Top 10 Phrasal Verbs in English - Most Common Phrasal Verbs

Hello and welcome to this video.  Today you're going to add the  

top 10 phrasal verbs to your vocabulary to help  you sound more fluent and more natural in English.  

Of course I'm Jennifer from JForrest English.com  and this channel is dedicated to helping you feel  

confident speaking English in public so you  can take your career and your life to the next  

level. Now before we go any further, make  sure you subscribe and hit that bell icon  

so you're notified every time I post a new  lesson. Now, let's dive in with this lesson.  

Are you ready to add the top 10 phrasal verbs  to your vocabulary. Well let's get started with  

number one. Number one, to get ahead. To get  ahead. This means to become more successful  

in work or in whatever you're doing. So if you're  a student, and you want to get ahead, that would  

be to become more successful with your studies,  with your academic career. But we do use this a  

lot in terms of your career and your work. So for  example, I could say it's difficult to get ahead  

in the film industry. So the film industry is a  very highly competitive industry, it's difficult  

to get ahead, to be successful. Number two, to aim  for. When you aim for something specific, you set  

out something as a goal or a target. So you have  a goal or a target that you're aiming for. So for  

example I could say we're aiming for a 30% cost  reduction by next quarter. So our target is 30%  

cost reduction, and that's what we're aiming  for. That's what we're working towards,  

that's our goal, or target. Number three, to back  something up. This is a very important one because  

it's something that everyone should be doing, but  most people don't do. And when you back something  

up, it means that you make a duplicate copy of  something. And in this specific context, we're  

talking about your electronic file. That's your  something. All of your information is saved on  

your computer, right. Your photos, your personal  information or work, your records your files.  

Everything is on your computer. Well, what happens  if your computer is lost, stolen or destroyed?  

You're going to lose all your work, photos, your  personal files or information, your work stuff,  

everything, right. Unless, unless you back it  up. Back it up. "It" being the content of your  

computer. So you back it up, which means  you just create a duplicate, and then you  

save that duplicate in a different location. This  is really easy because file forms like the cloud  

allow you to save your files online, to back  it up online. But you can also buy an external  

hard drive and you copy all your information  to an external hard drive, and then you have  

a duplicate in a different location. So a very  important phrasal verb, to back something up.  

This something being your computer files. So  answer honestly in the comments, when was the  

last time you backed up your computer? If you are  saying, I've never backed up my computer... You  

need to stop right now and go back up your files,  it's really important. Our next phrasal verb,  

to fall through. Now when something falls  through, it means it didn't go as planned,  

and it didn't go as scheduled. So let's say I have  planned a vacation. And then I could be talking to  

a friend, and I could say we were supposed to  go on vacation next week, but our plans fell  

through. So remember, if something our plans. If  they fall through, it means they didn't happen.  

As planned, or as. So it means we didn't go on  our vacation, most likely because something else  

came up, so this is a really great one because  you can use it in your personal life, with plans,  

but you can also use it in a business context  as well. Maybe you had a meeting with a client,  

but it's so rude. So it didn't happen. Number  five, to burn out. This is something you want to  

avoid something that a lot of people are dealing  with, you really want to avoid that. Because when  

you burn out, it means you are just completely  exhausted because of stress and that stress is  

usually the result of work or school, if you're a  student, or it could be something going on in your  

personal life as well. So there's some situation  that's causing you just to feel 100% exhausted.  

Then, about what you can say, I'm so burnt out,  or maybe you're talking to a friend that just  

looks exhausted, and your friend is talking about  all these responsibilities. She has everything  

she's doing, and you can tell your friend isn't  doing well, you might say, you should take a  

vacation, both, or you burn out, because you  don't want your friends, get to the point of being  

100%, exhausted you want to avoid that. Or next  phrasal verb to chip in. I really like this one,  

because when you ship it, it means that  multiple people contribute towards a common  

goal or purpose. And what do they contribute.  Well, they can contribute their money, their  

time or effort or other resources, as well. So for  example, out work, maybe one of your coworkers,  

comes to you and says, Everyone is chipping  in for Maria's retirement party. So Maria  

is having a retirement party and, obviously,  you need to buy food, buy a present, organize  

a lot of things. So everyone is going to chip in,  they're going to contribute something differently  

towards Maria's retirement party. So I like this  one because it has a main sense of everyone being  

involved and working towards a common goal, or  next phrasal verb to stop. When you stop up on  

something, it means you collect or purchase  a large quantity of something, a large number  

of something. Well, we saw this not too long  ago, where everybody went crazy and stocked up  

on toilet paper, massive, massive amounts  of toilet paper. Now that was an extreme  

version of stocking up. Usually when you stock up  on something, maybe you'll just get three or four  

or five of the item, you don't necessarily  get an entire garage full of an item.  

For example, let's say you have an item that  you use all the time and it doesn't go bad like  

toothpaste, and there is a sale on toothpaste,  It's a really great sale. So, you should probably  

stock up. Stock up on toothpaste, and my version  of stocking out would just be to buy, maybe four  

or five tubes because that would last me a really  long time. I'm not going to buy an entire garage  

full of toothpaste face so the toilet paper was an  extreme example, usually stocking up on something,  

doesn't have such a negative association, like  it did with toilet paper, you just get a larger  

quantity than normal, usually because you can  save money, or just out of convenience as well so  

you don't have to keep buying that product, every  time you go out. Our next phrasal verb to put  

something off when you put something off, it means  you delay, doing something, And that's something  

is generally a task that you don't want to do.  For example, cleaning the garage. Nobody wants to  

clean the garage right it's not really a fun task,  you have to do it. eventually. So you could say,  

I've been putting off, cleaning the garage  for months, you know you need to clean it, but  

every week, you say, Oh, I'll clean it on  Sunday, and then Sunday comes and you put it off,  

and you say, I'll do it next Sunday, And  guess what next Sunday comes, you put it off.  

The same thing happens again and again and again.  Now, unfortunately, many people put off tasks,  

they should do, they need to do in order to reach  their goals, and that's a big it's a big problem  

in life, because for me, not cleaning my laws  that isn't impacting my overall success in life,  

but a lot of people actually put off the exact  things they need to do in order to achieve  

success. So ask yourself, is there something  you're putting off that you should be doing. And  

are there other things are putting off that you  don't really care about like cleaning the garage.  

Our next phrasal verb to measure. Now, when  you measure up to something or someone,  

it means that you need somebodies expectations.  So you can imagine, in terms of measuring my  

expectations for your performance or here. Now, if  you perform at this level, you didn't measure up  

to my expectations. However, if you perform at  this level you measure up, you did measure up.  

Okay, and then at this point, I could say,  You exceeded my expectations. So you can  

not measure, measure up, or exceed expectations.  So it's common when you're evaluating a  

new hire a new employee, you might ask  the person in charge of that employee,  

how they're measuring how the new sales rep,  measuring up. And finally, our last phrasal verb  

to shop around. This is a great phrasal verb to  shop around. When you shop around, it means you  

look at many different stores in order to compare  products or compare prices. So let's say you want  

to buy a new car. Well, the first thing you're  going to do is you're going to shop around,  

you're going to go to different dealerships,  you're going to go to different websites,  

you're going to compare different cars  different prices different features,  

all of that to help you make your final decision.  So basically just the background research you do  

before purchasing a product, we call that shopping  around and how are we going to sleep, Internet  

makes it very easy to shop around. So now you have  the top 10 phrasal verbs added to your vocabulary.  

But of course, you need to practice this. So  let's do that right now. I want you to choose  

three new phrasal verbs or your favorite 3  from the list. And I want you to leave example  

sentences using all three in the comments below.  Of course you can do more than three, if you like,  

but just to make it a manageable number, let's  stick with three. So leave those in the comments  

below. And if you found this video helpful,  please hit the like button, share it with your  

friends and of course subscribe. And before you  go, make sure you head on over to my website,  

JForrest English.com and download your  free speaking Guide. In this guide I share  

six tips on how to speak English fluently and  confidently. And until next time, happy studying.