes in the world because they're too afraid to talk to people.
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So I took her giving me that book as a shot or as a challenge, let's say, to become more of an extroverted human being.
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And at that exact point, I flipped the switch, started trying to talk to more people, get out of my comfort zone more, and become more of an extroverted human being.
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Most of us know that a fundamental part of human life is our social connections.
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As much as you might not wanna think so, or you might be willing to just sit on Instagram and scroll through social media for the rest of your life, talking to people is a very important part of life.
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and we all forget to do it or choose not to do it because it's scary because we don't want to get rejected and we don't want to get our egos bruised.
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In a very short amount of time, we have stopped going up to each other on the streets and instead just resorted to staring at our phone.
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And I find that we've lost this certain connection where it looks like we're more connected online, but at the same time, we're becoming increasingly disconnected in reality.
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Now to help me film this portion of the video where we're going to go talk to strangers, this is Joe.
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What's up?
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I made an Instagram story asking someone if they wanted to help me film.
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He answered like literally 60 seconds later.
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I saw it at that moment.
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I'm like, what am I doing?
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I'm not training.
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Gotta come help him out.
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Wanted to do it for a while.
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So perfect timing.
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I knew William from hockey.
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He was kind of an asshole in hockey.
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Like he wasn't that inspirational guy.
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So the idea I had of William was like an asshole.
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I don't know.
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One day my friend showed me.
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He's like, yo, look at this guy.
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I'm like, oh, fuck, I know him.
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He's an asshole.
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He's like, no, no.
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Look at this.
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Then I started listening to his content.
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I'm like, huh, interesting, okay, whatever.
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I'll give him a follow.
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And it's actually pretty great content.
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And he's a nice guy, I think so.
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We'll find out, we'll find out after today.
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So when it comes to actually developing the confidence to go and approach a stranger, you really just have to remember the fundamental lesson, which is a stranger is just a friend that you haven't yet met.
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Now, in my experience of talking to a lot of people and going up to them on the street and getting over my own version of social anxiety, the best way to talk to a stranger is to have a goal in mind before you enter the conversation.
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Once you've got that, it's really important to just be friendly when you enter the conversation.
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So one way that I really like to use, which honestly works all the time, is you just say, excuse me, sorry to bother you, do you mind if I ask you a quick question?
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Very Canadian, it's very friendly, it's very polite, but it really works.
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Once you're in the conversation, you're in.
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Like the hardest part is actually just getting the conversation started, and once you know that the person is interested in you and has given you the time to speak, then you just gotta do your thing.
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Be very complimentary to people, be very nice, and people will be nice in return.
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So what we're gonna do right now is I'm gonna show you a few different ways that you can actually walk up to strangers and talk to them.
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And I'm just gonna give you the entire rundown from not speaking to them to getting into a full-blown conversation.
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So we're just gonna start off with an ask and not a request.
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This is a really easy way to ease yourself into a conversation and just get the adrenaline pumping.
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After maybe two or three conversations with a stranger, you'll see when you try it, things get a lot easier.
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Hi, how are you?
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How's it going?
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Good, good.
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It was good, all right.
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That wasn't part of it, but...
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Excuse me, guys.
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Do you mind if I ask you a quick question?
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Okay, we're filming a video.
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We're from out of town, but we want to know what is one thing that we could do in Montreal that's really fun, that you recommend.
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Okay, wait, go for a good poutine.
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Go for a good poutine?
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Yeah.
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Okay, cool.
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All right, thank you.
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Excuse me, sir, how's it going?
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Can I ask you a quick question?
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We're not from Montreal, but we're trying to figure out cool things to do, so we're asking strangers if they can recommend anything.
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We're in the real present.
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There's a good night flight.
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Where are you from?
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I'm from Brazil.
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Brazil, nice.
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Excuse me?
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Sorry?
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What are you listening to?
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Drill.
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Drill?
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By who?
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What's up, dude?
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How are you?
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Filming a video or talking to strangers.
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Learning how to talk to strangers.
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Not a stranger though.
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How's it going?
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Been a while.
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I feel like I know everyone who's walking on the street.
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Every time I see someone in the distance, I'm like, I think I know you.
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Can I ask you guys a quick question?
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You mind if I ask you guys a quick question?
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No one speaks any language.
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Excuse me guys, can I ask you a quick question?
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Can I ask you a quick question?
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Excuse me?
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Do you mind if I ask you guys a quick question?
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Parle pas anglais, ok.
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En français?
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First rejection.
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Yeah, first rejection.
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See, what's the worst case that happens?
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Like my feet are still moving, their feet are still moving, it's all good.
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The thing about rejection is that most of us think it's personal.
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But the reality is, it's not personal.
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No one knows you.
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They don't know who I am.
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They're just making a judgement.
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They're basing it off that.
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So if we can get past that, then we're good.
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Alright, so part number two.
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I'm going to take one of my extroverted friends, which is Joe.
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Joe supposedly claims that he's not afraid of anything.
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I am not afraid.
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And we're going to walk him through how to start random conversations with random strangers.
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And he's taking me to the same category in the hardest part.
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Yeah, I'm taking you to the most busy street in Montreal.
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Excuse me.
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Do you mind if I ask you a quick question?
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What's your best piece of life advice?
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No one to say no.
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not in a good place can i issue a challenge to you yeah go for it can i get you to walk up to a stranger and ask them if you can give them the hug yeah okay go for it i love this hi i'm so sorry
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yeah no problem okay better question can i also get a hug sure yeah that's it bro just out of curiosity why did you say
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yes so fast is that you vlogging i am vlogging yeah i want to give love to people you should always say yes more often you'll have more
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stories two future motivational speakers right here sir we just want to say you're doing a great job thank you you're awesome really we needed
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someone intelligent as part of the organization so you'd be the only person in my family yeah that's why i'm here have a good one that was the gm of the hubs that was can't that It does Ken Hughes, it does the GM of the house.
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Okay, last step in the progression of trying to talk to strangers.
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We're going to go out with a little bit of an extreme challenge and walk up to different restaurants and ask them if we can get a free item.
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Hey, how are you?
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I'm good.
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We're doing a social experiment for you too.
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So for the last part of the video, we're going up to different restaurants and asking if we can get one free item.
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It's just a project we're doing.
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Can we take some of the groceries?
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I got the no at Starbucks.
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Two scoops.
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Free garlic potatoes from Amir.
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We just got a free drink and a free cheeseburger from McDonald's.
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Success!
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Success.
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So we went to ask at five places and we got four yeses and one no.
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So we got a black coffee from Java U, a cheeseburger from McDonald's,
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two full scoops of protein powder from liquid nutrition some garlic roasted potatoes from amir if you know montreal you know that lebanese
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garlic potatoes these are like the bomb and then last but not least we got six mini donuts from mr puffs we
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got all of this for absolutely no cost just because we asked now talking to strangers is really nerve-wracking and that makes me at least sweat a lot and it makes my clothes pretty stinky So the sponsor of today's video, True Earth, is a perfect remedy for that.
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True Earth is a Canadian company that makes eco-friendly products that help you reduce the amount of plastic that you use in your household and that you use when you travel.
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They have a lot of products, but the one that I'm going to show you today is their eco-friendly laundry strips.
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And these are actually really amazing, both if you have a laundry machine, but also if you don't have one available at your disposal.
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In my case, all I have is this sink that I filled with water, and I'm going to show you how you can use these on the go.
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The first thing that you're going to do is you're going to fill up your sink with some water and then you're going to tear open the True Earth packet, take out one laundry strip, and then all you're going to do is throw it into the water.
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It will dissolve itself.
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From there on, you just put your clothes in and let it soak for about 15 or 30 minutes.
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Then take it out, rinse it off, and voila, hang it anywhere you need to.
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Now, if you want to try any of their products out, then make sure to hit the link in the description below and use my discount code SPROUT on checkout for 10% off.
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Thank you, True Earth, for continuing to support me.
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Now let's get back to this video.
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Funny enough, learning how to talk to strangers is about everything except for learning how to talk to strangers.
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It's about rebuilding one of the most essential human traits that the human race has lost in the last 15 years.
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And after high school, I started figuring out more and more what I wanted to do in life.
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And I realized that if I wanted to have a big brand and be on social media, then there's no way that I could do that and still be introverted and achieve the same success that I have planned for myself in my head.
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And I know for a lot of you watching, it's the same thing.
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Even if you don't necessarily want to be on social media and running a brand like me, just being able to talk to more people and open up more doors is probably going to get you to where you want to be in life.
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It comes back to you.
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If you're comfortable with you and you know yourself, you go up and ask.
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Either they're going to say, leave me alone or nothing.
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That's the bottom line.
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You have to try in life.
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Pretend that you're abroad.
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No one knows you.
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You know, just asking for some little things.
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You know, what do you like about city?
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Like, what's, I don't know, where to eat and everything.
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Just like not thinking too far.
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just like hey i just wanted to tell someone today you know just asking about how they're doing and stuff i did just love gags for five years so i knew how to go up to strangers i did this for five
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years before i used to be shy when i was younger when i would prime people i'm like okay what's the worst that could happen the worst thing for example right
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now is that they don't want to hug me you know we can't be afraid of rejection it's important and it's part of life so yeah you just gotta ask They're good.
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That is how not to walk up to a stranger.
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Why practice speaking with this video?
Engaging with unfamiliar faces can unlock new experiences and enhance your English speaking practice. The video "Talk To Strangers. It Will Change Your Life" emphasizes the significance of overcoming social anxiety and building confidence in conversations. By watching and mimicking the speaker, you not only learn effective communication strategies but also practice the vital skill of expressing yourself in English.
Interacting with strangers helps you become adaptable in various social settings, and utilizing methods like the shadowing technique allows you to imitate native speakers' expressions and tones. This practice equips you with the confidence to initiate conversations, helping break down language barriers while fostering relationships. Every interaction serves as an opportunity to improve your vocabulary and fluency through real-life application.
Grammar & Expressions in Context
The video provides a rich array of conversational structures. Here are a few key expressions to note:
- "Can I ask you a quick question?" - This is a polite way to initiate a conversation. Note how questions can engage a listener and make them more receptive.
- "Nice to meet you." - A common yet effective expression used when meeting someone new, helping to establish friendliness.
- "What are you listening to?" - This inquiry showcases an excellent way to connect over shared interests, making it easier to keep the conversation flowing.
- "I can only..." - Understanding how the speaker uses this structure can help you clarify when responding to questions or comments.
Practicing these expressions through a shadowing app can enhance your ability to recall and use them naturally in conversation. Use the phrases as a springboard for your discussions with others.
Common Pronunciation Traps
Paying attention to pronunciation is vital for effective communication. In the video, certain words and phrases might present challenges:
- "strangers" - The initial 'str' sound can be difficult; practice articulating it clearly.
- "cool" - The casual tone should resonate in your speech. Ensure you practice its pronunciation to sound more natural.
- "hug" - Note the relaxation of the 'h' sound and the soft 'u'. This can be tricky for non-native speakers, so repetition is key.
To overcome these pronunciation hurdles, consistently use techniques like shadowspeak to mimic the speaker’s tone and accent, refining your own pronunciation. Engaging in this practice not only boosts language skills but also enhances your comfort in diverse conversational contexts.
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.