Hi there, a student asked me when we use the word feeling singular versus feelings plural.
Like in the sentence, I can certainly understand your feeling or feelings.
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Let's get started with today's lesson.
Well in that sentence, the most natural choice is feelings because we use the plural form
when it's a substitute for the word emotions.
Feelings refers to emotions in general and we usually use the word feeling singular when
we're talking about one specific feeling.
It's usually modified with an adjective like an amazing feeling, a terrible feeling, etc.
So let's look at some collocations with the words feeling and feelings.
Collocations are common combinations of words that are often used together and learning
them will help you speak English more easily and naturally.
I have two ways for you to learn collocations fast.
One is my e-book 1000 Collocations in 10 minutes a day which is great for intermediate
learners and the other one is my advanced vocabulary and collocations course which is
perfect for more experienced English learners.
Click on the links under this video for more information and free samples from both of
those products.
Alright, we'll start by looking at collocations with feelings.
You can say he finds it hard to express his feelings when you express your feelings that
means you talk about your emotions and you share them with other people.
Another very common expression is to say, she hurt my feelings.
If someone hurts your feelings it means that they made you sad or they made you upset,
that person made you experience negative emotions.
Another expression is mixed feelings.
You can say, I have mixed feelings about the situation.
This means you have some good emotions and some bad emotions.
It's mixed, it's not clear exactly how you feel.
Can you figure out what this collocation means?
He has strong feelings for her.
If one person has strong feelings for another person, that means he is in love with her.
So this implies strong romantic feelings when you have strong feelings for another person.
Now, if you have strong feelings about an issue, it doesn't mean you're in love with
the topic.
Some feelings about an issue simply means you have a strong opinion or maybe an emotional
opinion about this topic.
Many people have strong feelings about politics in the US.
One informal phrase with the word feelings is, no hard feelings.
This means there is no anger or resentment.
For example, I had a fight with my best friend, but afterwards we talked about calmly and
now there are no hard feelings.
There is no anger, no resentment, no negativity from the previous fight.
The opposite of expressing your feelings is to hide or mask your feelings.
This means you feel certain emotions, but you don't want to let other people know how
you're feeling.
You can even repress or suppress your emotions or feelings.
This means you try to stop feeling a certain way so that not even you experience these
emotions.
Those people refer to their innermost feelings, meaning the emotions that are deep inside
them, and usually private or personal.
Let's see what collocations we have with feeling singular.
As I mentioned, we usually use adjectives, so a positive emotion could be a good, a great,
a wonderful, and amazing or a terrific feeling.
A negative emotion could be a bad, a horrible, a terrible, or an awful feeling.
Now usually when we say, I've got a bad feeling about this.
It means you suspect that something bad is going to happen, or there's something bad
about the situation.
A similar expression is to have an uneasy feeling.
It means you feel a little uncomfortable because you're slightly worried or afraid something
bad might happen.
You could also say, I've got a good feeling about this, meaning the opposite.
You think something good will come out of it or there's something good about this situation.
Another collocation is a nagging feeling.
A nagging feeling is a feeling that won't leave you alone.
It just keeps coming back and coming back and you can't ignore it.
For example, after she left the house, she had a nagging feeling that she'd forgotten
something.
You can also have a gut feeling.
A gut feeling means a feeling that is deep inside your heart.
You can't really explain it logically, but you are strongly convinced that it's true.
For example, my gut feeling is that we can trust him.
One feeling that is very bad is when you have a sinking feeling.
A sinking feeling is when your emotions just start to go down and you start to get very upset,
very depressed or just feel very bad.
For example, he read the bad news with a sinking feeling.
It's usually this moment when you realize that something bad has happened or is going to
happen and your emotions, your feelings just go down.
That's a sinking feeling.
And finally, we have the expression, I have a feeling.
What on earth does this mean?
I have a feeling is another way to say, I suspect.
Let me give you an example to make it clearer.
Let's say you have a friend who never comes on time for anything.
He's always late, late to meetings, late to parties, late to events.
And let's say you plan to meet up with this friend and some other friends.
And when you arrive, all the other friends are there, but this particular friend is not.
You can say, I have a feeling he's going to be late.
This means I suspect he's going to be late.
Okay, so use the word feelings plural when talking about emotions in general and with
the collocations I taught you today.
And use the word feeling singular when talking about one specific emotion.
That's usually described by an adjective, a good feeling, bad feeling, a sinking feeling,
a nagging feeling, etc.
If you enjoyed this lesson and you want to keep going, you will learn a ton of collocations
in my 1000 collocations e-book and then my advanced vocabulary and collocations course,
both available at espressoenglish.net.
To remember collocations better, make sure to put them into practice.
So try writing some sentences with the expressions we covered today.
Thanks for watching and I'll talk to you next time.
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