Everyday metaphors and what they imply:
1. “Kill them with kindness.” Of course, when we say this we don’t actually mean to go out and kill someone using kindness as a weapon. This metaphor also implies that kindness is the weapon being used. What is being implied is that a person should act very kind to those who they dislike or who dislike them. I’ve mostly heard this metaphor used in association with advice when it comes to bullies.
2. “Beating a dead horse.” When an issue that has already been settled, but is brought up again, this metaphor is often used. The metaphor doesn’t mean to literally beat up a dead horse but rather when the same topic is brought up over and over again.
3. “Burning with anger.” We don’t mean that someone is burning, but rather that they are angry. Saying that they are burning with anger implies how angry the person truly is. We can associate the color red with extreme anger (face turns red) and with burning. Burning with anger is another way of saying extreme (red hot) anger.
4. “Fight fire with fire.” It’s a poor way to put out a fire, but that is not what this metaphor implies. The metaphor implies that a person should use the same strategy or method as the person they are up against almost like a competition.
5. “A heart of stone.” Taking this literally would mean someone’s heart is made of stone. Metaphorically, it implies that the person has little to no feelings.
6. “A whirlwind of fun.” A whirlwind is air moving rapidly around in a funnel shape and is involved with storms. The metaphor implies that the fun that will be experienced will be rapid.
7. “My head is pounding.” As a metaphor this means that you head hurts and you have a headache. It does not mean that your brain is pounding against your skull.
8. “Sweet dreams.” Dreams don’t have flavor so they can’t be sweet in the sense of taste. The metaphor is implying that the person has nice dreams instead of nightmares.
9. “Blanket of snow.” Snow would make for an awful blanket; however, blankets don’t only keep you warm, they cover things. They can cover beds, couches, chairs, etc.…when there is enough snow, it covers what it lands on and is therefore like a blanket.
10. “You crushed it.” This can be taken literally, and something actually was crushed. But this can also be taken as a metaphor to mean that someone has perfectly or amazingly accomplished something.
“People don’t often think about how metaphor operates in their understanding of others, themselves, and the world- of how it makes ideas visible, gives form to the unknown, and helps integrate otherwise discrete experiences. Through metaphor we discover meaningful resemblances among things, and, through that process, we connect the abstract to the concrete” (Hickey 2).
I never realized how often we truly used metaphors and how this makes them vital to our language. Metaphors are constantly being used to describe concepts and how they work and without the metaphor, it is difficult to grasp that understanding. That’s why the familiar is used in metaphors; so, people can easily understand and picture it. For instance, metaphor nine, “Blanket of snow”. Blankets are widely known and the general knowledge on it purpose is to cover up. A person can cover up with a blanket to be warm. A blanket can be draped across something, covering what’s under it. If you are to tell someone, “the ground was covered in a blanket of snow”, they would be able to picture the ground covered in snow as if the snow itself is a blanket.
In metaphor three, “burning with anger”, makes it easy to picture how angry the person is. Burning can be uncontrollable in a fire and so the persons anger can be uncontrollable as well. Metaphors allow us to give details much quicker than if we were to describe something without the use of metaphors. “Burning with anger” is one example of metaphors using something concrete, like burning, to describe something abstract, like anger.
Metaphor 7, “my head is pounding”, also displays connecting the concrete to the abstract. The abstract in this case is implied by the meaning of the metaphor, rather than being stated in it. When your head is pounding, that means you have a headache and you are describing you pain in a concrete way. The pounding of something (like someone pounding on a door) is equivalent to what you feel is happening in you head. Pain is felt and its severity can’t be understood without the use of metaphors because pain is abstract.
It is the job of the metaphor to bridge the concrete and the abstract together for a clearer understanding of the world around us and the people in it.
I have been learning about metaphors for as long as I can remember, but ,as you also mentioned, I never realized how often they are used. They become so ingrained in our language that it's easy to over look them. I also find it interesting that a metaphor that is commonly used and understood in Ohio could have someone in Indiana scratching their head in confusion. I'm sure some are known across the US, but it also seems that many metaphors are regional. Very interesting read!