hamster wheel
1
5.5
- noun
- /ˈhæmpstər wiːl/
- Informal
:
rueda de hámster
- Working overtime without a break can feel like being on a hamster wheel, where you put in effort but see no progress.
I was on this hamster wheel of creating weekly videos.
- I was on this hamster wheel of creating weekly videos.
- It's so nice to not have that hamster wheel in your head about that all the time.
- It's just been a hamster wheel of buying, selling, buying, selling, buying, selling.
- I don't aspire to things that are going to keep me on the hamster wheel of consumption.
- Sorry, my brain is like a hamster wheel right now.
- And if you're not doing that, you're just that rat on a hamster wheel.
- Now, you may not know how it's coming, and that's where the hamster wheel comes in, because we think we have to do it all ourselves.
- Otherwise I tend to end up in a sort of hamster wheel that I can't control and it feels like a cluttered mess.
- And I think when somebody like you gets a platform and speaks, it forces them to get out of that hamster wheel.
- We're all on a hamster wheel looking for love on Mars and going to the ends of the Earth when it's all right here.
- It feels like this hamster wheel that you're just always running on and you can never, ever stop because it changes so much day by day.
- Now we start, we start on the hamster wheel of, of, of, of, of, of pharma.
- And there's this certain like hamster wheel that I stay on because it's familiar.
- So they're straight into the, the whole kind of press and promotion hamster wheel is, is what it is.
- Facebook, Twitter, Vine, All these things are keeping us on this perpetual hamster wheel of Doo Doo Doo Doo Doo. The very few people stop
- They do they, they, they want an escape from that and, and often they don't know how to get themselves out of that hamster wheel mentality.
- Do you feel on some level that it all falls and some in some way to the fact that it's very lucrative to keep America on this hamster wheel?
Examples
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You're stuck on a hamster wheel.
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We're all on a hamster wheel looking for love on Mars and going to the ends of the Earth when it's all right here.
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It's just been a hamster wheel of buying, selling, buying, selling, buying, selling.
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It's so nice to not have that hamster wheel in your head about that all the time.
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I was on this hamster wheel of creating weekly videos.
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Of course, you might say we need a different technology, but that is just jumping on the hamster wheel again.
Blog text (32) -
If you try to balance everything, you are just sentenced to a lifetime ride on the hamster wheel.
Blog text (34) -
Otherwise I tend to end up in a sort of hamster wheel that I can't control and it feels like a cluttered mess.
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It feels like this hamster wheel that you're just always running on and you can never, ever stop because it changes so much day by day.
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Collectively, we are trapped in a hamster wheel running from one technological "panacea" to the next, foolishly thinking that "this time it will be different" when it never is.
Blog text (32)
Synonyms
43
5.5
A fixed routine that is hard to change
12
4.2
A boring repetitive situation that feels never-ending
4
4.1
A repeating cycle of events that seems pointless and has no end
A lot of activity or talk that makes no real progress
A situation where people keep moving or working but make no real progress
Antonyms
How Unproductive
Surface Forms
Morphology
The literal image of a hamster running in a wheel readily evokes continuous, repetitive motion without forward progress, so an intermediate-level learner who knows 'hamster' and 'wheel' can infer the general metaphor. However, mapping that image to the specific meaning of repetitive, unproductive work requires a metaphorical extension rather than simple compositional semantics, so the relation is not fully predictable without exposure.
Etymology
Hamster wheel comes from the picture of a small pet hamster running in a wheel and not getting anywhere. So, it means 'doing the same work again and again with no real progress'.