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Glite Dictionary
to roll up one's sleeves

to roll up one's sleeves

19 3.8
To get ready to do hard work
  • idiom
  • Informal
translation icon : arremangarse
  • It's such a great feeling to roll up my sleeves and make something.

Examples

  • She's not afraid to roll up her sleeves and get her hands dirty.

    Repo Chick (2009)

  • There are times to spectate and there are times to roll up one's sleeves and participate.

    Blog text (23)

  • Maybe I better roll up my sleeves then, huh?

    Sparkle (2012)

  • Well, here I was ready to roll up my sleeves, clean us some fish.

    Buried Alive (1990)

  • Well, the only thing we can do is roll up our sleeves and get back to work.

    WWJD II: The Woodcarver (2012)

  • You come home from work tired, but you roll up your sleeves to make dinner.

    Blog text (10)

  • So, let's just roll up our sleeves and get to work.

    Magic Camp (2020)

  • Solutions are brought about by rolling up our sleeves and working on things.

    Blog text (15)

  • Then she rolled up her sleeves and started scrubbing the deck.

    Fiction book (1999)

  • We're facing some tough challenges, so let's roll up our sleeves and start working.

Synonyms

to put one's shoulder to the wheel
vsto roll up one's sleeves
  • Informal
2 7.5

To start working very hard to reach a goal

prepares someone to tackle hard tasks rather than begin right away
to set shoulder to the wheel
vsto roll up one's sleeves
  • Informal
8.8

To begin working very hard and not give up on a difficult task

prepares someone to work hard rather than start immediately

Antonyms

to give up
∞ 1.2

To stop trying to do something or accept defeat

to relax
∞ 1.0

To feel less nervous and more calm

How Prepared

to get to work
  • Informal
231 2.0
to roll up one's sleeves
  • Informal
19 3.8
to prepare
∞ 1.0
to consider
∞ 1.1

Surface Forms

roll up one's sleeves infinitive
rolled up one's sleeves past
rolled up one's sleeves past participle
rolling up one's sleeves present participle
rolls up one's sleeves third person singular

Morphology

roll + up + one + sleeve

The meaning 'to prepare to work hard' is directly motivated by the literal action of rolling one's sleeves up to ready oneself for manual or focused effort; the components 'roll' + 'up' + 'sleeves' map transparently onto that image. This gesture-to-action metaphor is common across languages and follows standard compositional patterns, so a B1 learner who knows the constituent words will very likely infer the idiomatic meaning.

Etymology

Roll up one's sleeves comes from the simple move to roll up your sleeves on your arms so your hands are free to work and you can get a bit dirty. So, it means 'to prepare to work hard'.