Shadowing Practice: you want to do everything so you do nothing - Learn English Speaking with Video
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We're going to start this video with a little story.
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There's this girl, let's call her Lola.
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Now Lola wants to do many things, you might even say she wants to do everything.
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She wants to be a writer but she also wants to be a teacher and why not a Pilates instructor,
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a human rights lawyer and a filmmaker.
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She wants to be fluent in French
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because she's always wanted to live in Paris but then again she would love to live in a skyscraper in New York.
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Lola sits down to read a book
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but before she's finished a couple of pages she's distracted by Pinterest
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and she's pinning pictures of Devon Lee Carlson onto her dream life board.
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She ends the day feeling like she's not really done anything
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and instead of choosing something and making a commitment she's just scrolled on her phone for hours.
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And the cycle begins again.
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Lola isn't lazy, she's indecisive.
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There's this strange mix of intense ambition and total paralysis.
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In fact it seems she's exhausted by all of these potentials, so many directions to explore and so many Lolas she could be.
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If you've clicked this video you probably recognize Lola in yourself
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but not to fear because today we are going to go through the psychological trap of wanting everything but doing nothing,
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why it paralyzes you and the simple but tough love truths that you need to hear to finally start moving.
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Hi everyone it's Isabel, welcome back to my channel.
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This year was the year that I decided to not let this curse, it is a curse, to not let this curse control me.
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Having been Lola before, having worked through it and now got on the other side of the mountain,
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I want to share my understanding and my experience of this trap and how to break free of it.
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This video will be broken down into four chapters.
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Chapter one, the anatomy of the trap.
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Chapter two, the disguises of doing nothing.
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Chapter three, how to break the paralysis and frameworks to use.
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And chapter four, your next steps and words of encouragement to get started.
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Chapter one, the anatomy of the trap.
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I could not talk about this topic without talking about the fig tree analogy.
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Now I know loads of you have already heard about this before,
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I've spoken about it before and lots of people on the internet have spoken about it.
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I'm not going to go too in depth but for those who have never heard about it, the fig tree analogy was something that Sylvia Plath,
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the author, wrote about in The Bell Jar.
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It's this very famous metaphor where she describes someone sitting under a fig tree
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and looking up at all of the figs on the tree
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and each fig represents a different life path that she could take.
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So one could represent becoming a teacher, one could represent being a lawyer one could represent having a family
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and being a mum the other is traveling the world and never settling down.
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Now in the passage all these choices all these different figs is making the woman very paralyzed
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and she is unable to pick one because she knows that when she picks one she loses all the rest.
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She's sitting there under this fig tree stuck spending
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so much time trying to decide until the point where figs are actually rotting
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and fall to the ground meaning that she's not able to pick any of them.
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This is such a great analogy of what it means to not make a choice
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because doing nothing is a choice and that is the first thing
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that you've got to come to understand and be aware of.
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By not making a choice you're choosing to let all your options rot, to not choose any of them.
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Maybe you're sitting here watching this video right now looking at your life and thinking where even am I?
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I'm neither here nor there.
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I've never actually pursued any of the things that I wanted to pursue
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and I'm kind of just letting time go by and letting my dream float out of my grasp.
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Just as the fig trees are rotting you are rotting in your bed scrolling,
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not taking action and not actually going down any of those paths to figure out what you actually want.
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We now live in a modern world where we have access to so many options, more than we ever have been before.
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That comes with all sorts of pros and benefits where we know and are aware of how so many different people live,
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all the different lives that we could choose to live ourselves.
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We have the most freedom and access to resources and knowledge than we ever have before.
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In the past your path was mostly chosen for you, it was mostly determined by your circumstances, by the people you grew up with,
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the area that you grew up in.
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There was no way of knowing how people were living in other countries, maybe you'd read about it in books but most people weren't experiencing that,
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they were just experiencing their small world and their small circle.
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And now we live in a time where we can actually make those choices and we have this freedom to choose.
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The psychological twist of all of this is that you would think
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that all this freedom would make us feel liberated but clearly
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because this turn of phrase exists
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and a lot of people resonate with it we actually feel paralyzed by the choices
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because not only does choosing a path mean saying no to the others
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and getting severe FOMO about all the different people and potential that you could possibly be,
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if we make the wrong choice we have only ourselves to blame.
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This fear of making the wrong choice or making a choice
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and closing off a better choice without even knowing puts us in this perfection paralysis.
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We so desperately want to make the right choice.
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We will feel so annoyed at ourselves, so frustrated if we don't get it right.
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This is when we lean into productive procrastination which is something I'm very familiar with.
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A bit like the story at the beginning with Lola who can't make a single decision
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so she ends up just scrolling on Pinterest, watching loads of videos and tutorials about how to do something without actually going and doing it.
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Think that you're making progress because you're learning a lot
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and your knowledge is getting better but the progress and the position that you're in doesn't move.
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This was something I was doing for years.
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I would watch videos about how to master YouTube, about how to be a content creator,
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about how to make videos and show up and find the confidence
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and not feel the fear of being seen or feel the fear of failure.
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I was watching all this different content about how to better myself, how to live this dream life that I was imagining.
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Was I actually doing anything to progress and move forward?
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No. Okay, chapter two, the disguises of doing nothing.
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I wanted to quickly break down different personalities and archetypes of people
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that are probably going to find themselves in this situation and relate to this concept.
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I honestly think that I have been all these different people at different times in my life
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and I'm sure you might relate to more than just one
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but I think having an archetype
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and an understanding of why you are the way you are helps to break down this fear
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and to move on from it.
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Number one, the perfectionist.
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They won't start until they can do it properly.
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They want to go from zero to a hundred.
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They've never made a film but they want to be Martin Scorsese
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and because we put so much pressure on what this perfect thing needs to be, it is so much easier to just never touch it
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and let it sit there on the bookshelf collecting dust because then it can never be bad.
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For perfectionists, the biggest thing that holds us back is the beginner discomfort that feels like failure.
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Learning something, making mistakes, being a student again, and accepting that things won't be good at the start.
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They'll be messy, they won't be as you imagined.
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Second archetype who wants to do everything but does nothing is the potentialist.
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The potentialist is hooked on the idea that there are so many choices and people that they could be.
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That feels so much more juicier than actually just choosing one.
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Because real progress comes with real limits.
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We're wasting time living in these dreams of what these potential lives could look like and almost glamorizing all these different lives.
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Every path that you choose, no matter which one you choose, there are going to be setbacks, there are going to be limits,
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challenges and sacrifices that you have to make with every single one.
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But when we think about these worlds, we don't think about all those setbacks, we just think about all the good parts.
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We really see all these potentials through rose -tinted glasses.
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The third archetype is the overthinker or the strategist.
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These are the people who are researching, planning.
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These are the productive procrastinators who make getting prepared feel like work,
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feeling like progress, and gives you a small taste of that identity without actually having to fulfill the task.
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And that makes you feel good.
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I mean, I know when I watch YouTube videos of people that I'm inspired by,
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I feel so productive when I watch a productive video because I'm like,
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wow, I actually did something too when I actually just sat there watching someone else study or watching someone else work.
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There's absolutely nothing wrong with that if it's inspiring you to change your life.
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But just watching them and not taking any action in your own life is not doing anything.
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The fourth and final archetype, which I think is something that is less thought about and less understood, is the comfortable one, the comfortable life.
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This is something I think a lot of people relate to,
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but they never know how to find the words for it because it makes you sound ungrateful for the life you have,
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which it's not, that's not what it is.
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But you feel guilty and shameful for wanting more from a life that is already good.
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The comfortable one is the person who is living a life that is fine, that is good, that a lot of people might even want themselves.
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But for some reason something isn't quite clicking.
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They might not have found their purpose or their values aren't being honoured in the work that they're doing.
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But because their life is comfortable, there's no push to go and explore the uncertainty of more.
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Comfort is the quiet one where nothing is wrong enough to make you move, but it's not what you dream of at night.
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The reason why the comfortable one doesn't make a start is
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because the certainty of their life now is so much easier than the uncertainty of the unknown.
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It's a bit of a go with the devil that you know rather than the devil that you don't,
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but the devil that you know is never going to get you where you want to be.
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Okay, so now we've run through the archetypes.
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I want to go through a couple of reasons why doing nothing feels like the best choice in the moment.
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These are the two things that all these archetypes go through.
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Number one is the fear of failure or sometimes even the fear of success.
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Your ego, your brain is always going to want to stay protected, is always going to choose the safe route.
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Doing nothing for all these archetypes is a defense mechanism.
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Your brain is always going to prefer the safe comfort over the unfulfilled potential
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because a vulnerability is needed for trying and failing that the brain just does not like.
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The second reason why all these archetypes are stuck is because of the dopamine overload.
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Our brains love a little cheat.
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So when we explain to our friends that we're going to do this, that, and the other, the brain releases dopamine just talking about it.
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It's the same when you're saving pictures on Pinterest or you're watching videos teaching you how to do the thing.
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You get the reward of the achievement without doing any of the heavy lifting.
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So you're addicted to the idea of what you could be.
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Okay, so chapter three, the framework to break the paralysis.
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This is why we're all here.
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How can we get out of wanting to do everything but doing nothing?
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I've thought long
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and hard about what advice I can give to someone who is stuck in this stage
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and there are different things specific to different people.
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So take what you need and take what resonates with you and your personality.
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The first one being the one thing rule and the seasons of life.
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Lots of people, more than you think, change careers, change their life choices, change their decisions.
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It's very normal, it's very much part of the human experience, making choices and then realizing okay now I want to change and do something else.
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By taking this idea of seasons of life means
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that you make a choice and go down a path
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and you actually get clarity by going down a path and taking action.
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So instead of closing a door you're just putting a pin in it, you're designating it for later in life.
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For example with me right now I want to pursue content but I don't see myself being 50 and pursuing content still.
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I don't know how my life will turn out and that is scary,
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of course it is, I don't know what is in the unknown but I know that I'm happy now, that I feel a purpose,
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that I feel fulfilled and that by choosing this path I am opening new doors,
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new opportunities to other things that I might not even know existed had I not walked down it.
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I don't think when I've got to 50, had kids and stopped making content
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that I'm going to regret sitting here making content right now
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but I would regret not ever chasing this dream and trying and seeing where it goes.
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Take the seasons of life approach,
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choose one path and that does not mean that those other paths aren't open for you at other times in your life.
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You can't be a master in everything and have proof in nothing and to have proof you need to commit.
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You need to commit to projects, you need to commit to finishing things to show that you can do it.
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Another thing is the two minute rule or micro actions that you can do to get started.
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A lot of people don't get started because the hurdle is too big.
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Scaling down the task is where the magic happens.
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You don't need to commit to two hours of reading.
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You can literally just read two pages at least you've moved at least you've moved forward
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and made some progress even though it's a tiny bit
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you've done better than where you were at the beginning of the day and
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that momentum creates this loop
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this positive feedback loop where you're thinking oh okay like i've made progress
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i'm moving forward i'm in a new position than i was yesterday last week
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i can see tangible progress also wanted to talk about adhd neurodivergent specific tips and tools because Because if you have ADHD,
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I understand that it is very hard to get started on tasks.
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Sometimes when you're in a task, you're very obsessive about it and you're very excited about it.
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But actually getting started and finding that momentum is really hard.
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So what I do is I make a to -do list for the week.
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I know every week I'm going to post four to five Instagram TikTok videos.
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I'm going to post a sub stack and I'm going to post a YouTube video.
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That is like the core of what I need to get done.
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Whether or not I do that on the Monday or on the Saturday is not anyone's business.
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That's fine.
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That is fine because I'm still ticking off the task that needs to be done this week.
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I know it's going to go out on Sunday.
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And honestly, that kind of time crunch helps me to get work done.
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At the moment, what's working for me is I get most of my work done from four to eight.
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And that's just how it is.
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As long as I hit those targets, it's really no one's business when I'm doing it.
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Another thing on a similar vein is you might want to use the Eisenhower matrix.
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Now this is simply drawing a cross like this on a piece of paper
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and writing urgent and not urgent and important and not important and putting all your tasks in these four boxes.
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What this helps you to do is to see okay what is on a deadline and needs to be done.
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Finally chapter four the next steps.
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The biggest takeaway I want you to have from this video is that clarity comes from action.
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You can only figure out what path is for you by walking down it.
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Walking down a path is how you realize whether or not it's for you and what path you can take next.
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An imperfect, messy, flawed action will always beat a perfect fantasy.
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Remember that.
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And I want to say this specifically to all my perfectionists out there
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that building your self -worth around things
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that are not to do with your outputs
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or your achievements is incredibly important with building self -worth
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and getting over this hurdle of things not being exactly as you planned.
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Have practices that you follow that help you with this.
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So I love these affirmation cards that my friend got me.
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They are so cute.
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They're like little frogs.
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And I look at them every other day whenever I feel like I need it.
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Just a message that I can say to myself to remind me that I'm doing okay, that I'm proud of myself that even
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if things aren't executed exactly how i want them to be they are still done
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i'm still moving forward i'm still making progress i'm also spending this month doing morning pages
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which i'm really enjoying it really helps to clear my mind have this relief
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and release when i write things down on paper
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and it's this little morning ritual that i have
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that makes me feel like i've achieved something in the day
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that has nothing to do with output is literally just my messy thoughts on a page
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and i can tick
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that off every day my final reminder for the day is you can either choose to feel restless
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and anxious because you're not making any progress and
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that will ultimately end in self -destruction in some way
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or you can make a start and you can feel
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so frustrated at what you're producing
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because there's nothing like how you want it to be
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but there is hope that's it for today thank you
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so much for watching I hope you enjoyed and
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if you want in the comments I would love
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if you can type out one thing one single thing
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that you're going to focus on for the next seven days just choosing one thing
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that you're going to commit to write it out in the comments below
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and hold yourself accountable and we can all be there for each other in this community
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helping each other get started and get going on our dreams thank you
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so much for watching and i'll see you next week bye
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Vocabulary and speaking notes for this lesson
This speaking lesson is built on the video “you want to do everything so you do nothing”. This video has 245 sentences and 3358 words to shadow. The speech runs for 16:03. The speaker talks fast, about 209 words per minute, so expect linked and reduced sounds. 86% 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 |
|---|---|---|
| commit verb | /kəˈmɪt/ | To give in trust; to put into charge or keeping; to entrust; to consign; used with to or formerly unto. |
| trap noun | /tɹæp/ | A machine or other device designed to catch (and sometimes kill) animals, either by holding them in a container, or by catching hold of part of the body. |
| pursue verb | /pɚˈsu/ | To follow urgently, originally with intent to capture or harm; to chase. |
| productive adjective | /pɹəˈdʌk.tɪv/ | Capable of producing something, especially in abundance; fertile. |
| devil noun | /ˈdɛvəl/ | An evil creature, the objectification of a hostile and destructive force. |
| relate verb | /ɹɪˈleɪt/ | To tell in a descriptive way. |
| fig noun | /fɪɡ/ | The fruit of the fig tree, pear-shaped and containing many small seeds. |
| curse noun | /kɝs/ | A supernatural detriment or hindrance; a bane. |
| messy adjective | /ˈmɛsi/ | In a disorderly state; chaotic; disorderly. |
| scroll noun | /skɹoʊl/ | A roll of paper or parchment; a writing formed into a roll. |
| analogy noun | /əˈnæləd͡ʒi/ | A relationship of resemblance or equivalence between two situations, people, or objects, especially when used as a basis for explanation or extrapolation. |
| rot verb | /ɹɑt/ | To suffer decomposition due to biological action, especially by fungi or bacteria. |
| output noun | /ˈaʊtpʊt/ | Production; quantity produced, created, or completed. |
| comfort noun | /ˈkʌm.fət/ | Contentment, ease. |
| regret verb | /ɹɪˈɡɹɛt/ | To feel sorry about (a thing that has or has not happened), afterthink: to wish that a thing had not happened, that something else had happened instead. |
Phrasal verbs you will hear
| Word | Meaning |
|---|---|
| move forward verb | To cause to make progress. |
| go down verb | To descend; to move from a higher place to a lower one. |
| go through verb | To travel from one end of something to the other. |
| walk down verb | To continually advance (on an opponent) and punch (the opponent) in order to control the fight and dominate the opponent, while shrugging off the opponent's… |
| break down verb | To stop functioning. |
| figure out verb | To come to understand; to discover or find a solution; to deduce. |
| close off verb | To seal or block the entrance to a road, an area, or a building so that people cannot enter. |
| end up verb | To bring to a conclusion. |
Sentences worth repeating
Short, complete lines from the video that you can reuse in everyday conversation:
- I'm neither here nor there.
- Was I actually doing anything to progress and move forward?
- They'll be messy, they won't be as you imagined.
- This is why we're all here.
Grammar in this video
The structures the speaker uses most, with the exact words from the video:
| Structure | In the video |
|---|---|
| Present perfect have/has + past participle — a past action that still matters now | you've clicked · have already heard · I've spoken |
| Passive voice be + past participle — the focus is on what happens, not who does it | will be broken · being seen · being honoured |
| Relative clauses who / which + clause — extra information about a person or thing | those who have · procrastination which is · people who are |
Pronunciation to watch
The speaker uses 84 contractions and reduced forms, such as I'm, you're, don't. Say them the short way, as you hear them.
- The “sh” and “zh” sounds: destruction /dɪsˈtɹʌkʃən/, anxious /ˈæŋkʃəs/, perfection /pɚˈfɛk.ʃən/, ambition /æmˈbɪʃ.ən/, shameful /ˈʃeɪmfəl/
- Long words — get the stress right: analogy /əˈnæləd͡ʒi/, psychological /ˌsaɪ.kəˈlɑː.d͡ʒɪ.kl̩/, momentum /ˌmə(ʊ)ˈmɛntəm/, uncertainty /ʌnˈsɜːtənti/, anatomy /əˈnætəmi/
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 commit, trap, pursue.
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.