Stop Saying This Wrong: Learn the Right Verb for English Fluency

Hi there. This is Harry. And welcome back  to Advanced English Lessons with Harry,  

where I try to help you to get a good  understanding of the English language.  

And in the lesson today we're going to look  at collocations, advanced collocations,  

particularly those relating to two words  miss and lose. And I'll explain them  

to you in a little bit more detail. Okay, let's get back to the lesson.  

Now the two different words, two verbs in English  - to miss, to lose. But in some languages they're  

the same or very, very similar. So it's  easy to get them confused. And I often get  

people in lessons telling me I lost the bus. And of course, you can't lose the bus unless it  

fell out of your pocket of your trousers. And  of course, unless you have very big trousers,  

you wouldn't be able to fit a bus in those. So you can't lose a bus. You can miss the bus,  

but you can't lose it. So that's  what we're talking about. And these  

particular collocation. So as I said, they're  both verbs, okay. To miss something and to  

lose. Usually we use miss when we're talking  about transport. As I mentioned to miss the  

bus missed the train, but you can also use  it when you're talking about appointments.  

You missed the dentist appointment because  you got up late. You missed the doctor's  

appointment because you forgot about it. Okay, so you can miss them in that situation.  

Or you can be sad about something. You can miss  your relatives. Okay, if your dog dies, you can  

miss your dog. Or if you move away from home for  study purposes and you go to a university town,  

you can miss your parents and your friends. Okay,  so you can use them in all of those situation.  

Or you can miss a bit of your school because  you're sick or he's missed three weeks this  

term. He's been really, really ill. Okay, so  there the situations when you can use miss.  

Now when we talk about the verb to lose, we can  talk about sport. It's the opposite of win. So  

we can lose a match. Oh my team has lost three  games in a row so we're in serious trouble.  

So the opposite of win. Or you can just lose personal  

possession. I lost my wallet yesterday. I lost the  car keys last week. I think I'm losing my mind.  

Yeah. Okay, so I've lost something, a possession. And of course, as we all would like to do when we  

train, or if we want to go on a diet, we like to  lose weight or he's looking great. He's lost a  

lot of weight recently, or he needs to lose some  weight because he's getting a little bit older  

and it's not so healthy when you get older. Okay, so simple examples of when you can use  

lose and then when you can use miss Now sometimes you can use both of them  

for the same thing. For example chance you can  miss the chance and you can lose a chance. Okay,  

so there are times when both words can be used  for the same situation, but in most cases,  

an example that I'm going to give you then  they are of a very different meaning.  

Okay, so let's go and look at some more  examples of when we talk about miss.  

So we can miss the train and miss the bus. Okay  I missed the train by minutes. I don't know what  

happened, but the traffic was really bad. When  I go to the train station, it was just pulling  

out. I missed the bus. The bus. They always come earlier than  

they say they will and I missed it. We can miss a chance, okay? A chance,  

perhaps of a promotion because you you weren't  sure what they should put in for the promotion  

or not, or you were sick for a couple of  weeks and you didn't send in the application,  

or you just didn't tell your boss that you  would be really interested in changing your  

position or going in for a position higher  than what you had, so you missed the chance.  

We can miss the point when we're having a debate  or an argument or a discussion with somebody.  

Somebody might say, I think you've missed the  point. So they're telling you reasons why it's  

a good idea to oppose increases in taxes. And other issues. And you start talking about the  

government or changes in the government. Yeah.  No, no, I think you've missed the point.  

What we're talking about here is the  impact of inflation or the rising costs  

or the higher taxes. So you've missed  the point. You didn't understand it.  

If you like this particular lesson, then please  like the video and if you can, please subscribe  

to the channel because it really, really helps. And then we have an expression miss the boat.  

Well now it doesn't mean like the bus or the  train we were talking about earlier. But when  

you missed the boat, you missed a real chance  or you missed an opportunity to do something.  

So if we go back to the issue about the  promotion, and you go home and you're  

talking to your friends and they say, well, what  happened? Did you find out about a job? Well,  

I missed the boat. I, I was late for a couple  of days put in my application and they wouldn't  

consider it. Okay, so you've missed the boat. Or if you send in your application late to go  

to a university, and if you're 2 or 3 days late  for registration, they tell you unfortunately  

it's full and you'd have to wait until  the following year. So you come home to  

tell your parents, okay, I've missed the boat  and meaning I'm late and I have to wait. Okay,  

so when we missed the boat, we missed a real  chance or a real opportunity to do something  

or to achieve something. Okay?  

Or it could be something really, really simple  where you have your eye on this girl and you're  

just a little bit shy and you're not sure  how you can approach it to ask her for a  

date. And then when you do pluck up the courage  after several weeks or months and you ask her,  

she says, look, I'm really, really sorry, but I'm  going out with somebody and you and you go back  

to your friends say, I missed the boat there. I should have had the courage of my convictions  

and asked her out 3 or 4 weeks ago. But I won't  make that same mistake again. Okay, so to miss  

the boat. So there are all opportunities  when you can use miss. So let's look at  

some other examples of when we lose something. We've already spoken about losing weight. Okay,  

so we lose weight when we go on a diet. We  lose weight when we go to the gym. We lose  

weight because we're under doctor's orders. We  lose weight because we are nervous or anxious  

about something. So the kilos fall off. You look  at him. He's lost so much weight in the last few  

weeks I’d hardly recognise him. To lose weight. Lose face. We lose face when we do something or  

say something that makes us look different in  the eyes of other people. Okay, so if you've  

made a terrible mistake and you don't want to  admit it, because if you do admit the mistake,  

you lose face in front of other people.  They'll think differently about you. What  

am I going to say to the people out there? I mean, they they don't expect me to make  

mistakes, that they'll think I'm stupid.  Well, it's better to tell them what you've  

done rather than to wait for them guessing.  And if you're honest and upfront about it,  

they'll understand and they'll forgive you. So okay, you might lose a little bit of face  

for a period of time, but after a few  weeks, they'll have forgotten about it.  

Okay. Or the government could lose face because  they change some policy that they said they would  

never do. So, for example, the government  come in and you vote for them and they say,  

I guarantee that during the three or 4 or 5  years of our term in office, we will never  

increase taxes. After 12 months, they realise that  the economy is having trouble and difficulties.  

So they announce that they're going to increase  taxes by 1 or 2 or 3%. So they immediately get  

lot of problems. People write into them,  people phone, people call on them to say,  

what are you doing? You promised us that you  would never increase taxes. So they lose face.  

They lose credibility. Okay? To lose face, to  lose credibility in the eyes of the public.  

To lose a chance. Well, when we lose the chance, for example, my football team  

had a great opportunity to go top of the league,  but they lost the chance because they they got  

beaten by the team bottom of the league. Nobody  expected it to happen. All we had to do was win  

1 or 2 nil, and we would have been  sitting proudly on top of the league.  

Now, as it happens, we're in a fight for second  or third place because we got beaten by the team  

at the bottom. This is the way football goes.  So we lost the chance. And as I said earlier,  

you can also use your miss so we can lose  the chance and miss the chance. So I could  

equally say my team lost the chance to go  top and they missed the chance to go top.  

And that situation. They  both mean exactly the same.  

We can lose time. We can lose time because our  computer crashes. Oh, look at the time I've lost  

today. I've been trying to get this organised. And  at the end of the day, it wasn't my fault at all.  

It was some poor fool outside, dug up the line  by mistake and cut everybody off. So I've lost  

so much time. Or the boss might say to you, don't  lose any time getting that contract completed.  

It's really, really important. The sooner  we get it completed, the sooner we get paid.  

So you can lose time. Or somebody might  tell you, make sure you don't lose time.  

You can lose time in driving from one city to  another because the traffic is really heavy. Oh,  

I lost a lot of time on the way here. Road  repairs ever seem to be every ten kilometres,  

so it really slowed me down. So I'm really sorry  that I'm late for the meeting. So to lose time.  

We can lose touch with people. Very, very easy  to do. You move city, you lose touch. You go  

and make friends in universities or schools  or whatever it is. And then you move school.  

You change school. You end the university. You  lose touch. Or somebody might say, please don't  

lose touch. Let's keep in touch. Let's don't  lose touch because friendship is important.  

You can often lose touch with some family members.  It doesn't have to be just friends. It can be  

family members. They move away and there's always  great promises. Oh, yeah. Keep in touch I. Yeah,  

yeah, I'll meet you. Come and see. But they never  do. So we lose touch over time. And that's where  

technology is a great thing because it helps  us to keep in touch so that we don't lose touch  

with those people nearest and dearest to us. Lose touch. You can lose touch. Of course, with  

reality. We often think that our politicians. have lost touch with reality. People who have, you  

know, some high expectations. And there they never  meet them. They've really lost touch with reality  

to lose ground. When we lose ground, it could  be, well, for example, economic situations and  

currencies. When you compare one currency to  another and something happens, they often lose  

ground against the other currency. For example,  

the British government introduced a serious, and significant measures of cutting tax,  

in a period when the inflation is high and as  a result, sterling lost ground against all the  

other major currencies around the world  euro dollar and and Swiss franc. Okay,  

so you can lose ground when talking about other particular currencies.  

You can lose ground in a race if you're  running a marathon and you hit a bit of  

a wall after 15 or 18 or 20km and you begin to  lose touch, there we go with that example again,  

to lose touch with those in front of you or you  lose a bit of ground meaning the distance between  

you and the people in front the leaders gets greater and greater, so you lose touch  

or you lose ground. And it's very hard to  

make it up because you really have to dig  in, dig deep, and try to get some extra  

energy into those legs or to lose ground. Okay, so there are all different examples of  

those collocations dealing specifically with. miss and lose. And as I said at the beginning,  

they can get a little bit confused. But just remember simple things. You can  

miss your parents. You can miss your friends. You can miss the bus. You can miss the train.  

But there are things that you definitely  lose. You lose the car keys because you  

just can't find them anywhere. I couldn't  find the car in the car park because I  

Forgotten where I had parked. So you lose  the car keys? They drop out of your pocket,  

you lose the football match. You lose  the opportunity to do something.  

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really, really helpful. So until next time,  this is Harry saying goodbye. Cheers.