take up

To begin doing a new hobby, sport, or activity, especially one you plan to continue; or to fill or use an amount of space or time.

Type

Separable phrasal verb.

Notes

When 'take up' means to start an activity, the object usually follows the full phrasal verb: 'She took up yoga' or 'She took it up last year.' If a pronoun is used as the object, it must go between the two parts: 'She took it up' is correct; 'She took up it' is not. When the meaning is to occupy space or time, the object typically follows the particle directly.

Conjugation

Narrative

Dmitri had spent fifteen years working in logistics, rarely doing anything just for himself. When his daughter left for university, the evenings felt endless. A colleague mentioned a woodworking class at the community centre — bedly , Tuesday nights, no experience needed. Dmitri almost di it, sure he'd be hopeless. He signed up anyway. The first night he split a plank badly and laughed about it on the drive home. B month three, he had built a s bookshelf that actually stood level. Ta woodworking hadn't just filled his evenings; it had g him something quiet and real to work toward. S , an ordinary Tuesday became something else entirely.

Register

Neutral

In 1962, at the age of thirty-one, Vera Rubin was already a working astronomer, but she was looking for a research problem she could call entirely her own. Deely avoiding the crowded, coive field of quasars, she chose to take up the study of galaxy rotation curves — how fast stars orbit the centre of a galaxy at varying distances. It was considered unous , almost peripheral. Working with instrument builder Kent Ford at the Carnegie Institution in Washington, Rubin began me the rotational speeds of the Andromeda Galaxy in painstaking detail. The data that came back was deeply strange: stars at the outer edges of galaxies were moving far too fast. By the early 1970s, Rubin and Ford had enough observations across dozens of galaxies to as that most of the matter in the universe is invisible — what we now call dark matter. What she to almost as a quiet retreat from academic rivalry turned out to be one of the most consequential research programs of the twentieth century. S , the lesson is clear: so the activity you take up out of curiosity re everything around it — in , more than she ever expected.

To stop trying to do something because it seems too difficult or impossible; to admit that you cannot succeed and abandon your effort. It often implies accepting defeat after a struggle.

Type

Inseparable phrasal verb.

Notes

As an intransitive or inseparable phrasal verb, 'give up' cannot have an object placed between its two parts when used in the sense of abandoning an effort. You can say 'She gave up the project' or 'She gave it up,' but when no object follows — meaning simply 'to stop trying' — the verb stands alone: 'She gave up.' Note that 'give up' can also take an object meaning 'to quit something,' in which case object pronouns must come between the parts: 'She gave it up,' never 'She gave up it.'

Conjugation

Narrative

Priya had been pitching her UX redesign proposal to the same director for four months. Every time, he pushed it to the next quarter. Her colleague Jonah told her to give up and move on — the company clearly wasn't interested. B Priya had data showing the current interface was costing them users. She bo one final meeting, arrived with printed customer complaint logs and a co comparison, and l it all on the table. The director approved a pilot run by the end of the hour. S , giving up, she later said, would have been the ea thing she ever did — a the bi mistake. She had refused to gi even after four months of no.

Register

Neutral

In October 1941, with the German army advancing rapidly toward Moscow, Soviet leader Joseph Stalin faced en pressure to evacuate the capital. Most government ministries had already fled east to Kuibyshev, panic was sp through the city, and some senior officials assumed Moscow would fall within days. On October 19, Stalin made a decision: he stayed. He announced a state of siege, appeared publicly in the city, and gave his famous address on November 7 — Revolution Day — standing on Red Square with German forces less than 50 miles away. The speech was broadcast nationally and filmed. Stalin's refusal to abandon Moscow st the Soviet defense. By December, a Soviet counteroffensive had pushed German forces back from the capital's outskirts. Historians debate many of Stalin's choices, b this particular episode is well documented: the moment when the sy and military weight of not giving up — of vi refusing to concede — shifted the psychological momentum of an entire campaign. So , the decision that changes everything is simply the refusal to gi . In , that single choice altered the course of the entire war.

To cut down means to reduce the amount or frequency of something, especially a habit or activity that you do too much. It suggests making a gradual or deliberate decrease rather than stopping completely.

Type

Separable phrasal verb.

Notes

When 'cut down' is used with a direct object (a noun), the object can appear either between 'cut' and 'down' or after 'down' — for example, 'cut down your expenses' or 'cut your expenses down.' However, when the object is a pronoun, it must go between the two parts: 'cut them down,' never 'cut down them.' When followed by 'on,' the phrase becomes 'cut down on' and is not separated.

Conjugation

Narrative

Maria had always driven everywhere — to the supermarket, to her sister's flat, even to the corner shop two streets away. B when petrol prices surged in the spring, she sat down with her monthly bank statements and felt a fa dread. She ma her usual routes and realized she was making over forty short car trips a week. She decided to cut down on unary journeys, re anything under two kilometres with walking or cycling. Three weeks in, she was sleeping better, spending less, a actually enjoying the route past the canal on Tuesday mornings. S , the car, she figured, could wait — she had learned to cu without really missing it.

Register

Neutral

In the early 1970s, the United States was consuming roughly a third of the world's oil while facing mounting economic strain. When OPEC im its oil embargo in October 1973, cutting supplies to the US and triggering panic at petrol stations, President Richard Nixon addressed the nation on November 7, 1973, and announced a package of ur measures. Americans were asked to lower thermostat settings, reduce highway speeds to 55 mph, and — crucially — cut down on car travel wherever possible. Me , airlines were directed to reduce flights; offices were told to dim their lights. The 55 mph speed limit became federal law in 1974 and remained in force until 1995. What began as a crisis response re American habits for a generation: carpooling grew, smaller cars gained popularity, and the idea that consumption could — and sometimes must — be deely reduced entered mainstream political life. The embargo lasted only five months, b its lesson endured. Noess , nations, like individuals, sometimes need a sharp external pressure before they genuinely commit to cuown on what they had always taken for granted.

To use all of something so that there is none left; to have no more of something available. When you run out of something, you have used or consumed the last of it.

Type

Inseparable phrasal verb.

Notes

"Run out" is inseparable when used in its core meaning. The object always follows the preposition "of": say "We ran out of water" — never "We ran water out." The phrase "run out" cannot be split by placing the object between "run" and "out."

Conjugation

Narrative

Marta was two hours into her solo road trip across rural Portugal when her phone buzzed a low-battery warning. She'd forgotten her car charger. Worse, she suddenly realised she'd also ru of cash — the last village had no ATM. She pulled over near an olive grove and th calmly: the next town was thirty kilometres ahead. She fl down a passing driver, explained in br Portuguese, and borrowed a pen to write down directions to a petrol station with a money exchange. S crisis, small solution. S , she was back on the road in twenty minutes, th still a little shaken. Ev , she laughed about it later.

Register

Neutral

In August 1914, the British Expeditionary Force re from Mons, Belgium, after holding against oving German forces. By the time units reached Le Cateau, many soldiers had run critically low on ammunition — some battalions had fired over 400 rounds per man in a single day. At the Battle of Le Cateau on August 26th, General Sir Horace Smith-Dorrien made the coial decision to turn and fight rather than continue retreating, partly because exhausted troops could not outrun the enemy, and partly because supply lines had broken down so severely that some units had effectively exhausted their reserves. The battle cost the British nearly 8,000 casualties b bo precious time for the main retreat to continue. Military historians point to this episode as a s example of how running out of essential supplies — ammunition, food, rest — forces commanders into decisions they would never otherwise make. Th a resource ru in the field, options collapse rapidly.