Shadowing Practice: This One Skill Will Change Your Life - Learn English Speaking with Video
Creating lesson...
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My question is, what does this listening posture look like over time?
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And with your knowledge of personal psychology,
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I think we can all say we've somewhere encountered one of those relationships where one person does all the work
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and the other person can't engage in this, even if they have been listened to over and over and over again.
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But at our society level, if that does happen, now let's try it.
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I totally agree with you.
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Let's listen.
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If we wind up in this, sometimes it's always listening and it never turns into listening back.
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Right.
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What's that look like over time?
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You do test for reciprocity.
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So children, for example, when children are investigating potential play partners on the playground, they'll come up to a child,
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let's assume a child of roughly the same age, because that would be the most common situation.
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Maybe we're talking about kids who are four or five years old.
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And they'll throw out a play gesture that's rather simple, so maybe that a two -year -old could manage.
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And then if the person manages a proper response, then they throw out a little more sophisticated and if the person responds appropriately,
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then they ratchet up to just above their developmental level, and then they play like mad at that level, and that'll make them friends.
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And so partly what they're testing for there continually is whether there's something approximating reciprocal altruism, right?
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It's tit for tat in the positive sense.
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And I would say that, well, we know there's actually a literature on this, which is quite interesting.
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This is also something very practical to know, and I'll get to another practicality here.
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So there have been psychologists who've done empirical investigations into what predicts the longevity of a relationship.
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And so here's one experiment that was conducted multiple times and I believe this is very reliable data.
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So imagine you have the two partners in a marriage, each rate the number of encounters they have with their other partner a day.
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It's kind of an arbitrary and subjective measure but it doesn't matter.
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You might say, well I talked to my wife eight times today we had eight different interactions.
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And then you'd say, well, did you rate those for whether they're positive or negative?
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And then you can calculate a ratio of positive to negative.
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And then you can use the ratio to predict the longevity of the relationship.
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And the data show that if the relationship interactions fall below five positive to one negative,
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then the relationship deteriorates and is generally doomed.
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And so five to one, that's preponderance of positive interactions,
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but we're wired so that negative interactions hurt us more than positive interactions help us if they are of the same magnitude.
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So, for example, people will work harder to avoid a loss of five dollars than they will to attain a gain of five dollars.
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And you might say, well, why is that?
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And the answer is you can be absolutely dead, but there's only so happy you can be.
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And so it's bare to err on the side of conservatism in the domain of negative emotion.
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And so, but interestingly And interestingly enough, if the interactions rise so that they exceed 11 positive to one negative,
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the relationship also deteriorates.
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And so what that suggests is that there's some, it's sort of like smiles with teeth, right?
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You want a fair bit of positive emotion and reflection from your partner, but you don't want them to be a naive,
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dependent pushover who's afraid to stand up for themselves.
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And so you want to, you know, because you're a nasty, horrible human being, and now and then you poke your partner just to see if there's anything there, because that's what you're like, and if you find out there isn't,
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you'll run roughshod over them, and you think you won't, but you will, especially if they're very good at implicitly encouraging that, which dependent people sometimes are.
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So you do assess for reciprocity,
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and the basic rule is you want approximately equal reciprocity in relationships that you want to maintain.
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Now, maybe, you know, you have enough additional resource to be the giver more often than receiver in some relationships, but I don't even think that really works that well with children.
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You know, I mean, you obviously have to take care of them, but it's not like they don't deliver the goods to you if you have a good relationship with them.
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And you want to, to some degree, to enforce that reciprocity.
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Now, you might say, well, what happens in relationships where that's impossible?
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And, well, I give you a practical piece of a suggestion on that front, and this is another thing you can do in your own household.
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This is so useful.
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Man, if you get good at doing this, your life will get so much better.
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You can't believe it.
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Is watch the people around you, and whenever they do anything that you would like to see repeated on a regular basis,
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tell them exactly what they did in detail.
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with, you know, be positive about it, obviously, and just indicate that you noticed.
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And because I saw this when I was grading student essays, you know, and so I taught this seminar for a long time, and I was trying to teach kids how to write.
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They were in their fourth year of university in the Honours Psych Program.
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You'd think they'd bloody well already know how to write, but they didn't.
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And so I'd have them write a four -page essay on a given topic, and then they had to rewrite that to a six -page essay, and then they had to rewrite that to an eight -page essay.
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And the first essay I graded was only 5 % of their grade, and I told them, I'm going to cut you into ribbons, but it doesn't matter because it's, you know, 5 % of your grade,
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and so they could tolerate that.
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And generally, by the third essay, they had written the best thing they'd ever written in their life, and they learned so fast it was unbelievable.
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But one of the things I noticed was that they did a little testing with the first essay.
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They'd hand in something.
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And he was just like, God, formulaic, boring.
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They weren't in it at all, you know.
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There was nothing of the person in there.
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There was no thought.
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There was just the kind of psychobabble that they'd learned, especially if they were in faculties of education.
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And it was dry and dull, and everything about it was wrong.
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And so those are hard to grade, right?
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It's like, what's wrong with my essay?
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Well, the words aren't right.
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The phrases, they're not so good.
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They're not organized well into sentences.
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The sentences aren't sequenced well in the paragraphs, the paragraphs don't make a coherent argument, and the entire thing is empty.
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But other than that, no problem.
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It was often easier just to rewrite those essays than to grade them.
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So, in any case, though, one of the things I did learn was that even in an essay like that,
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there is usually like one sentence or two sentences buried on like page three that was an actual thought
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and reasonably clearly stated and somewhat gripping, you know.
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It was like the person popped out from all the background rubbish and said, well, what about this?
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And if you saw that and checked it and said, hey, you hit the mark right there, the next essay would be like two -thirds that.
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And that was really fun to see.
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And then maybe by the third essay, maybe it was all like that.
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And then they were really thrilled.
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It's like, wow, I wrote this, you know.
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And it was sort of the culmination.
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Well, it was a fourth -year seminar.
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It was the culmination of their career as a psychology undergraduate.
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So that was great fun.
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But you can do that in your own household
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if the envious part of you isn't jealous of the revelation of the goodness of the person.
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And so here's the opposite tack if you want to do this.
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So imagine that you're a man who's managed to attract a mate and he believes he's punched above his weight.
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So this woman is more attractive, let's say, more vivacious, more desirable than he deserves.
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So that's going to grate on his soul a fair bit, right?
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Partly because her shining casts a dim light on his lack of utility, let's say.
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And so you can imagine someone like that being prone to jealousy, for obvious reasons.
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And so the best tact to manage in a situation like that, if you're that man, is to wait till your wife dresses herself up in a particularly attractive manner
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and then either fail to notice by occupying yourself with something trivial while she's attempting to gain your attention,
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or by criticizing her directly for what she's just managed to do.
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And if you do that 50 times, let's say, you can be sure that she'll never reveal her attractiveness to anyone else for the rest of her life,
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including you, and you'll get exactly what you deserve.
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So that's the opposite of watching people carefully.
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Now, I learned this in part from Skinner, B .F.
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Skinner, the famous animal behaviorist, because he used all sorts of reinforcement contingencies to shape animal behavior.
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Skinner was unbelievably good at this.
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He trained pigeons in World War II to guide missiles by pecking at photographs,
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so they could map the photographs onto the missile trajectory, viewing the territory underneath, and peck accurately enough to guide the missile to its destination.
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That was discontinued as the technology for guided missiles developed, but Skinner could do that.
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And, you know, we think pigeons, well, they're not that bright.
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It's like, they're smarter than you think, pigeons.
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That's why they can live in cities.
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That's not easy for a bird to pull off, you know.
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It's not their natural habitat.
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And so, but Skinner, although he would use punishment, technically speaking, which is the application of a certain amount of pain,
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or threat, which is the use of anxiety, but what he believed was most effective was reward.
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But it required a tremendous amount of attention.
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So, for example, if Skinner was trying to train a rat to climb up a little ladder
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and then across the ladder and then maybe do a pirouette and come down, which he could do with no problem, he'd wait, he'd just watch the rat, and then when it got close to the ladder...
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he'd give it a food pellet.
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Now, his rats were starved, by the way, down to three quarters of their normal body weight, so they were pretty eager to work for food.
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It's not something you necessarily saw in the methodology section of the papers, but...
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Well, and that's not a critique of Skinner, it's just an indication of how simplification takes place in laboratory experiments.
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In any case, he'd wait for the rat to get near the ladder and give it a food pellet.
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And soon, the rat would be hanging around the ladder quite a lot.
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and then now and then just more
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or less randomly the rat would put a paw up on
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the ladders food pellet well then the rat would hang around the bottom of the ladder with paw well
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if he did that
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continually through observation he could get the rat to do pretty much anything
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that you could imagine a rat to do
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and then maybe some things you couldn't imagine
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and this isn't a manipulative technique by the way although it can be used
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that way it's not effective unless you do it with a a certain degree of wisdom.
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You want to think, well, what do you want in your house?
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How about peace, tranquility, happiness and humor?
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Something like that.
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That's not a bad first -pass approximation.
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And you want to get that in your head.
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It's like, do you want that, or do you want the delights of endless martyrdom?
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Because you have to make a choice, and you might think, I wouldn't pick martyrdom.
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It's like, really?
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Really?
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You wouldn't, eh?
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You'd pick peace and happiness and humor, and so everywhere you go, that's all you're ever surrounded with.
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It's like highly improbable.
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So don't be so sure you're aiming up.
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But if you can orient yourself in that direction, and then carefully, and knowing full well what the hellish alternative is, because you need to know that,
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then you can watch and see, well, when is this manifesting itself in the people around me?
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And then you can tell them in detail, I noticed, son, I noticed.
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Today, we're having a discussion at dinner, you know, and you made a spectacularly witty remark right at the right time.
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And it was provocative, but not annoying.
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And so, good work.
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And then the kid thinks, oh my God, did he notice?
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And then he's like twice as funny the next day, and maybe not in some unbearable manner.
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And that really works.
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It really works.
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But like I said, you have to quell the envy that would otherwise beset you.
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And you have to want to aim up.
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And then you have to not be jealous of the other person's goodness and you have to be extremely attentive, but man, as a transformation technique,
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even in extraordinarily difficult relationships, which goes back to your point, there isn't anything I know of that's more effective.
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And I've been working with moderate Democrats in the United States recently
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and with a number of Republicans and suggesting that to the Democrats
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that when the Republicans do something that isn't absolutely malevolent and stupid, in your opinion, you might want to just say something.
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Like, that's not as bad as it could have been, you know?
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Something at least.
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And the same for the Republicans in relationship to the Democrats, and that because it's also one of the ways that you can reduce the tit -for -tat proclivity, right?
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You want to give the devil his due, especially when you're not actually talking to the devil, but just the person who's sitting across you, let's say in the house.
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It's an unbelie - and people, that's another issue.
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I mean, if you want people to appreciate having you around, learning how to listen, that is a skill that is absolutely unbeatable.
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And this technique of summarizing to their satisfaction, that works like a charm.
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And it's not, you know, you might be a little awkward when you first try it, and might feel a little manipulated because you're not that good at it, but if you get expert at it,
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And you have the greatest conversations with everyone.
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You know, I had people in my clinical practice who were extraordinarily impaired intellectually
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and suffering from all sorts of assorted pathologies in addition to that.
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And if I was listening to them properly, they were as fascinating as anybody I had on the more able and competent end of the spectrum.
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And you learn so much because there is nothing that people won't tell you if you listen.
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It is absolutely amazing what people will tell you and so quickly they'll reveal things they didn't even know about themselves.
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And they need to know those things often.
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They've been hidden for years.
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It's so rewarding.
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And then this use of attentive reward,
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that's also, it's fun in a game -like sense once you learn to play it because you're watching.
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You think, I'll just wait.
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This person's going to do something good sooner or later.
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It's like, pap, good work.
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And people are so thrilled that that little manifestation of goodness in their heart
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that managed to sneak out past their cynicism and boredom was recognized.
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They're so, what is it?
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It restores their faith in what's good inside them.
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It really does.
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It's unbelievably powerful.
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And so that can work.
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If you're embroiled in a difficult relationship, you know, and you can't escape easily, or maybe you can't escape on moral grounds,
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that listening, that helps a lot.
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You might have to listen a lot.
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But that use of judicious reward, man, that's a powerful technique.
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Vocabulary and speaking notes for this lesson
This video has 201 sentences and 2745 words to shadow. The speech runs for 15:13. The speaker talks fast, about 180 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
15 words from the video worth learning, with pronunciation and meaning:
| Word | Pronunciation | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| essay noun | /ˈɛs.eɪ/ | A written composition of moderate length, exploring a particular issue or subject. |
| ladder noun | /ˈlæd.ɚ/ | A frame, usually portable, of wood, metal, or rope, used for ascent and descent, consisting of two side pieces to which are fastened rungs (cross strips or… |
| interaction noun | /ˌɪn.təˈɹæk.ʃən/ | The situation or occurrence in which two or more things act upon one another to produce an effect; the effect resulting from such a situation or occurrence. |
| technique noun | /tɛkˈniːk/ | The practical aspects of a given art, occupation etc.; formal requirements. |
| reward noun | /ɹɪˈwɔɹd/ | Something of value given in return for an act. |
| missile noun | /ˈmɪs.aɪl/ | Any object used as a weapon by being thrown or fired through the air, such as stone, arrow or bullet. |
| goodness noun | /ˈɡʊdnəs/ | The state or characteristic of being good. |
| pigeon noun | /ˈpɪ.dʒɪn/ | One of several birds of the family Columbidae within the order Columbiformes. |
| practical adjective | /ˈpɹæk.tɪ.kəl/ | Relating to, or based on, practice or action rather than theory or hypothesis. |
| household adjective | /ˈhaʊshoʊld/ | Belonging to the same house and family. |
| carefully adverb | /ˈkɛɹf(ə)li/ | With care; attentively, circumspectly. |
| happiness noun | /ˈhæpinɪs/ | The emotion of being happy; joy; elation. |
| reveal verb | /ɹɪˈviːl/ | To uncover; to show and display that which was hidden. |
| experiment noun | /ɪkˈspɛɹ.ə.mənt/ | A test under controlled conditions made to either demonstrate a known truth, examine the validity of a hypothesis, or determine the efficacy or likelihood of… |
| ratio noun | /ˈɹeɪ.ʃoʊ/ | A number representing a comparison between two named things. |
Phrasal verbs you will hear
| Word | Pronunciation | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| hang around verb | To stay, linger, or loiter. | |
| throw out verb | /ˈθɹəʊ ˌaʊt/ | To discard; to dispense with something; to throw away. |
| come down verb | To descend, fall down, collapse. | |
| come up to verb | To approach. | |
| find out verb | To discover, as by asking or investigating. | |
| go back to verb | To stem from; to originate in. | |
| pull off verb | To remove by pulling. | |
| stand up for verb | To speak or act in support or defense of (a person, a cause, a belief, or the like). |
Pronunciation to watch
The speaker uses 73 contractions and reduced forms, such as you're, they're, don't. Say them the short way, as you hear them.
- The “th” sounds: thrill /θɹɪl/, underneath /ˌʌndɚˈniθ/, methodology /ˌmɛθ.əˈdɑ.lə.d͡ʒi/, pathology /pəˈθɒləd͡ʒi/
- The “sh” and “zh” sounds: interaction /ˌɪn.təˈɹæk.ʃən/, ratio /ˈɹeɪ.ʃoʊ/, emotion /ɪˈməʊ.ʃən/, punishment /ˈpʌnɪʃmənt/, destination /dɛstɪˈneɪʃən/
- Long words — get the stress right: interaction /ˌɪn.təˈɹæk.ʃən/, experiment /ɪkˈspɛɹ.ə.mənt/, psychology /saɪˈkɑ.lə.d͡ʒi/, continually /kənˈtɪnjuəli/, longevity /lɒnˈd͡ʒɛv.ɪ.ti/
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 essay, ladder, interaction.
Grammar in this video
The structures the speaker uses most, with the exact words from the video:
| Structure | In the video |
|---|---|
| Passive voice be + past participle — the focus is on what happens, not who does it | have been listened · was conducted · aren't sequenced |
| Relative clauses who / which + clause — extra information about a person or thing | kids who are · this, which is · speaking, which is |
| Present perfect have/has + past participle — a past action that still matters now | have been listened · have been · They've been hidden |
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.