Listen to the author reading this blog post:
If you’ve resolved to achieve something that requires a lot of effort in 2024, then this post is for you! Today I’m looking at idioms and phrases that we use to talk about making an effort. If you didn’t already know this, ‘make an effort‘ (= try hard) is a phrase itself, for example:
Can we all, please, make an effort to keep the kitchen a bit cleaner?
Staying with the ‘effort’ theme, if someone spares no effort to do something, they do everything possible to achieve that thing:
We will spare no effort to secure their release from prison.
Let’s look now at two ‘back’ idioms in this area. If you break your back, you make a great effort, working extremely hard to achieve something and if you put your back into something, you use a lot of effort (especially physical effort) to try to do something:
There I was, breaking my back to get the project finished while he was skiing with his girlfriend!
You could clear this whole area in an hour if you put your back into it.
Someone who goes the extra mile makes more effort than is necessary in order to do something as well as they can:
She really went the extra mile to ensure the event was a success.
Two informal and emphatic phrases meaning ‘try extremely hard to achieve something’ are bust a gut and sweat blood:
If you can finish the report by Friday, that would be great, but don’t bust a gut.
We sweated blood to get that award.
In UK English, a way of saying that someone is putting a lot of effort into a task is to say they are hard at it:
We’ve been hard at it all morning and I think we’re starting to see results.
Finally for verb phrases, if you greatly increase your effort in order to do something, you might say you redouble your efforts:
The government has said it will redouble its efforts to prevent such a thing happening again.
Moving on to noun phrases, if a task requires hard, physical effort, for example when cleaning or polishing something, we say that it needs elbow grease. More emphatically, if you put the greatest possible effort into achieving something, you might say it has involved blood, sweat and tears:
You can do the job by hand, but it does take a bit of elbow grease.
He put blood, sweat and tears into that restaurant.
That concludes my post on idioms for making an effort. If there’s something that you will ‘go the extra mile’ to achieve this year, why don’t you tell us about it in the comments section?
Maybe it can be applied to some people who make the minimum effort to accomplish a task. Example:
Some state employees do their work with the law of ‘minimum effort’ every day.
Great idioms to know, nice effort!
I like to improve my self in pain.
‘He put blood, sweat and tears into that restaurant` `blood, sweat and tears`’ is a citation, isn`t it? We should remember to whom that phrase belongs, to whom it was told and in which circumstances and avoid cynical use of it in ami-cochon or pseudo -business `primitive chat
Ok day
I know a person who routinely expends extra effort and goes the extra mile and does the 110% in writing. Over the top vocabulary carries one’s point further than mere information.
Words like “mendacity” is a noun name for an act and “mendacious” is a name for the character who exhibits “mendacity”.
If one thought going the mile would do the trick, then they could use lies for “mendacity” and lier for “mendacious”.
It’s pretty obvious that going the extra mile, in this case at least, is extra energy expended in furtherance of a darker objective.
Obscure vocabulary wording is an example of going the extra mile for its heightened impact’s sake.
What extra effort to reward payoff is sought takes motivation in another direction.
Going the extra mile is usually construed as a person’s positive contributory attitude supported with actions.
“Over the top” is an expression which can be a word picture for an excess of positive effusive contribution or an intended excess of slamming’s effect.
Witnessed both, motivation behind either is in diametrically opposed vectors.
You spare no effort to facilitate our goal attainment.
I read somewhere long time ago that such phrase was firstly pronounced by Winston Churchill at the outset of the Second World War and presumably while reflecting on the effort that would take for British to win the war.
I personally like the phrase ‘bite the bullet’, which means to force yourself to do something unpleasant or difficult, or to be brave in a difficult situation.
Honestly, I’ve taken the plunge & set my sights on knuckling down to my studies in order to finally pull off the highest level of proficiency in English. 🙂
Thank you Kate, I love your posts. I will go the extra mile this year to get back in shape.
Thanks a lot.
Thank you for the time and effort you put into this post. I enjoy it a lot. I am inspired to go the extra mile to elevate my English skills.
What did Christ mean when he told his disciples to go the extra mile ? and they hated that order / suggestion ? What did the extra mile mean in Roman conquered territories? Matthew 6:33
i like the following ones: “go out of your way”, “put your mind to sth”, “set your heart/mind/sights on sth” 🙂 i’d be happy to see another part of such useful idioms. thanks!
Thank you for this priceless article you wrote!
Nice going , make an effort. how is instigating.
See it through…is my favorite.
Also, bend your back
idiom
If you bend your back, you use a lot of physical effort to do something:
He deserves credit for the way he bent his back to get the job finished.
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I’m breaking my back in order to get to know myself better in this year
Personally, I find the phrase brake somebody’s back really related to my language as we also have a common-used daily terms with a similar metaphor with the back. It is usually common for youngsters gamer when there is a a team member, try harder than others to carry the team to victory. It is hilarious that today I learn a similar phrase in English. Possibly I will redouble my effort to nail the English proficiency this year. Thanks for your amazing “wordy” blog!
Such an explicit one to share and will for sure start using this idiom right away since it varies the speech style and enhances the meaning without being in such a learner form.