Winning English - Mastering Idioms, Slang, and References
Happy New Year! • In the history books • New Year's resolutions • To take stock • Turn over a new leaf • Make a fresh start • Get your act together
Happy New Year! Or maybe Happy New Year’s Eve! It depends on where you are in the world when this is published. For me, I have six more hours to go until 2020 is in the history books!
“In the history books” is a phrase that means “in the past” or “is over”.
To celebrate the arrival of 2021, I thought I would talk about some phrases, words, and idioms that have to do with new beginnings.
First, it’s very common for people to make New Year’s resolutions. A resolution is a decision to do something better. It’s a promise we make to ourselves to improve our lives in some way.
If you plan to make some New Year’s resolutions, you’ll first need to take stock of your life. “To take stock of” something means to review that thing, then decide if it is good or bad. For example, you might “take stock of” your health and decide you really need to lose some weight. You might decide to start running, lifting weights, or doing yoga.
It can certainly feel good to turn over a new leaf and make a fresh start. The beginning of the new year is a perfect time to get your act together. I’m sure you will succeed in 2021. Good luck, and again, Happy New Year!
“To turn over a new leaf” means to start acting in a new and positive way. This idiom is more than 400 years old. It comes from a time when the pages of books were called leaves, instead of pages. So, if you “turned over a new leaf”, it meant you were turning to a new, blank page where you could write a new story about yourself.
“To make a fresh start” is probably easy to understand. When something is “fresh”, it is new, young, and good, so a “fresh start” is a new beginning.
And finally, when you “get your act together,” it means that you are putting your life in order and doing good things. This saying probably came from theater, where actors put on “an act” to tell a story. You can think of your life as an act that you write. When your act is together, you are telling a compelling and good story.
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Happy new year!