HOLD Basic Verbs Learn English Grammar
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hi everybody welcome back to know your
verbs my name is Alicia and in this
episode we’re going to talk about the
verb hold let’s go
the basic definition of the verb hold is
just to have in your hand to have
something so like hold my beer hold my
beer or I want to hold your hand hold my
beer or I want to hold your hand for
example so let’s look at the
conjugations for this verb present hold
holds past held past participle held
progressive holding so now let’s talk
about some additional meanings for this
verb the first additional meaning for
this word is to have a position or some
special distinction so let’s look at
some examples of this he held the world
record for doughnut-eating for three
years she holds the top position in the
company so in these situations we see
like a position someone’s job someone’s
position or some kind of special
distinguishing mark like a world-record
holder or a record holder so he holds or
she holds a position currently can refer
to someone’s job so we can also use it
for something that we had in the past
some special distinction we had in the
past like he held a world record or
maybe for a present distinction we can
say she holds the world record for
something so profession a job a special
kind of recognition we can use the word
hold to describe them
the second extra meaning quite broadly
is to restrained to restrain so like to
hold something back some examples of
this hold your fire
he has trouble holding his temper the
first example sentence was hold your
fire if you’ve ever watched a war movie
or maybe a historical drama some kind of
film like that you might have heard the
expression hold your fire
so fire means shooting so hold means
restrain or stop from doing something so
hold your fire I mean stop shooting your
gun hold your fire
so if you’ve ever seen a war movie you
might have heard this expression hold
your fire in the second one he has
trouble holding his temper
so to hold your temper one’s temper is
ones emotional control so to hold your
temper means to be able to control your
emotions so usually when we say temper
it means our angry emotions so he has
trouble holding his temper means it’s
difficult for him to control his angry
emotions or it’s difficult for him to
control his anger so hold your temper
control your anger but it sounds a
little less direct the next meaning is
to carry out to carry out like an event
so examples of this the company is
holding a conference tomorrow we held an
event at the concert hall last year okay
so in the first example sentence we see
the company is holding a conference
tomorrow so holding in the progressive
tense refers to a future plan the
company is holding in other words the
company is going to carry out some event
tomorrow the company is going to carry
out a conference tomorrow but instead of
saying going to carry out we can say the
company is holding a conference tomorrow
so meaning an event is going to occur in
the second example sentence we held an
event at the concert hall last year we
see the past tense we held an event
meaning we carried out an event some
event happened there last year but we
can use hold or in this case the past
tense version held to describe that
quickly
let’s look at some variations on the use
of this verb the first variation is to
hold one’s breath to hold one’s breath
means two just to keep air in your lungs
so like when you go swimming for example
you hold your breath so it’s a short
example of that but to keep the air in
your lungs so now not taking air in not
taking air out that’s to hold your
breath examples how long can you hold
your breath he held his breath until his
face turned red so we can use this
expression to mean like keeping the air
in our lungs however we also have a set
expression which is don’t hold your
breath so don’t hold your breath means
don’t wait for something to happen
because it’s going to take a long time
so for example if you are hoping that
you are going to get a huge raise and a
big house like next year or something
like that you really really really want
this big I don’t know bonus or something
like that you might say to your coach
you’re calling or your coworkers yeah I
really want this I really want like this
much more money your coworker might say
to you don’t hold your breath
meaning it’s going to take a long time
so the image in this situation is that
if you hold your breath you can only do
it for a short period of time a few
seconds maybe a minute or so so don’t
hold your breath
means the suggestion you made is going
to take a long time so you’re going to
hurt yourself or get in trouble if you
expect it’s going to happen quickly so
don’t hold your breath the next
expression is to hold your horses or to
hold one’s horses so this expression
means to restrain or to keep in your
enthusiasm so it’s like you’re too
excited calm down in other words some
examples hold your horses there will be
plenty of time for celebration when the
project is finished whoa hold your
horses were not done yet so in both of
these examples sentences we see hold
your horses meaning there’s too much
enthusiasm you need to slow down
so I guess horses is used here because
horses are like annum
that want to run quickly they’re like
fast have lots of energy but to say hold
your horses means keep them back keep
them restrained but not literally horses
it means like your energy your
enthusiasm means keep it restrained for
now and oftentimes that just means
because we’re using the verb hold it
means restrain it and then maybe later
you can use that just it doesn’t mean
like stop your enthusiasm it means just
keep it back for now so hold your horses
another common expression so those are a
few different uses of the verb hold I
hope that it was useful for you if you
have any questions or comments or if you
want to try to make a sentence using
this verb please feel free to do so in
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watching this episode of know your verbs
and we’ll see you again next time bye
bye yeah that’s true we use hold on the
phone I never explained that like when
we want to like when we’re on the phone
with someone and like we need to contact
someone else we can say please hold and
we put the phone down thank you for
holding that’s a very common one