Shadowing Practice: Will Smith | How To Achieve Success - Learn English Speaking with Video
Creating lesson...
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Following your dreams is a lonely, solitary, scary, dangerous pursuit.
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You can't wait for somebody to think you can do it.
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And it's like they they because they don't think you can do nothing they can't do.
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Exactly.
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You know what I mean?
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It's like it is a lonely, scary, dangerous pursuit.
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And you got to be willing to risk everything to become that seed of what you believe is in there.
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You got to be fearless.
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You got to be relentless everybody has dreams and and
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and as much as you you want to be able to listen a little bit
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because somebody's going to give you a gem but nobody knows
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but you you can't get advice on what you should do
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with your life right nobody knows what you are like even
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even sometimes you don't really even know what you what you are you got to take your shot
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and it's like as much as you want people to agree
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and you want the people around you to be supporting your dreams
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and all it's not gonna be like
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that all the time you got to do it alone
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and people will help you and once you
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when you get the ball rolling people will jump on but
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if you don't believe nobody else is gonna believe people come along
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because your belief is so insane that your belief is
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so strong that makes people be like yo it's crazy grow
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or die was the basic central premise that we were working with
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that if you're not if you don't grow you will perish there's there's one relationship
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that you have to maintain and that's the one with you right
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and it's like if if you're not loving you
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if you're not taking care of you everything
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and everybody is second to you taking care of you first
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and foremost when you are steady
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and calm in yourself it makes it easier to manage the insanity
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that other people are going to bring to you the core
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of how things are created in the universe is through collision you know
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so you got to be prepared to collide
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if you want to create something only sustainable mission throughout your whole existence is to improve lives
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and as soon as i made the shift in my mind from trying to be big
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and trying to have money and trying to be popular to making sure
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that i improved lives every step of the way on this earth then all of a sudden i started experiencing healing
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Vocabulary and speaking notes for this lesson
This video has 38 sentences and 429 words to shadow. The speech runs for 2:21. The speaker talks fast, about 183 words per minute, so expect linked and reduced sounds. 91% of the words are among the 3,000 most common in English, so the vocabulary is easy to follow.
Key vocabulary in this video
The 12 most advanced words in the video, with pronunciation and meaning:
| Word | Pronunciation | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| pursuit noun | /pɝˈsut/ | The act of pursuing. |
| collide verb | /kəˈlaɪd/ | To impact directly, especially if violent. |
| perish verb | /ˈpɛɹɪʃ/ | To decay and disappear; to waste away to nothing. |
| relentless adjective | /ɹɪˈlɛntləs/ | Unrelenting or unyielding in severity. |
| fearless adjective | /ˈfɪɹləs/ | Without fear. |
| insanity noun | /ɪnˈsænɪti/ | The state of being insane; madness. |
| solitary adjective | /ˈsɑlɪˌtɛɹi/ | Living or being by oneself; alone; having no companion present |
| foremost adjective | /ˈfɔː.məʊst/ | Positioned in front of (all) others in space, most forward. |
| premise noun | /ˈpɹɛm.ɪs/ | A proposition antecedently supposed or proved; something previously stated or assumed as the basis of further argument; a condition; a supposition. |
| collision noun | /kəˈlɪʒn̩/ | An instance of colliding. |
| heal verb | /ˈhiːl/ | To make better from a disease, wound, etc.; to revive or cure. |
| sustainable adjective | /səˈsteɪnəbəl/ | Able to be sustained. |
Phrasal verbs you will hear
| Word | Meaning |
|---|---|
| come along verb | To accompany. |
Pronunciation to watch
The speaker uses 12 contractions and reduced forms, such as don't, can't, you're. Say them the short way, as you hear them.
- The “sh” and “zh” sounds: perish /ˈpɛɹɪʃ/, collision /kəˈlɪʒn̩/
- Long words — get the stress right: insanity /ɪnˈsænɪti/, solitary /ˈsɑlɪˌtɛɹi/, sustainable /səˈsteɪnəbəl/
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 pursuit, collide, perish.
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.