In this mini episode, you will learn the idiom “come to grips with.”
Episode 464 of the Everybody ESL podcast is a mini episode that teaches you the idiom “come to grips with.” Send your questions about English and your comments and suggestions to EverybodyESL@gmail.com. (And let me know if you’d like to record the introduction to a future episode.)
Intro
“Hello. This is Basmah, from Saudi Arabia. And you are listening to Everybody ESL.”
Welcome to episode 464 of Everybody ESL, the podcast for everybody who wants to improve their English, practice their English, or just learn more English. My name is Ben, and I have a mini episode for you today, where I am going to teach you about one English topic. You can subscribe to the Everybody ESL podcast at Apple podcasts and wherever you find your podcasts. If you like Everybody ESL, leave it a good review so other people can find out about it too. And if you have any questions, comments, or suggestions for me, please send an email to EverybodyESL@gmail.com. Okay! Let’s get on with this mini episode.
The episode
In this episode, I am going to teach you an interesting idiom. The idiom is “to come to grips with.” To come to grips with. That’s c-o-m-e, t-o, g-r-i-p-s, w-i-t-h. To come to grips with.
What does this idiom mean? And how do we use it?
First off, let’s look at that word grips. Grips. Do you know what the word grip means? The word grip has more than one meaning, but usually you will hear it as a verb meaning “to grab something tightly.” To grab something tightly with your hand. That is to grip, to grip something.
Also, you will sometimes hear it as a noun meaning “the part of an object that you hold when you use the object.” That is called a grip. That’s the place where you hold it when you use it.
This kind of meaning of the word grip is important for understanding this idiom, “to come to grips with.”
“To come to grips with” means “to begin understanding or accepting or dealing with a difficult problem.” When we face a difficult situation, a difficult event, or a difficult problem or person, and we think about how we are going to handle it, what we are going to do about this problem, and we then start to take action, that is called coming to grips with the problem. Coming to grips with.
For example, let’s say that somebody has bought a used car. This is an old car, and he bought it without inspecting it very carefully. After he buys this car and takes it back to his house or his garage, he starts inspecting this car, and he finds all of the problems with this car. There are so many things that don’t work. There are so many things that are broken. He has a big problem to deal with.
After he has considered it a little bit, we could say that he has now come to grips with the problem. He has come to grips with the problem. Now he understands the problem. He accepts the problem, and he has started to deal with it. He has started to figure out what he needs to do to make all of these repairs. He has come to grips with the problem. He is now handling it.
And look at that word that I just used, handle. I said he is now handling the problem. He’s coming to grips with the problem, or he’s handling the problem.
That’s interesting because the word handle and the word grip are related. They both have to do with using your hand to hold something or fix something or somehow take care of something or manage something.
Wait a minute.
That’s another word that works the same way. The word manage. Manage. M-a-n-a-g-e. That comes from an old word meaning hand. It comes from the Latin word for hand.
So we have these three ways of saying something very similar. Three ways that have to do with hands and holding things. Coming to grips with, handling, and managing a problem. Maybe being aware of these three different hand expressions might help you understand or remember this idiom, “to come to grips with.”
And that is “to come to grips with,” an interesting idiom that I think you should know.
Outro
This is the end of episode 464 of Everybody ESL. Remember: If you have any questions about English, or if you have comments for me, or if you would like to record an introduction that I can play at the beginning of future episodes—the same way Basmah recorded the introduction you heard at the beginning of this episode—send an email to EverybodyESL@gmail.com. I’ll be back soon with a new episode. And until then, keep going, keep practicing, and keep learning. I’ll see you soon. Goodbye!