Winning English - Mastering Idioms, Slang, and References
Cold shoulder • Talk to the hand • Eating out of the palm of your hand • Breathing down your neck • Bending over backwards • Show some backbone
Many idioms and sayings are derived from parts of our bodies. That’s quite natural, given that our bodies are with us everywhere we go. 😄 Today I’m going to focus on a few.
I hope that no one gives you the cold shoulder any time soon. It’s not very fun when someone is upset with you. You’ll know the person is really angry if he or she doesn’t even want to talk to you. If the person is really rude, he or she might say, “Talk to the hand!” If that does happen, I’m sure you will be able to fix the relationship quickly. Soon you’ll have them eating out of the palm of your hand!
To be given, or to get, “the cold shoulder” means that someone is avoiding talking to you because he or she is angry with how you have behaved. We often say someone is “cold” if he or she is not friendly. For a “cold shoulder”, picture someone turning away from you so that the shoulder, instead of the face, is pointed toward you. This phrase is used very often in English to describe when people disagree - whether it’s in politics, sports, or medicine.
When someone tells you “to talk to the hand” - or maybe “gives you the hand” - it means that he or she doesn’t want to hear what you are saying and wishes you would leave. Picture the person holding his or her open hand up to your face in order to block your face and voice (like in the image above).
When you have someone “eating out of the palm of your hand”, it means that you have been very persuasive - so much so that the person will do whatever you want. This saying comes from the way domesticated animals behave. Most animals will never calmly eat food out of a human’s hand. But animals that we have tamed will do so. Be careful with this saying. Most people don’t like to be compared to a tamed animal.
Picture yourself talking on the phone at work. You finish the call, turn to your colleague, and say, “Wow, that was our boss. She’s really breathing down my neck! She wants my project done, but I can’t get the other departments to support it. They keep requesting changes.”
Your colleague says, “Maybe you need to stop bending over backwards to make the other departments happy. Show some backbone! Get them to agree, and get it done.”
When someone “is breathing down your neck”, it means he or she is putting a lot of pressure on you to finish a task. Imagine someone standing so closely behind that you that you can feel their hot breath on the back of your neck. That person is watching everything you do very closely - and wants it done quickly.
“To bend over backwards” means that you are doing everything you can to help someone or to do what they want. The idea is that you are being pushed backwards by their needs or demands and can no longer stand straight up.
Finally, another word for “backbone” is spine. “To show some backbone” does not literally mean to show someone your spine. That likely would be very painful! Instead, it means that you should not allow others to tell you what to do. You should be strong and do what you want or what you know is right and ignore pressure from other people.
Thanks for reading Winning English, and a special thanks this time to a reader who suggested many of today’s examples! Remember to listen to the podcast, as well, to reinforce your learning. Also, as always, if you like what you read or hear, please tell a friend about it. Thanks, and talk soon!