To reach the same level or position as someone who is ahead of you, often after falling behind. It can also mean to update yourself on news, events, or information you have missed.

Type

Inseparable phrasal verb.

Notes

When 'catch up' is used with an object referring to a person or group, the preposition 'with' is required and the phrase cannot be split — you say 'catch up with her,' never 'catch her up with.' Note that in British English, 'catch someone up' (without 'with') is sometimes used to mean overtake or reach someone, but the standard international form remains 'catch up with someone.'

Conjugation

Narrative

Priya had taken a year off after her engineering degree to care for her mother. When she finally rejoined her postgraduate program in September 2022, her cohort was already deep into advanced coursework. She felt the gap immediately — references to lectures she had never attended, terminology that meant nothing to her. Rather than panic, she made a plan: two extra hours of study each morning before class, weekly sessions with a study partner, and a color-coded revision calendar. By December, she had managed to catch up with the group and even scored above average in the semester final.

Register

Informal

In the early 1960s, the United States found itself dangerously behind the Soviet Union in the space race. The USSR had launched Sputnik in 1957 and put Yuri Gagarin into orbit in April 1961 — milestones that stunned American scientists and politicians alike. NASA's budget was a fraction of what was needed, its rockets unreliable, and its engineers racing against time. President John F. Kennedy responded on May 25, 1961, by committing the nation before Congress to landing a man on the Moon before the decade was out. The declaration was audacious: the technology required barely existed. NASA expanded rapidly, hiring thousands of engineers and scientists, establishing facilities in Houston and Cape Canaveral, and running parallel development programs simultaneously. On July 20, 1969, Neil Armstrong stepped onto the lunar surface. The United States had not merely caught up with its rival — it had surpassed it entirely. The episode remains one of history's most dramatic examples of what focused, resourced determination can achieve when a nation decides, urgently and collectively, to catch up.

To have a serious argument or disagreement with someone that causes damage to your relationship with them. After falling out, people often stop speaking to each other for a period of time.

Type

Inseparable phrasal verb.

Notes

"Fall out" is an inseparable phrasal verb, meaning the verb and particle cannot be split by an object. You say "they fell out over money" — never "they fell the matter out." When used with a preposition indicating the cause, the pattern is "fall out over/about + noun" or "fall out with + person."

Conjugation

Narrative

Priya and her flatmate Jess had lived together for two years without any serious problems. Then, last month, they fell out over a simple household bill — Priya felt Jess had been paying less than her fair share for months and finally said so directly. Jess got defensive, and within minutes they were barely speaking. For two weeks, the flat felt unbearably cold despite the central heating. Eventually, Priya knocked on Jess's door with two cups of tea and the actual bank statements printed out. Facts on paper, and a cup of tea — it turned out to be enough to begin making things right.

Register

Neutral

In the early 1840s, Abraham Lincoln and James Shields were both rising political figures in Illinois — but their relationship collapsed dramatically and nearly fatally. In 1842, Lincoln published a series of anonymous satirical letters in the Sangamo Journal mocking Shields, then the Illinois State Auditor, as vain, incompetent, and dishonest. When Shields discovered Lincoln was the author, he was furious and demanded a formal apology. Lincoln refused to give one he considered adequate, and Shields challenged him to a duel. The two men actually traveled to an island on the Missouri River — Sunflower Island — on September 22, 1842, prepared to fight with cavalry broadswords. Only last-minute mediation by their seconds prevented bloodshed. The affair deeply embarrassed Lincoln, who rarely spoke of it afterward, and the two men maintained a frosty distance for years. It is a vivid historical reminder of how thoroughly two people can fall out — and how a disagreement, left without genuine repair, can escalate far beyond its original cause.

If two people grow apart, they slowly become less close and connected to each other over time, usually because their lives, interests, or feelings have changed. This process happens gradually, not because of a single argument or event.

Type

Inseparable phrasal verb.

Notes

"Grow apart" is an inseparable phrasal verb, meaning the two words cannot be separated by an object. You must always say "They grew apart" — you cannot place a word between "grow" and "apart." There is also no direct object with this verb; it describes a mutual, intransitive process between two or more people.

Conjugation

Narrative

Mia and her childhood best friend Diane had been inseparable through school, but after Diane got married and Mia moved abroad for graduate studies, their phone calls became shorter and less frequent. One evening, scrolling through old photos, Mia felt a quiet sadness. She typed a long message to Diane, admitting, "I feel like we've grown apart and I miss you." Diane replied within minutes: "Me too. Can we do a video call Sunday?" That one honest message didn't fix everything, but it cracked open a door they had both been afraid to touch.

Register

Neutral

Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels are celebrated as lifelong intellectual partners, but their relationship was not without strain. After the failed revolutions of 1848 swept Europe, Marx settled in London in poverty, increasingly consumed by his massive theoretical project that would become Das Kapital. Engels, by contrast, returned to managing his family's textile factory in Manchester — work he found soul-crushing but financially necessary to support Marx. Through the 1850s and 1860s, the two men wrote frequently, but their daily realities could not have been more different: Marx in a cramped Soho flat, burying himself in British Museum manuscripts; Engels navigating cotton prices and factory ledgers. Their letters from this period show flashes of irritation, misunderstanding, and emotional distance. Yet unlike many partnerships under similar pressures, they chose to close the gap — Engels eventually moved to London in 1870, and the two resumed their close collaboration in person. Their story is a reminder that even the deepest bonds can grow apart under the quiet pressure of diverging circumstances, and that distance, left unaddressed, has a way of becoming permanent.

To stop yourself from showing or expressing a feeling, or to prevent yourself from doing or saying something. When you hold back, you keep something under control rather than letting it out freely.

Type

Separable phrasal verb.

Notes

As a separable phrasal verb, 'hold back' can be split by placing a noun object between 'hold' and 'back' — for example, 'She held back her tears' or 'She held her tears back.' When the object is a pronoun, separation is required: you must say 'She held them back,' never 'She held back them.'

Conjugation

Narrative

Priya had rehearsed the conversation a hundred times. She needed to tell her older brother that his dismissive comments had been hurting her for years. When she finally sat across from him at their mother's kitchen table, she felt the familiar tightness in her throat. For a moment she almost held back — smiled, changed the subject, let it go again. But this time she let herself speak. Her voice cracked once, then steadied. Her brother went quiet. Neither of them had expected honesty to feel so much like relief.

Register

Neutral

On the night of April 3, 1968, Martin Luther King Jr. delivered what would become his final public speech at the Mason Temple in Memphis, Tennessee. He was exhausted, ill, and had nearly skipped the event altogether. Standing before striking sanitation workers — men who had endured violent intimidation for weeks — King spoke about threats on his life and said, with startling calm, that he had 'been to the mountaintop' and was no longer afraid to die. Aides present that night later recalled that King wept backstage after the speech, overcome by the weight of what he sensed was coming. He did not hold back those private tears, though for months he had held back his deeper fears from the public platform, projecting strength so that others would not lose courage. He was assassinated the following evening. The episode reveals something true about 'holding back': sometimes what we suppress in front of others costs us greatly in private, and the choice of when — and for whom — to hold back defines the kind of strength we carry.