Idioms and Phrasal Verbs to talk about problems

Hey guys!

Everybody knows the importance of learning some phrasal verbs, idioms and colloquial expressions, especially when you live in a foreign country. We always learn a lot of them by communicating with native speakers or watching movies and series. In this post, you learn some phrasal verbs, idioms and expressions to communicate in a more natural way when speaking English in a foreign country.

Tired man sitting on floor with paper document piles around flat vector illustration. Cartoon frustrated office employee doing paperwork. Business, fatigue and bureaucracy concept

* think sth through – consider everything that could happen in a situation.

I need some time to think it through – I don’t want to make any sudden decisions.

* a storm in a teacup – a lot of anger and worry about sth unimportant.

I still have the feeling that really this may be a misunderstanding which is causing a storm in a teacup.

* have a chip on your shoulder – be sensitive about or feel offended by sth, as a result of sth that happened in your past.

He’s got a chip on his shoulder about not having been to university.

* take the bull by the horns – face a difficult situation in a very direct and confident way.

Why don’t you take the bull by the horns and tell him to leave?

* get over sth – recover from sth such as a disappointment or illness.

It took him years to get over the shock of his wife dying.

* pull yourself together – regain control of your feelings and behave calmly.

Just pull yourself together. There’s no point crying about it.

* a recipe for disaster – a thing that is likely to cause sth bad to happen.

All those children unsupervised sounds to me like a recipe for disaster.

* dwell on/upon sth – spend time thinking about sth difficult or unpleasant.

In his speech, he dwelt on the plight of the sick and the hungry.

* bury your head in the sand – refuse to admit that a problem exists, or refuse to deal with it.

You’ve got to face facts here – you can’t just bury your head in the sand.

* face up to sth – accept and deal with sth that is difficult or unpleasant.

She’s going to have to face up to the fact that he’s not going to marry her.

I hope you learned some new phrasal verbs and idioms today, see you next time! Source: Idioms and Phrasal Verbs – Advanced / Ruth Gairns and Stuart Redman – Oxford

Photo Credits: Bureaucracy vector created by pch.vector – www.freepik.com