🗓️ Idiom: Treading Water (verb)
💬 Meaning
- Making an effort but without progress.
- Trying hard just to cope, especially during stressful times.
🧠 Example Sentences
- Lately, I feel like I’m just treading water at work instead of moving forward.
- After so many deadlines, the whole team was treading water to stay on top of things.
- When stress builds up, it can feel like you’re treading water with no clear direction.
🏛️ Origin
The idiom “treading water” comes from swimming. When a swimmer treads water, they move their arms and legs to stay afloat but don’t move forward. Now it describes situations where people work hard just to maintain their current position, often under pressure or stress.
📝 Practice Exercises
1. Fill in the blank:
After months of heavy workload, he felt like he was just ________ at his job.
Answer
treading water
2. Choose the correct answer:
What does “treading water” mean in a work situation?
a) Making fast progress
b) Staying in the same place with effort
c) Taking a long holiday
Answer
b) Staying in the same place with effort
3. Change the sentence using “treading water”:
“She’s working hard but not getting any closer to her goals.”
Answer
She’s treading water.
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Rob is a CELTA qualified English teacher with 15 years of international experience. He has a BSc and PGDip from Loughborough and St Andrews universities in the UK. He has taught in Thailand and Saudi Arabia and now works with professionals worldwide.
